Low Motor Assessment: A Comparative Pilot Study with Young Children With and Without Motor Impairment

Accommodating the Bayley-III for motor and/or visual impairment: a comparative pilot study

PURPOSE

This study assessed the validity and usefulness of the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development, Third Edition (Bayley-III) Low Motor/Vision accommodated version. Accommodations are adaptations to minimize impairment bias, without altering what the test measures. Of the items, 66% have Low Motor accommodations like enlarged materials; 62% have Low Vision accommodations.

METHODS

Using a within-subject design, we tested 19 children with the accommodated and standard Bayley-III, in a randomly counterbalanced order. The children had motor and/or visual impairment and a chronological age between 22 and 90 months. The test administrators completed an evaluation form.

RESULTS

A subgroup of children benefited from the accommodations; 2 children obtained a large raw score difference. Test administrators considered the accommodations as practical, and advantageous for most children.

CONCLUSION

The Low Motor/Vision accommodated version seems to validly assess the development of this population. Future, larger-scale research should study whether the accommodations improve the construct validity of the Bayley-III.

Validity and suitability of the Bayley-III Low Motor/Vision version: a comparative study among young children with and without motor and/or visual impairments

The aim of the present study was to examine the validity of the Bayley-III Low Motor/Vision version, and its suitability for children with motor and/or visual impairment(s). This version contains accommodated items, that is, adaptations to minimize impairment bias, without altering what the test measures. We hypothesized that the accommodations would not affect the item scores of children without impairment, and that children with impairment(s) would benefit from the accommodations. We tested 41 children without impairment and 63 children with impairment with both the standard Bayley-III and the Low Motor/Vision versions, in randomly counterbalanced order. The test administrators filled in an evaluation form. Results showed that the accommodations did not affect the test scores of children without impairment and did improve the test scores of children with impairment on the Cognition scale, while no improvement was found for the other scales. The test administrators indicated that the vast majority of the children with impairment had been able to show their abilities on the test and that the accommodations were beneficial in 29 out of these 52 cases. For some children, the accommodated instrument appeared to be unsuitable because the impairment was too severe. The conclusion is that the accommodations improve the validity of the Bayley-III when used with children with mild to moderate motor and/or visual impairment, especially with regard to the Cognition scale.

A Review of Standardized Developmental Assessment Instruments for Young Children and Their Applicability for Children With Special Needs

This article provides a review of contemporary instruments for the developmental assessment of children aged 0–4 years and their applicability for children with special needs. The issues involved in the developmental assessment of children with special needs are discussed, and, on the basis of these issues, various instruments are then evaluated.

Method:A literature search was carried out for articles about or using standardized developmental assessment instruments for children aged 0–4 years.

Results:Eighteen instruments were found, of which 2 were nonverbal and 2 were designed for motor-impaired children. The instruments varied in terms of their suitability for children with special needs.

Conclusion:The range of instruments is limited, especially for children younger than 2 years of age. Instruments for children with motor or hearing/language impairments are available, but their psychometric properties need to be researched and improved. For children with a visual impairment, no appropriate instrument is currently available.