An observationalmeasure for early childhood contexts. The measure is designed to capture theaffective valence of teacher-child interaction, with a particular focus on theextent to which teachers are positive, responsive, and engaged with children. Atrained observer visits a classroom and observes the lead and/or aide teacherinteracting as they normally would for approximately 1 hour. The observer thenrates the teacher on 25 to 30 items, which requires approximately 10-15 minutesto complete. Descriptive data provide information regarding the general tone ofteachers’ interactions with children. The measure has modest evidence ofinternal reliability for the posited sub-scales (Arnett, 1989), although morerecent work suggests that it might be best understood as a single scalereflecting overall positive interaction (Colwell, Gordon, Fujimoto, Kaestner,& Korenman, 2010).
Cowell, N., Gordon, R.A., Fujimoto, K., Kaestner, R., & Korenman, S. (2013). New evidence on the validityof the Arnett caregiver interaction scale: results from the early childhoodlongitudinal study-birth cohort. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 28, 218-233.
See Child Behavior Checklist (CBL), Child Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ), Early Childhood Rating Scale (ECRS), HOME inventory, Teacher Belief Scale