A Snapshot of Early Childhood Development in Australia 2012

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List of tablesTable 2.1: AEDI results for physical health and wellbeing domain (2012) __________________________ 16Table 2.2: AEDI results for social competence domain (2012) __________________________________ 18Table 2.3: AEDI results for emotional maturity domain (2012) __________________________________ 20Table 2.4: AEDI results for language and cognitive skills (school-based) domain (2012) ______________ 22Table 2.5: AEDI results for communication skills and general knowledge domain (2012) ______________ 23Table 2.6: AEDI results vulnerable on one or more, or two or more domain/s (2012) _________________ 24Table 3.1: Proportion of children developmentally vulnerable by AEDI domain and state/territory,2009 and 2012 _______________________________________________________________________ 26Table 3.2: Proportion of children developmentally vulnerable, 2009 and 2012 ______________________ 27Table 4.1: Age by state/territory 2012 _____________________________________________________ 30Table 4.2: Indigenous and Language Background Other Than English (LBOTE*) children bystate/territory (2012) __________________________________________________________________ 31Table 4.3: Main languages other than English spoken by Indigenous children (2012)* _______________ 32Table 4.4: Main languages other than English spoken in the home (2012) _________________________ 32Table 4.5: Country of birth (2012) ________________________________________________________ 33Table 4.6: School transitions (2012) ______________________________________________________ 35Table 4.7: Additional or special needs of children (2012) ______________________________________ 35
Ministerial forewordThe Australian Government wants to ensure every Australian child gets the best possibleopportunity to succeed in life.We all play an important role in ensuring parents, early childhood educators, schools and thosewho have a role in helping a child to develop into an adult, have the resources they need.To do this, we are developing and using new sources of quality information about where children inneed are and what type of challenges they have.We are taking this approach from the earliest days of a childs life and right through their schooling,as we work to build an Australian school system that will better meet the needs of every student.As part of our drive to better target resources to where they are most needed the AustralianGovernment made an important investment with the first national implementation of the AustralianEarly Development Index (AEDI) in 2009.The AEDI examines early childhood development across the whole community, showing us howchildren in the local area have developed by the time they start school. Together with other sociodemographicand community information, the AEDI results are a powerful tool to help governmentsand communities understand what's working well and what needs to be improved or developed tobetter support children and their families.Australia is the first country in the world to have collected comprehensive and population baseddata on young children across the entire nation. This AEDI data is a vital tool for educators,governments and the community, as it helps us understand the importance of early interventionand provides information about the support children and families need.Following this success, the Australian Government has now committed to collecting this valuabledata every three years, representing a total commitment of $51.2 million over five years from2011-12 to 2015-16.A Snapshot of Early Childhood Development in Australia 2012 - AEDI National Report provides asummary of the results from the 2012 AEDI data collection. The 2012 AEDI collected data onalmost 290,000 children in their first year of formal full-time schooling, with almost 7,500government and non-government schools participating.The findings of the report are encouraging, showing the majority of Australian children are doingwell across each of the five domains measured by the AEDI: physical health and wellbeing, socialcompetence, emotional maturity, language and cognitive skills, and communication skills andgeneral knowledge.There is still more important work to be done and these results suggest we are heading in the rightdirection. The Australian Government is committed to working with all communities to address thedevelopmental vulnerabilities of children so they are given the very best start in life.While the AEDI national implementation is an Australian Government initiative, its success reflectsthe strong collaboration with state and territory governments. I would like to express my gratitudeto all the teachers and principals of the many schools across Australia who made the 2012 AEDIdata collection a success.
Page 5: Table of contentsForewords ________
Page 9 and 10: ForewordWe are very pleased to be w
Page 11 and 12: Executive summaryIn 2012 the Austra
Page 14 and 15: 1 IntroductionThere is clear eviden
Page 16: A Snapshot of Early Childhood Devel
Page 19 and 20: 26.0 per cent of Indigenous childre
Page 21 and 22: Information about children with spe
Page 23 and 24: 2.3 Social competence domainThis do
Page 25 and 26: 2.4 Emotional maturity domainThis d
Page 27 and 28: 2.5 Language and cognitive skills (
Page 29 and 30: Figure 2.6: Communication skills an
Page 32 and 33: 3 2009 & 2012 comparative resultsTh
Page 35 and 36: 4 Profile of Australias childrenThe
Page 37 and 38: Indigenous and Language Background
Page 39 and 40: Table 4.5: Country of birth (2012)C
Page 41: Questions asked of teachers about h
Page 45 and 46: AEDI scoreAn AEDI score will be cal

A Snapshot of Early Childhood Development in Australia 2012

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