Nursery World - Quality Assurance, Part 3: ECERS and ITERS assessment scales

Early years settings can apply researchers' scales to self-evaluate their own practice. Mary Evans outlines how the scales work.

The tools used by academic researchers in the renowned EPPE studies, which demonstrated how quality provision in the early years can transform young children's learning, are being applied by settings to improve their practice.

The ECERS, ITERS and FCCERS scales were designed by a research team in North Carolina, to evaluate the quality of pre-school provision. However, because the scales give a detailed picture of how the provision performs across a wide range of criteria, they can be used in a practical way by early years workers to reflect on practice and implement changes.

The scoring system highlights good practice and pinpoints the next steps in the areas where progress is needed. Obviously, to be an effective research tool the scales have to be robust and impartial. Some observers say they give a more accurate assessment of a setting than an Ofsted inspection report.

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