Preschool year and improved school attainment : study of Birth-to-Twenty cohort.
Date
2010-03-12T10:25:04Z
Authors
Luxomo, Viwe Gift
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Abstract
The demand for access to education for all children has in recent years become a focus
for many countries, including South Africa. In this context, preschool attendance has also
gained prominence, tagged conspicuously to attempts for improving the system’s internal
efficiency. There is, however, little empirically based work done in South Africa that has
made a case for quantifiable educational benefits of early childhood development (ECD).
This study has made use of the largest and longest longitudinal birth cohort study dataset
on the continent of Africa (Birth to Twenty), to measure statistically significant
correlations between attendance at preschool and grade repetition. Although preschool
attendance made a statistical significant point difference of 6.6%, in-depth analysis of the
data show that this difference is arguably too little for effecting systemic changes.
The study recommends that further research is required to identify those factors affecting
preschool effectiveness. It also recommends the need for strategies that can be used to
manage the transition from preschool to grade 1.