Børns perspektiver på sprogvurderinger i daginstitutioner.

The purpose of this study is two-fold. The study aims at collecting knowledge and experience on how child perspectives can be included in evaluations and studies, and to elucidate three-year-old children's experience of the language assessment situation. Specifically, various collection methods are tested such as video recordings, questionnaires and mini interviews with children in the study.

The study concludes that combining the linear logic of language assessment tests and the child's associative logic constitutes some challenges. Pedagogues balance between receptiveness and responsiveness towards the child's input and consideration of the validity and reliability of the test. The better prepared and more experienced the child carer appears, the more likely it is that the language assessment will be a positive experience for the child. The study finds that video footage of language assessment situations provides the most nuanced and valid data, and serves as the best tool for the study of children's experience and perspectives. The open questions in the questionnaires work the best because they enable the child to verbalise the situation it has just experienced. Generally, the children perceive questionnaire questions and the interviews as being abstract.

The data material consists of 20 video recordings of language assessments at six daycare centres in two municipalities. Moreover, responses to questionnaires about the language assessment situation by 18 children and 18 child carers are included, as well as 18 interviews with children who participated in follow-up language activities. The data has been analysed on the basis of Bales' Interaction Process Analysis (IPA) which focuses on verbal and bodily actions in task-related situations and on the socio-emotional nature of the situation.

Danmarks Evalueringsinstitut (2010). Børns perspektiver på sprogvurderinger i daginstitutioner. København: Danmarks Evalueringsinstitut.