Screening Measures Used in Child Daycare Centers: A 15-Years Systematic Review

Childcare programs can be expensive for developing countries. To measure the efficiency of these interventions in early childhood cognitive outcomes, screening measures are proposed in this article. A systematic review was conducted to answer two questions: which are the empirical evidence available in the literature to support using psychological screening measures in child daycare centers; and if those measures can be adopted as cost-effective assessment policies for children’s cognition. A total of 109 articles were retrieved. After the exclusion criteria, 18 articles remained. Ten screening measures were detected in the literature. Among those ten, three instruments were used both in child daycare centers and as assessment policies. Psychometric properties and adequacy of these measures to childcare programs are considered. Using Brazil as an example, the present article also discusses the challenges of adopting evidence-based practices in childcare policies in developing countries.