Qualitative study designs and methodological approaches

DEVEREUX EARLY CHILDHOOD ASSESSMENT (DECA) program

Devereux Early Childhood Assessment Tool and Qualitative Research

The Devereux Early Childhood Assessment Program (DECA) is a set of tools for teachers to assess their students' academic performance and social behaviors in order to catch any potential issues early on in order to address them as soon as possible. The program allows teachers to use assessment strategies in order to keep track of their students' progress in the most fundamental steps of development. Due to its very unique and tailored approach, this is a program which could easily facilitate qualitative research methodologies. The DECA program provides teachers with assessment questions and survey materials in order for each teacher to make cognitive recognition of potential patterns. The research shows how the program asks teachers questions "to assess for attachment (e.g., 'During the past 4 weeks, how often did the child do things for himself?'), self-control (e.g., 'During the past 4 weeks, how often did the child handle frustration well?'), initiative (e.g., 'During the past 4 weeks, how often did the child ask adults to play with or read to her?'), and behavioral concerns (e.g., 'During the past 4 weeks, how often did the child cooperate with others?)" (Child Savers, 2014). These questions are relatively open ended, which helps support the justification for using qualitative research methods for researching within the field of early education where DECA is present.

A logical study would focus on how well teachers can catch issues before or as they arise within children's behaviors and performance. Here, the research suggests that the DECA program aims to "promoting resilience and reducing the risk of young children developing social and emotional skills deficiencies" (Child Savers, 2014). Yet, that is a very abstract and unique concept, given the individual nature of each child. Thus, a study could use qualitative measures in order to gauge whether or not the program is being successful in helping teachers uncover potential issues.

One methodology that would work well in this scenario is the use of grounded theory. In grounded theory, research aims "to explore what's out there in the field and to generate a theory that is truly grounded in the data -- as opposed to one that is guided by previous research" (Research Center, 2014). This type of research would use the open ended questions inherent to the design of the DECA program to extrapolate data that will help generate conclusions about what strategies are most efficient for increasing resilience in children. The questions can be analyzed, with particular concepts being grouped together through the use of coding. Coding is essentially the mining of textual data in order to pull out frequent patterns and themes that can help lead to more substantial conclusions. Teachers would submit their open ended questions for review, with patterns being extrapolated based on the frequency of words and tones. These patterns can then be analyzed based on the perceived success of different strategies aimed at increasing resilience within the children.