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Two new school-age child care resources are now available to assist providers. Both resources were developed and published by well-recognized experts in the school-age child care field and add substantially to the tools available to the neglected member of the child care family, who gets less attention than programs for younger children.

The School-Age Care Environment Rating Scale by Thelma Harms, Ellen Vineberg Jacobs, and Donna Romano White represents the conclusion of a series of program evaluation tools developed by the Frank Porter Graham Child Development team. This scale joins previous ones designed for infant and toddler, preschool, and family day care settings to offer valuable tools for all early childhood programs, as well as researchers delving into quality issues.

The scales are observation-based and focus the observer's attention on 36 important dimensions of quality like indoor space, space for gross motor activities, space for privacy, room arrangement, furnishing for routine ...