Factors affecting variance in Classroom Assessment Scoring System scores: season, context, and classroom composition

Promoting the Quality of Teacher-Toddler Interactions: A Randomized Controlled Trial of “Thrive by Three” In-Service Professional Development in 187 Norwegian Toddler Classrooms

“…We also found that whereas the quality in classrooms in the intervention groups increased on most quality dimensions, the quality of the teacher-child interactions in the control classrooms decreased over the course of the intervention period, strengthening the conclusion that the improvement in the quality of caregiver-child interactions was due to the Thrive by Three intervention. A few studies have studied the variance in CLASS scores through the course of a typical childcare year ( Buell et al, 2017 ; Gandhi et al, 2020 ) in pre-kindergarten classrooms. Although the results are somewhat inconclusive, CLASS scores are typically found to be lower in fall than spring, contrary to what was found in the control group in the present study.…”

Factor Analysis of the Classroom Assessment Scoring System Replicates the Three Domain Structure and Reveals no Support for the Bifactor Model in German Preschools

“…Studies evaluating the reliability of the CLASS Pre-K reported that scores are moderately to highly stable throughout the morning ( Curby et al, 2010 ; von Suchodoletz et al, 2014 ; Stuck et al, 2016 ) but are not stable across seasons. For example, Buell et al (2017) reported that scores differed significantly between fall and spring over the course of 3 years. Given that our data is cross-sectional, and most of our observations were conducted during the spring months (109 times, 62%), followed by during the summer months (41 times, 23%), during the winter months (18 times, 10%), and during the fall months (9 times, 5%), our sample does not permit further investigation of the measurement invariance and latent mean differences for different times of year (e.g., using multiple group factor analysis).…”

The when and what of measuring ECE quality: Analysis of variation in the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS) across the ECE day

“…Exacerbating concerns about reliability and validity is the practice of modifying ECE quality assessment tools for application in policy and practice decisions (Buell, Han, & Vukelich, 2017;Mashburn, 2017;Setodji et al, 2018). Mashburn (2017), for example, examined the assumptions underpinning the use of CLASS in determining funding renewal for Head Start grantees.…”

“…Content and formats are not only determined by the educator, but also occur in response to children. In this way, the individual needs, abilities and interests of children within a class play a role in defining the work of the educator (Buell et al, 2017;Steinberg & Garrett, 2016;Whitehurst, Chingos, & Lindquist, 2014). Thus a growing body of work documents that both size and composition of a class group constrain the educator's possibility of attaining high assessment scores (Buell et al, 2017;Cohen & Goldhaber, 2016;Steinberg & Garrett, 2016;Whitehurst et al, 2014).…”