Validity reliability study of flexible thinking in early childhood scale

This study was conducted to make the validity and reliability of the Flexible Thinking in Early Childhood Scale for 60-96 months old children. The universe of the study, which is a survey study, was composed of the parents of 60-72 months old children attending official independent kindergartens affiliated to the Ministry of National Education or kindergartens affiliated to the primary school and 73-96 months old children attending the first or second grade of primary school in the 2020-2021 academic year. The study group of this research was composed of the parents of 573 children selected with the convenience sampling method. In the collection of research data, "Flexible Thinking in Early Childhood Scale" and "Personal Information Form" developed by the researcher were used. Validity, reliability and measurement invariance studies have been carried out by using the data obtained with the "Flexible Thinking in Early Childhood Scale". Item analysis, content validity index, exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were performed to evaluate validity. Accordingly, some items deemed unsuitable were removed. Some items have been edited. Reliability indices were calculated with Mcdonald ω, Heise and Bohrnstedt's Ω, Cronbach alpha and test-retest method. As a result of the research, it has been accepted that the "Flexible Thinking in Early Childhood Scale" is valid, reliable, and it provides measurement invariance according to gender.