The Anchor Items for the Measurement of Early Childhood Development (AIM-ECD) are tools designed to help countries assess and improve early childhood development. AIM-ECD includes two free tools: the Caregiver Report (CR) and the Child Direct Assessment (DA). These tools measure early literacy, early numeracy, executive functioning, and social-emotional development in children aged 4 to 6.
The AIM-ECD initiative is part of global efforts by the Early Learning Partnership to promote research and inform policy on early childhood education. Depending on specific objectives, AIM-ECD can be used alongside Teach ECE resources to study the impact of early childhood education quality on developmental outcomes.
The Direct Assessment involves an enumerator engaging in 14 activities directly with a child over approximately 20 to 25 minutes. The Caregiver Report measures development indirectly through a 10-minute interview with a caregiver.
AIM-ECD comes with various resources supporting its implementation. These include guidance on stakeholder engagement, tool translation and adaptation, enumerator training, data collection, analysis, and dissemination of results.
Developed from psychometric studies using data from Measure of Early Learning Quality & Outcomes (MELQO) in 12 low- and middle-income countries, AIM-ECD items have demonstrated robust psychometric properties across different contexts. Since its launch in 2021, these tools have been implemented in over ten countries.
The CR generates an overall developmental score based on caregiver responses. The DA assesses four domains—early numeracy, early literacy, executive functions, and social-emotional skills—through 14 subtasks.
The Caregiver Report is suitable for population-level studies or household surveys addressing broad questions about early childhood development outcomes. In contrast, the Direct Assessment is designed for detailed use in impact evaluations and studies linking child outcomes with early childhood education quality but can also be used for population monitoring.
While open access, AIM-ECD requires adherence to several protocols and training resources to ensure reliable scoring by enumerators. The implementation guide covers five stages: stakeholder engagement and planning; tool adaptation and translation; enumerator training; data collection; data analysis; and result dissemination.
For more information on using AIM-ECD in specific settings, contact the team.
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