EO Center Resource Alert

Division for Early Childhood (DEC)

Page 8 provides an overview of Standard 4: Assessment Processes that focuses on how early childhood special educators use strength-based, culturally relevant assessment processes to evaluate, plan, and monitor progress for young children. It emphasizes collaborating with families, pairing valid formal tools with authentic routine-based observations, and making data-informed intervention decisions. The following page includes practical vignettes across birth-to-three, preschool, and early elementary settings that demonstrate how to apply these competencies across real-world early intervention and classroom settings.

Early Childhood Personnel Center (ECPC)

This resource offers a series of e-learning lessons focused on authentic child assessment practices, emphasizing the importance of understanding children’s strengths, interests, participation, and learning in everyday activities. Through practice illustrations, performance checklists, and interactive activities, educators can explore strategies for conducting meaningful assessments and using observations to support children’s learning and development.

Early Childhood Personnel Center (ECPC)

These resources are aligned with DEC's EI/ECSE Professional Preparation Standard 4: Assessment Processes. It offers examples of readings, assignments, and authentic learning experiences that help learners apply evidence-based practices through reflection, guided practice, feedback, and real-world application in early childhood and early intervention settings.

Early Childhood Personnel Center (ECPC)

This case study follows a family’s journey from a childcare referral and intake through multidisciplinary evaluations, IFSP development, and specialist consultations. It highlights important considerations related to language barriers, cultural responsiveness, and interdisciplinary collaboration. Reflection questions and professional development resources are included to support educators in exploring ethical, strengths-based assessment practices and applying them to their work with families.

Early Childhood Personnel Center (ECPC)

This resource provides a collection of videos and multimedia examples that illustrate evidence-based assessment practices in early childhood and early intervention settings. Topics include authentic assessment, observation and documentation, hearing screenings, sharing information with families, and using assessment data to support children’s learning and development.

The field of early intervention offers a broad array of career opportunities including developmental specialists, service coordinators, physical therapists, occupational therapists, speech-language pathologists, infant mental health specialists, and more. Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) federal regulations requires states to have policies and procedures to ensure that qualified personnel are available to support the early intervention system for infants and toddlers with disabilities.

This resource includes a competencies framework and an assessment tool to measure a set of priority competencies in pre-service students who are preparing to work with infants and toddlers with special needs. These tools are designed for instructors and trainers teaching the pre-service infant/toddler workforce and could be used for practitioners to engage in self-reflection.

A unified vision outlining essential content knowledge and practical skills for entry-level early childhood educators in Michigan, detailing what they should know, understand, and demonstrate in their teaching practices. These standards capture the profile of a well-prepared beginning teacher, equipped to support and respond to the holistic needs of young children.

The first stand-alone standards to focus specifically on the preparation of EI/ECSE professionals who work with young children ages birth through eight years who have or are at-risk for developmental delays and disabilities and their families in homes, classrooms, and other community settings.

These standards support the growth and development of all children throughout the state, birth to kindergarten; to support early childhood professionals in recognizing individual developmental trajectories and expressions of learning, and to guide programs toward the highest quality in their operations.

This set of standards and competencies describe what early childhood educators should know and be able to do. As such, there is a core body of knowledge, skills, values, and dispositions that early childhood educators must demonstrate to effectively promote the development, learning, and well-being of all young children.

Encourage your students and recent graduates to explore job opportunities from employers across Michigan. Our job board features current openings in Special Education, Early Intervention, and Early Childhood fields—perfect for those seeking their first position or next career step.

(Note: If you’re an employer looking to post a job, please email the link to eotweb@edzone.net.)

The Central Directory includes a category specifically for Early Intervention Research in Michigan. Click the category to discover current projects, reports, and research focused on Michigan’s youngest learners.