Federal funding for this website ended in 2003, therefore few materials have been added since that time. Fortunately, there is continued interest in culturally and appropriate materials, curriculum, and programs. Because of this, we have allowed this site to remain as an archive. Please feel free to use this site, but recognize that it is no longer current.
The following Review Guidelines are intended to help service providers and individuals involved in personnel preparation determine the congruence between the beliefs, values, and practices of the individuals in your community and current recommended practices in early childhood/special education. The Review Guidelines will first help you consider the overall effectiveness of presentation of a material. Next, questions follow which pertain specifically to the content area of Child Guidance and Discipline.
It is important to realize that no material is likely to match the exact needs of individuals in your community. Therefore, in many instances, you may wish to make some simple adaptations to the materials before using them.
A separate set of Review Guidelines is available to help select materials that have been translated from one language to another. In addition, other suggestions for choosing materials are available on the CLAS Web site (http://clas.illinois.edu). It is our hope that you may use these Review Guidelines to engage in meaningful dialogue with families and colleagues in your community, as you decide which materials to use in your early childhood setting.
Effectiveness
of Presentation
Please respond to all that apply.
Clarity
- Is the purpose of the material clear?
- Is the presentation of the information easy to follow?
- If there are directions on how to use the material, are they clearly stated?
- Does the material include an effective explanation of technical terms or jargon?
- Does the language in the material acknowledge diversity (e.g., family structures, multi-generations, disabilities, gender, ethnicity, socio-economic status, religion, etc.)?
- Is the format (e.g., print, audio, video, etc.) appropriate for the intended users of this material?
- Are contact agencies or persons for accessing additional information or support easily identifiable?
Comprehension Level
- Easy = mainly simple sentences with minimal or no technical jargon;
- Average = a mix of simple and complex sentences with some technical jargon (e.g., USA Today);
- Difficult = mainly complex sentences with a lot of technical jargon or discipline-specific terms (e.g., College-level text or New York Times).
- For printed materials, the reading level of the material is:
Easy | Average | Difficult | N/A - For video and audio materials, the comprehension level of
the material is:
Easy | Average | Difficult | N/A
Graphics, Illustrations and Photos
Do the graphics:
- Represent a non-stereotypical view of cultural (e.g., contemporary dress) and linguistic groups?
- Represent a wide variety of groups (e.g., disabilities, gender, race, generation)?
- Enhance the materials (e.g., photo prints and designs are appropriate and of high quality)?
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Establishing a Healthy Relationship Between Providers and Families
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To what extent does the material …
- Emphasize the importance of providers and families establishing a comfortable relationship (e.g., understanding values and beliefs)?
- Encourage the provision of services in the families’ preferred language or through the assistance of a qualified translator/interpreter who can serve as a cultural mediator?
- Acknowledge the importance of employing service providers who respect and are knowledgeable about the cultures and languages of the families served?
- Encourage providers to engage in self-reflection regarding their role, assumptions, and beliefs and how they may be perceived by the family (e.g. supportive, interfering, guiding, intrusive)?
- Offer strategies to address conflict or misunderstanding that may arise between suggested child guidance and discipline interventions and families’ preferences?
- Acknowledge the importance of developing a climate of mutual respect and trust by responding to family concerns as they arise (e.g., answering questions, providing resources, changing the intervention program)
- Encourage communication among individuals (e.g., families, providers) regarding differing views of child guidance and discipline strategies?
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Assessment Considerations
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To what extent does the material …
- Encourage an assessment of cultural variation and language proficiency of the child and family? Providers should use this information to determine acceptable child guidance and discipline practices.
- Encourage providers to determine causes for or functions of problem behavior that may be an alternative means of communication due to language difficulties, cultural or class differences, or developmental variation?
- Provide for a functional analysis of the problem behavior? This includes an assessment of (1) the function the behavior serves for the child and (2) the environmental or biological events that precede and follow the target behavior.
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Intervention Strategies |
To what extent…
- Does the material assist families and providers in determining which child behaviors require intervention?
- Does the material emphasize the importance of ongoing family participation in the development of child guidance and discipline strategies?
- Does the material acknowledge that multiple members of the family, school, and community (e.g., parents, siblings, grandparents, extended family, teachers, assistants) may be involved in implementing the child guidance and discipline strategies?
- Does the material emphasize ways to come to agreement on appropriate strategies that are acceptable to all implementors, especially to the primary care provider?
- Are the directions for implementing the child guidance and discipline strategies clear for families and providers?
- Does the material encourage providers and family members to focus on the function (effect or impact) of the behavior exhibited by the child (e.g., does it function to access attention or to escape/avoid an unpleasant task?)?
- Are the terms used to describe the approach technically accurate (e.g., modeling, re-directing, time-out, ignoring, reinforcement) and understandable to all providers and family members?
- Does the material offer several alternative strategies for responding to problem behavior, beginning with the least intrusive (prevention) and then moving to gradually more intrusive (e.g., re-direction or reinforcing appropriate behavior, extinction/ignoring, time-out, and response cost)?
- Does the approach to child guidance and discipline take into account the environment in which the family lives (e.g., living space, safety considera-tions) and in which the child guidance and discipline strategies will be delivered (e.g., home, school, community)? Strategies should be environmentally sensitive and may vary according to setting.
- Are rationales provided for all strategies described in the material as well as examples of how and when alternative strategies might be selected?
- Does the material provide alternatives to physical or other adversive punishment?
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Model Effectiveness
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To what extent does the material …
- Identify potential short-term outcomes for both the caregiver and/or the child?
- Identify potential long-term outcomes for both the caregiver and/or the child?
- Specify the cultural and linguistic groups with whom the approach has been used?
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Evaluating Impact and Appropriateness of Intervention and Services |
To what extent does the material …
- Encourage providers to systematically evaluate the appropriateness of the interventions with families based on their changing needs and preferences?
- Suggest ways of ensuring that outcomes are important and meaningful to the families as well as the service providers?
- Include a variety of options for gathering information from families (e.g., interviews, observations, checklists, etc.) that respect families’ cultural and linguistic background and considers families’ level of acculturation?
| The following two questions are intended to deepen the analysis of the ways materials address issues of diversity. In some cases, these issues may have been addressed in the preceding questions. |
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Does the material acknowledge and address complex and sometimes subtle aspects of diversity as they relate to child guidance and discipline, such as: |
- Power (refers to the division of members of society into levels with unequal access to resources, knowledge, and authority)
- Racism (refers to systems advantage based on race)
- Prejudice (refers to an adverse judgment or opinion based on preconceived beliefs and ideas about different groups)
- Socio-Economic Class (refers to the division of society into levels with unequal wealth and prestige)
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Are there any spoken or unspoken assumptions, values, or beliefs in this material that could conflict with the delivery of culturally and linguistically appropriate services (e.g., assuming all parents view themselves as advocates or equal partners)?
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University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign