Competency Frameworks for Infant and Toddler Teachers and Caregivers in Oregon
Evidence | Publications

Competency Frameworks for Infant and Toddler Teachers and Caregivers in Oregon

OPRE report #2022-323
Published: Dec 30, 2022
Publisher: Washington, DC: Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Human Services Early Childhood Early Childhood Systems Professional Development Child Development Federal
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Associated Project

Infant and Toddler Teacher and Caregiver Competencies (ITTCC)

Time frame: 2017-2023

Prepared for:

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation

Clients
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Authors

Theodora Vorias

Andrea Mraz Esposito

Christopher Jones

Key Findings
  • The state reviews all trainings offered on the CKCs to ensure they meet the quality requirements of the state’s professional development registry. The state’s infant toddler specialists train and coach infant and toddler educators on the ZERO TO THREE Critical Competencies.
  • Oregon institutions of higher education have not designed courses around the CKCs, but many college courses meet the registry’s training and education criteria, which allows infant and toddler educators to count the courses as professional development within the registry.
  • The CKCs have been integrated into all facets of the early childhood system, including licensing decisions and requirements, a credential, the career lattice, and the quality rating and improvement system. The ZERO TO THREE Critical Competencies have not yet been fully integrated into the state’s early childhood system.
  • Infant and toddler educators are not currently required to demonstrate achievement of the competencies in the CKC framework or the ZERO TO THREE Critical Competencies. Completion of trainings or courses is based on attendance, rather than demonstration of learning. Only those early educators seeking to obtain the state’s Infant-Toddler Professional Credential must prepare a portfolio, including an observation and written statements, to describe their competence in 5 of the 10 CKCs related to the care and education of infants and toddlers.
  • The state plans to replace their CKC framework with the Professional Standards and Competencies for Early Childhood Educators from the National Association for the Education of Young Children to provide early educators with guidance on the specific attributes and skills, in addition to knowledge, needed for their practice.

To support the quality of care for infants and toddlers, many states have developed competency frameworks to outline specific competencies (that is, knowledge, skills, and attributes) that are essential to the practice of teaching and caring for infants and toddlers. The Infant and Toddler Teacher and Caregiver Competencies (ITTCC) project conducted in-depth case studies of five states to learn about the processes and practices that facilitate use of competency frameworks and how competencies in those frameworks are assessed.

This profile provides an overview of the two competency frameworks Oregon is using—the state-developed Core Knowledge Categories and Standards (CKCs) and (2) the ZERO TO THREE Critical Competencies for Infant-Toddler Educators—to help early educators across settings and program types obtain culturally responsive professional development to support high quality care and education for children from birth to age 8 and to provide specialized content for educators of infants and toddlers.

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