Combining standard-based assessment with a participatory-reflective approach. A collaborative research in the italian ECEC services

Abstract

The growing attention to ECEC quality has led to the development of several standardbased measures to assess it. However, the
objective and decontextualized character that distinguishes many of these tools appears distant from – and even in contrast with – the Italian EC educational culture, which favours a negotiated, participatory and reflective assessment. This paper presents
a Collaborative Research that involved Italian ECEC practitioners in a critical discussion on the CLASS tool. The results highlight how
these two perspectives on evaluation can be constructively combined.