The Early Years Assessment and Learning Tool (EYALT) is an online resource co-designed with early childhood teachers to help understand each child’s unique strengths, interests and abilities. It’s a valuable tool for all early childhood professionals, both new and experienced.
More than 1,000 kindergarten services across Victoria are using EYALT as part of their planning and assessment practice, including Isabel Henderson Kindergarten in Melbourne’s inner north.
Staff at the 110-year-old kindergarten have been experimenting with the tool since they took part in the rollout at the beginning of 2023 and have used it in different ways.
Director Anna Tib said they were eager to try an innovative way of assessment.
‘The EYALT is great at ensuring we are assessing children across all developmental areas.’
Finding an area of focus
Educational leader Lisa Layton said the team found the data from the Group Report to be invaluable. They use the results to group children for focused group work and peer-to-peer learning opportunities.
‘The results from Learning Reports and progress markers in the Profile Reports have been the source of reflective conversations amongst educators and have generated rich conversations around children’s development and learning objectives,’ she said.
Sparking conversations
Lisa believes the biggest benefit for her team has been the deep pedagogical conversations and reflections the EYALT has sparked.
‘The information gained from the tool has supported staff with different levels of knowledge and training to come together and assess programs and strategies critically,’ she said.
‘This leads to rich, well-balanced learning opportunities for children and builds confidence in teaching practices for educators.’
Taking the time to learn
Lisa said it took time to learn how to use the tool efficiently but found the more they used it, the more proficient they became.
‘We worked out the most valuable way to use the tool for our kindergarten; for example, we do not assess all children in all learning areas because this would be too time-consuming and unnecessary.’
Anna said her advice to other services was to enlist a small group to work together and experiment with the different areas and commit to using EYALT for the 2 assessment cycles.
‘This will allow the team to get a feel for how it works and how the results can be used practically to assist programming,’ she said.
‘It takes time, but results can be used to gain time in other areas, for example setting group and individual objectives, planning for meetings with families, pre-school field officers or allied health professionals, summative reports and Transition Learning and Development Statements.’
Find out more
For more information, visit the Early Years Assessment and Learning Tool web page.
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