Supportive interactions between teachers and children
The most important indicator of quality is likely to be the nature of the interaction between teacher and child.  Indeed, how teachers relate to and interact with children appears to matter more than curriculum in early childhood education.  Teachers facilitate interactions among children to provide opportunities for development of self-esteem, social competence and intellectual growth.

Safe, supportive and engaging learning environments
Young children learn best in environments that are physically and emotionally safe.  High-quality programs recognize the role of play in children's learning and provide environments that encourage play as an important opportunity for children to learn through their own experimentation and exploration.  The health, safety and nutritional needs of participants are met to promote all phases of development.

Focus on the whole child
A program's approach should include a variety of areas of a child's learning and development, such as the eight factors identified by Head Start, which include: language development, literacy, mathematics, science, creative arts, approaches toward learning, physical health and development, and social and emotional development.

Meaningful learning for the individual child
High-quality programs provide learning experiences that are grounded in children's interests and that are developed around learning in several disciplines.  High-quality teaching reflects the knowledge that young children are active learners, drawing on direct physical and social experience as well as culturally transmitted knowledge to construct their understanding of the world around them.

A culture of authentic assessment and continuous learning
Young children learn and develop at different rates, and their learning cannot be defined by any single assessment.  High-quality programs pay attention to all aspects of children's development: physical, social, emotional and cognitive.  In addition, systematic assessment of the programs themselves helps ensure that the programs are continually improved.

Connections to families and community organizations
Strong connections to families stimulate a child's development.  They include parents' classroom participation, two-way communication with families and opportunities to incorporate ideas and languages from a child's home and culture into the school environment.