Dale Walker, PhD
Juniper Gardens Children’s Project
University of Kansas
Current IGDI Development Team:
Charles Greenwood, Judith Carta, Dale Walker,
Jay Buzhardt, Susan Higgins, Barbara Terry
Statistical support: Waylon Howard, Luke
McCune, Todd Little, & Rawni Anderson
Original IGDI Development Team:
Judith Carta, Charles Greenwood, Dale Walker,
Jane Atwater, Gayle Luze, Deborah Linebarger,
Carol Leitschuh, Ken Parsley, Annessa Staab, Gabe
Cline, and Susan Higgins
 Provide background on Individual Growth and
Development Indicators (IGDIs)
 Describe the Early Communication Indicator
(ECI)
 Administration and Scoring
 Describe a web-based approach for using the
ECI for guiding intervention decisions
Increased expectations of accountability for child outcomes
We often do not know when interventions are making a
difference or closing the gap
 Programs and staff need to know when they are moving
children toward desired outcomes
 To identify children who may benefit from intervention, or
a change in intervention to make progress
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 In a tiered model, to decide when to change to more intensive
or individualized intervention
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Early interventionists need to know how children are
responding to interventions
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Reflect progress toward a socially valid general outcome
Strategic (a leading indicator) not comprehensive
measurement
Brief and quick to administer in variety of settings
Repeatable, reflect rate of growth and slope over time
Chart an individual’s progress
Trend line compares expected vs. actual rates of
performance
Benchmarks help decide when a child is or is not
progressing or responding to intervention
 Measures of child performance on key skill
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indicators of an important socially valued
general outcome
Designed for early interventionists to
administer in variety of settings
Sensitive to short-term growth
Provide information that guides intervention
Website Reports accessible to early
interventionists and parents
Quickly conveys a
meaningful piece
of information about
health status
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The most well known
IGDIs are Pediatric
Growth Charts
Widely used by pediatricians and
parents
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How can we learn more
quickly that a child is falling
behind in development?
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How can we use that
information to guide what
we do in intervention or
programs?
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How do we know if what we
are doing is improving a
child’s trajectory?
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Each IGDI measures growth in different area for
infants and toddlers between 6 – 36 months:
 Early Communication Indicator (ECI)
 Early Movement Indicator (EMI)
 Early Social Indicator (ESI)
 Early Problem-Solving Indicator (EPSI)
 Indicator of Parent Child Interaction (EPCI)
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Online training & certification
Administration Procedures
Toy-play setting with familiar adult as play
partner
 6-minute testing sessions
 Play partner’s role is to facilitate play and
follow child’s lead
 Set-up/clean-up/put away
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Alternate Toy Forms Barn and House
Observational Recording Procedures
Toy Form A: House
Toy Form B: Barn
 Familiar adult plays with child in
manner that encourages interaction
 Child may be in chair with tray, at
table, or floor
 Toys within reach of child
 Play partner can have eye contact
 Play partner knows administration
protocol
 May score session with second
observer or videotape to score
 ECI can be administered with children who are
English Language Learners or with special needs
 Play partner and coder need to be able to
understand the child’s language
 Suggestions are available for adapting materials for
children with special
needs
 Data form allows for
notation that child is ELL
or has an IFSP
Gestures are physical movements made by the
child to communicate with the play partner
(taking, giving, pushing away)
 Vocalizations are non-word verbal utterance
voiced by the child to the play partner (babbling)
 Single Words are single words voiced by the
child and understood by the coder
 Multiple Words are a combination of two or
more different words
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Enter Data
•
Is it reliable?
 Trained observers agree on what communication they
record. (90% overall) (2011 study: r =.96)
 Alternate Forms: .72
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Is it valid?
 ECI indicators correlate with standardized and parent
report measures. (PLS .75 Receptive; .62 -.72 Expressive;
CCM Parent Rating .51)
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Is it predictive?
 ECI indicators correlate with preschool IGDI Preschool
Picture Naming; .65. Larger study in progress to
investigate predictive link from 36 – 60 months.
 Were patterns of ECI growth influenced by gender, IFSP
status or home language environment?
 Samples of more than 5,800 infants and toddlers across
two states show change over time and sensitivity to
individual differences
 Growth not conditional on Gender or Home Language
 Conditional on IFSP Status (later onset, smaller
slopes, less acceleration and lower means)
 Sensitive to changes from intervention in a series of
intervention studies
Greenwood, C. R., Walker, D., & Buzhardt, J. (2010). The Early Communication Indicator (ECI) for
infants and toddlers: Early Head Start growth norms from two states. Journal of Early
Intervention, 32(5), 310-334.
30
Weighted Communication Rate
Lower Strategy Use
Higher Strategy Use
23
15
8
0
10
18
27
Child Age in Months
35
43
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Monitoring growth over time of individual or
groups of children
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Identifying children who are not progressing at
expected benchmark levels on ECI
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Assisting in intervention planning process and
adjusting intervention based on the child’s
progress or response to intervention (RTI)
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Monitoring progress before, during and after
intervention implementation
Publicly accessible material
 IGDI descriptions
 Materials needed for IGDI
 implementation
 Scoring definitions
 Scoring sheets
 Administration checklists
 Toys for administration
 Psychometric properties
 Training and certification resources
 Intervention materials
 Contact information
Online data system
(password-protected)
Data management
Web-based certification
Assessor management
Child rosters and
demographics
 Program-wide aggregated
reports
 Data-based intervention
decision making tools
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 Progress monitoring graphs
 Making Online Decisions
(MOD)
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Base level support…
Child Progress Monitoring Graphs
 Weighted Total Communication
 Key Skill Elements
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Program Reports
 List all children falling below benchmark
 List children due for an assessment
 Aggregated graphs of IGDI performance
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Individual Child Reports
Individual Child Report
Child’s Data Table
Child’s Data
Summary
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Continue administering IGDI on more frequent schedule
Are Key Skill Elements and Total rates moving toward
benchmark?
Is the slope of progress increasing?
Is there evidence that intervention impacts behavior?
If progress not at expected rate, examine intervention
and make necessary changes
Sometimes assistance with decision-making is needed…
The MOD is a web-based tool informed by the ECI that assists
with making individualization easier and effective
1. Automates identification of children performing below
(1SD) benchmark on the ECI
2. Helps problem solve with ECI user possible reasons as to
why the child might be low on the ECI
3. Recommends evidence-based strategies informed by the
child’s ongoing ECI performance
4. Provides a way to document fidelity of intervention
delivery
5. Provides reports on child’s response to the intervention
strategies; and recommends what to do next
Five Early Head Start programs participated
 659 children; 124 eligible (1 SD below benchmark)
Primary Research Questions
 How does the MOD affect child outcomes?
 How does the MOD affect home visitors’ work with parents
regarding their use of language promoting strategies?
 What are home visitors’ perception of the MOD?
Buzhardt, J., Greenwood, C., Walker, D., Anderson, R., Howard, W., Carta, J. (2011). Effects of web-based
support on Early Head Start home visitors’ use of evidence-based intervention decision making
and growth in children’s expressive communication. NHSA Dialog: A Research-to-Practice Journal for
the Early Childhood Field, 14, 3, 121-146.
Two Piece Level 2 Analysis:
ECI Slopes of MOD vs. NonMOD Children
Total Communication
MOD Slope = 1.72
nonMOD Slope = 1.05
0
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Months from Eligibility
8
9
10
11
12
Recommended Strategies and Routines
From the MOD recommendations the interventionist
selects strategies and routines based on child and adults
 Recommended strategies are indexed to evidence-based
communication intervention strategies:
 Language Intervention Tool Kit (Crowe, 2002)
 Promoting Communications Strategies Manual (Walker, et
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al., 2004)
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Interventionist prints strategies to review with caregiver(s)
Caregiver fills in checklist documenting intervention
Data reviewed in system/by interventionist until child
shows expected progress or growth, then return to less
frequent progress monitoring
IGDIs (ECI) are psychometrically sound
measurement for identifying children who may
most likely benefit from a change in intervention
 Designed for monitoring individual children’s
progress and groups of children to inform the
need to continue or change intervention
 IGDIs part of a longitudinal set of progress
monitoring assessments spanning 6 months – 8
years ( IGDIs for infants, preschoolers, and
DIBELS)
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Please contact Dr. Dale Walker: [email protected]
IGDIs Infants and toddlers: www.igdi.ku.edu
We gratefully acknowledge the support from SRS/EHS of
Kansas, USDE Office of Special Education
Programs, HHS/ACF, the KIDDRC University of
Kansas, Institute for Education Sciences (IES) and
participating families
and early childhood personnel
and programs
for making this work
possible.