Beliefs About Infant Toddler Practices (BAITEC): Validating a Tool for Formative Assessment of Professionals and Quality Evaluation

Abstract

Approximately two-thirds of US birth-to-age-three-year-olds attend Infant Toddler Care and Education (ITCE) full- or part-time, making it the fastest growing segment of childcare. Despite widespread understanding of the importance of the first three years to lifetime learning and development trajectories, and recognition of the need for quality ITCE for families in the workforce and the US economy, ITCE remains underresearched. Too little is known about what qualifications and characteristics, pedagogical beliefs, and needs and motivations of ITCE professionals related to ensuring quality for children and families. Needed too, are valid and reliable tools to assess these attributes for use in pre- and in-service professional development of ITCE program administration and staff. Thus, the researchers developed and tested reliability and validity of a self-report survey – the Beliefs About Infant Toddler Education and Care (BAITEC). BAITEC items reflect NAEYC’s developmentally appropriate practice (DAP) principles for birth-to-age-three along with other widely adopted DAP-inspired guidelines for ITCE practice from major professional organizations including WestEd PITC, RIE, and ZERO TO THREE. Existing beliefs/practices instruments were used as models of survey language and structure. Reliability (internal consistency), and face, content, construct, and criterion related validity were tested using descriptive statistics, factor analyses, and hierarchical multiple regression. BAITEC was found to be a reliable and valid measure of ITCE teachers’ beliefs and education level moderated the relationship between beliefs and self-reported practices. Implications are identified for use in pre-and-in-service professional development.