School-Age Care Environment Rating Scale

Rating:
Summary: A thorough tool for center/self examination...
Review: I was fortunate enough to receive classroom training in using this manual. (As well as the others in the series.) But over the years I've found it to be a great tool in monitoring overall classroom quality. It is broken down into very specific sections and the scoring system is easy to follow, with specific defintions/descriptions for item. It encompasses a "wholistic" approach to evaluation. It not only takes into account room arrangement, health & safety, and curriculum, but staff and child interractions, peer interractions, and day to day activities (transition time, meals) as well. It is a wonderful tool to use when you want to evaluate the quality of your school age program. And the great thing is, it can be used over and over again as a way of seeing how much improvement has been made.
This is the criteria that the Mentor-Teacher program in my area uses when they award accredidation to a person who wants to be a mentor teacher. They go step by step, page by page, when evaluating a potential candidate (or for re-accredidation). So if you are thinking of pursuing a mentoring position, or just want to improve the overall quality of your classroom, this is the book for you.