Cognitive Assessment of Young Children (CAYC)

The Cognitive Assessment of Young Children (CAYC) is a newly developed easy-to-administer screening and assessment tool used to identify children with developmental delays. It is based on the same reliable, successful, theoretical model as the DASI (Developmental Activities Screening Inventory) and DASI-II. This test was normed on 743 demographically representative children, residing in 16 different states.
The CAYC serves four main purposes:
1. Early Identification of Developmental Delay to facilitates early intervention.
2. Determination of Strengths and Weaknesses contributes valuable information to the total diagnostic effort.
3. Documentation of Progress provides clinicians, early childhood educators, teachers, diagnosticians, and psychologists a base from which to monitor change. Conclusions can then be made on whether to continue, modify, or terminate the intervention program.
4. Research Data can be collected from the reliable and valid results.
The CAYC consists of 107 structured play-based items in six age-related levels. Each level consists of developmental and mega-cognitive tasks,
including, but not limited to the following:
(a) fine motor coordination and planning
(b) interactive communication and play
(c) memory
(d) reasoning
(e) perceptual development
(f) processing
(g) classification and organizational skills
(h) concept development
(i) practical knowledge
(j) components of early learning skills
Items increase sequentially in difficulty. The child being tested must have sufficient hearing, vision, and movement skills to understand and respond to test items.