Tier 1 Instructional Strategies To Improve K-4 Reading Comprehension
Category: Student Learning
Instrument Overview
Expert Notes AvailableView expert commentary on strengths and cautions for this instrument
Strengths
Performance-based and structured as a sequence of prediction–observation–prediction tasks, allowing it to capture children’s scientific reasoning processes and how they revise their thinking based on evidence.
Cautions
Uses a relatively small number of items per task, which may limit reliability and the ability to capture the full range of children’s scientific understanding and variability in performance.
The Preschool Assessment of Science (PAS) is a performance-based assessment designed to measure preschool children’s science knowledge and inquiry skills through hands-on tasks. The instrument focuses on children’s ability to engage in a cycle of scientific reasoning, including making predictions, observing outcomes, and revising predictions based on evidence.
The assessment consists of structured tasks centered on physical science phenomena, such as floating and sinking and changes in water level. Within each task, children are guided through a sequence of related prompts that require them to make an initial prediction, observe and describe the outcome of an event, and then make a second prediction in a similar context.
Children interact directly with materials and are asked to explain or demonstrate their thinking. Responses are scored across the sequence of items, and scores within each task are combined to represent overall performance.
The instrument is designed to examine how young children use observation, prediction, and evidence to support their understanding of scientific phenomena.
Organization
Topic
Collection Category(ies)
Content
Grades
Pre-Kindergarten
Languages
English,
Spanish
Respondent
Student
Administration Information
Length
2 tasks
Access and Use
Developer
Jess Gropen; Janna Kook
Price
No fee
Contact
jgropen@edc.org; jkook@edc.org
Open Access
No
Psychometrics (additional guidance)
Psychometric References
Gropen, J., Kook, J. F., Hoisington, C., & Clark-Chiarelli, N. (2017). Foundations of science literacy: Efficacy of a preschool professional development program in science on classroom instruction, teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge, and children’s observations and predictions. Early Education and Development, 28(5), 607-631.
Item Type
Multiple choice
Open response
Populations of Validation
The study sample consisted of 142 preschool teachers and 1,004 four-year-old children drawn from a mix of Head Start, public school, and community-based preschool programs in New York State, with children's mothers ranging in education from less than a high school degree (roughly 12–22% across cohorts) to a bachelor's degree or above (roughly 27%), and children assessed in either English or Spanish.
