Abstract:

The goal of this study is the presentation of the initial procedures regarding the adaptation of the ECERS-E (Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Extension) into the Greek language. The scale was selected as a widely accepted instrument in order to be used in the evaluation of the Greek Early Childhood Education (ECE). In the current study the back translation procedure and some preliminary construct validity results will be presented. Detailed and more advanced statistical methods regarding the assessment of the reliability and validity of the scale will be implemented in later stages of the project. The “Thales-EarlyQ” project “Evaluation of the ECE quality” is an innovative attempt to evaluate for the first time the provision of the quality in the Greek ECE settings. The ECERS-E is one of the instruments selected for this procedure and assesses the curriculum of ECE in the areas of Literary, Mathematics, Science/Environment, Diversity (Sylva et al., 2011). The items of the scale evaluate the provided curriculum quality in the above domains aiming at fostering academic development (Summons et al., 2002).

The first step of an instrument adaptation in a different language includes a back translation of the items. First the items of the ECERS-E are translated into Greek language by the authors. Then a bilingual scholar, who is also a member of the research team, translated back the items into English. The authors and the scholar compared the original and back-translated scales and corrected the identified discrepancies.
Afterwards, in order to proceed with the construct validity of the scale the items were presented to experts of the field (a) to confirm that they “make sense” (face validity), and (b) to examine thoroughly the scale items and to determine whether they fully captured the aspects of the construct (content validity). The examination of the experts’ answers revealed a complete agreement among the experts that all the items of the ECERS-E referred to the evaluation of the curriculum and environment for children 3-5.

Based on the above mentioned it can be argued that the current study results regarding the preliminary procedures for the assessment of construct validity of the scale were encouraging. The initial outcomes were positive towards the adaptation procedure of the ECERS-E in the Greek educational settings. Yet, the more sophisticated statistical methods that will be implemented further in the following stages of the project will offer a more concrete ground in order to be drawn firm conclusions.

*This study was supported by a grant from the European Union (European Social Fund) and national resources under the operational program “Education and Lifelong Learning”

Keywords:

Early childhood evaluation, construct validity, ECERS-E.