Reaching the marginalized: EFA global monitoring report, 2010; 2010

010CHAPTER 22Education for All Global Monitoring ReportFigure 2.4: Wealth-based gaps in learning begin early and widen over timeTest scores across ages for the poorest and the fourth deciles in Ecuador, 2003–2004Standardized test scores110100908070605036 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64 66 68 703-year-olds 4-year-olds 5-year-oldsAge in months4th decile1st (poorest) decileNotes: The test scores used are from the Test de Vocabulario en Imágenes Peabody, the Spanish versionof the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test. The figure presented here, a smoothed version of the original figure(which appears in the source document), has also been reproduced elsewhere (e.g. Fiszbein et al., 2009,and World Bank, 2006j).Source: Paxson and Schady (2005b).significant increases in four key cognitive scores,including pre-reading, pre-writing, literacy skillsand vocabulary. While Head Start children scoredbelow average for all children, reflecting racialand social background factors, the programmehalved the achievement gap that would have beenexpected in its absence (US Department of Healthand Human Services, 2005). 2While these findings relate to developed countries,there is also evidence from developing countriesthat effective early childhood care and educationcan both raise learning achievements and narrowdisparities. That evidence was extensively reviewedin the EFA Global Monitoring Report 2007. Whilethe precise channels of influence are a subjectof debate, good-quality early childhood provisionclearly has the potential to weaken the influenceof parental factors on later education achievement.Pre-primary education —slow and unequal expansion‘Pre-primary’ is an umbrella term covering awide range of providers and programmes, mostlyfor children aged 3 and above. Countries differenormously in the mix of public and privateprovision, and in financing arrangements andgovernance. As in other areas of education, data oncoverage say little about quality, but high-qualityprogrammes tend to start early, be based incentres, have a critical mass of trained teachersand involve parents (UNICEF, 2008b).Participation in pre-primary education has beensteadily increasing. Some 140 million children wereenrolled in pre-school programmes worldwidein 2007, up from 113 million in 1999. The grossenrolment ratio (GER) climbed from 33% to 41%over the same period (Table 2.1). Increases havebeen most pronounced in sub-Saharan Africa, andSouth and West Asia, albeit from a low base. Onein seven children in sub-Saharan Africa is enrolledin an early childhood programme, compared wihone in three for all developing countries.2. In 2005-2006, 24% ofchildren from the poorest20% of United Stateshouseholds were incentre-based Head Startprogrammes, comparedwith 1% of children fromthe wealthiest 20%.Evaluations of earlier pilotchildcare programmes –such as the NorthCarolina AbecedarianProject and PerryPreschool Program –have also recorded widerangingbenefitsassociated with preschool,extending fromprimary education tocollege attendance,employment, wages andcrime reduction(Campbell et al., 2008;Karoly et al., 2005;UNESCO, 2008a;Schweinhart et al., 2005).Observed effects werestrongest for poorchildren and childrenwhose parents had littleeducation.Attending the French pre-primary educationsystem (école maternelle) increases classretention of low-income and immigrant childrenin primary school by 9% to 17%, with widerreported benefits for literacy and numeracy(Nusche, 2009).Early childhood care can help overcomelanguage-based disadvantage and the problemsfaced by children of migrants (Cunha et al., 2005).In the Netherlands, children of Turkish andMoroccan immigrants who spent two years inkindergarten halved the average test score gapfrom the national average (Leseman, 2002).In New Zealand, 12-year-olds who had participatedin high-quality early education performedbetter in reading and mathematics, aftercontrolling for household income (UNICEF, 2008b).Looking beyond the regional data reveals a diversearray of country experiences. Among the countriesfor which data are available, seventeen states insub-Saharan Africa have coverage rates of lessthan 10%. In the Arab States, levels of pre-primarycoverage are far lower than average income mightseem to indicate: out of nineteen countries withdata for 2007, fourteen have GERs below 50%. Egyptand Saudi Arabia have lower levels of coverage thansome far poorer countries, including Nepal and theUnited Republic of Tanzania. Indeed, sub-SaharanAfrica has increased pre-primary enrolment atthree times the rate of the Arab States, with GERsrising by more than 20% since 1999 in severalcountries, including Burundi, Liberia and Senegal(Annex, Statistical Table 3A). The Arab States regionalso remains the only one with significant genderdisparity at early childhood level: just nine girls areenrolled for every ten boys.50