67807 rev from EVIDENCE to POLICY Learning what works, from the Human Development Network April 2013 Is Preschool Good for Kids? How can we help kids reach their full potential? Experts At the World Bank, we are committed to working with know that the first years of life are crucial to healthy de- governments to help them meet the United Nations Mil- velopment. And that’s just the start. Children need regular lennium Development Goals, including universal primary mental and physical school education. We also recognize that getting kids to stimulation—along school is just a start—they need to be prepared physically, with healthcare and cognitively and socially for the challenges of learning. To proper nutrition—to test the effectiveness of preschool programs on children’s keep their develop- enrollment in and readiness for primary school, the World ment on track. Pre- Bank supported a study of an early childhood develop- school programs are a ment preschool program in Mozambique run by Save the great way to give kids Children. The evaluation showed that children enrolled in EDUCATION the educational build- preschool were better prepared for the demands of school- ing blocks to help ing than children who did not attend preschool and that them learn and prepare they were more likely to start primary school by age 6. for primary school. But in low-income countries, parents This study, which we believe is the first randomized evalu- don’t always have the opportunity: governments haven’t ation of a preschool program in a rural African setting, invested in preschools; private sector offerings may be too shows that preschool education can be an inexpensive and pricey or not close by; and parents may not understand the highly effective means for helping children overcome the benefits. For policymakers and education experts, the ques- developmental blocks that come from poverty. Based on tions are clear: Does it make sense to invest in preschool the results, Mozambique’s Ministry of Education has education and, if preschools are available, will parents use begun work to expand the community-based preschool them and do children truly benefit from such programs? model to 600 communities in the 2013–2015 period. Case Study Save the Children set up a pilot preschool program in 12 ers to simultaneously carry out an evaluation of the impact communities in a rural part of Mozambique in 2006 and ex- of the program on children’s development and readiness for panded the program to 30 new communities in 2008. As part school. The 30 communities were picked randomly from 76 of the expansion, plans were made for World Bank research- eligible communities—the remainder became the control group—and researchers conducted a detailed baseline survey of 2000 households with preschool-aged children. They also Did You Know… surveyed community leaders and first grade students in all 76 Only 4 percent of children in Mozambique are in preschool, but…. communities. The survey included measures of child develop- it costs less than $3/month to send a child to preschool in ment, standard socio- economic questions and health ques- Mozambique. tions. The endline survey was conducted in 2010 and had a 95 percent re-contact rate. Background Mozambique’s primary school enrollment more than dou- ment. As a result, they may arrive at school ill-prepared for bled between 1998 and 2010, reaching close to 95 percent. learning in a group environment. While preschool programs Nonetheless, close to one-third of children are not enrolled are generally viewed as an effective way to boost children’s in primary school by age 6, and when they do enroll, they development and better prepare them for school, only four are not always prepared for the demands of school. Children percent of children in Mozambique go to preschool, and from poor, rural communities in particular often show signs these tend to be from wealthier families and in urban areas. of developmental delays. This isn’t a surprise: an estimated Save the Children’s early childhood development program 61 percent of children in sub-Saharan Africa don’t reach de- was designed to help bridge this gap and give poor children velopmental milestones because of poverty. Brought up in the right start in life so they have a better chance of reaching homes where parents themselves may be illiterate, children their full potential. The cost of running the program was in such poor communities don’t always have access to the U.S. $2.47 per child per month, which included paying the toys, books and verbal interactions that help stimulate phys- teachers a $10/month stipend. ical, cognitive, linguistic, and socio-emotional develop- EDUCATION The Findings Many parents want to send their children to preschool. Children who attended preschool were more likely to enroll in primary school and more likely to start at the In communities where Save the Children preschools were right age. Once in school, they also spent more time on available, 55 percent of eligible children aged 3 to 5 years homework and other school-related activities. old were enrolled in the program, compared with 11.7 per- cent of children in control group communities. On average, Primary school enrollment rates among children in the treat- children attended school five days a week, for nearly four ment group were 24 percent higher than those in the control hours a day. group two years after the evaluation was launched. Children Three-quarters of families in the treatment group said who had been enrolled in preschool also were 10.2 percentage they had access to a preschool, compared with 22 percent of points more likely to start primary school at the right age—6 those in the control group. Among those in the treatment years old for first grade —an increase of 21.7 percent over the group who did not enroll their preschool-aged children, the control group. most commonly given reasons were that the child was too Once enrolled in primary school, they spent an av- young (suggesting misinformation about the appropriate erage of 7.2 hours extra a week on homework and other enrollment age), that the primary caregiver objected or that school-related activities, including classroom time. This the school was too far. translates into an increase of almost 50 percent over the This policy note reviews research presented in “The Promise of Preschool in Africa: A Randomized Impact Evaluation of Early Childhood Development in Rural Mozambique,” by Sebastian Martinez, Sophie Naudeau and Victor Pereira. The evaluation was funded in part by the Spanish Impact Evaluation Fund. control group, who spent on average 15.5 hours per week on not have to watch their younger siblings during the day. homework and classroom time. Caregivers, who were basically freed from 15 hours a week The increase in time spent in school and on homework of childcare because of the preschool program (depending on came in part from a reduction in time spent working on the the ages of their other children), were 26 percent more likely family’s farm and accompanying their caregivers to attend to have worked in the previous 30 days than those whose chil- community meetings. The time children usually spent play- dren stayed home. At the same time, caregivers in the treat- ing, sleeping or doing chores was not affected. ment group were less likely than those in the control group to see physical punishment as appropriate to use on a child. Children who attended preschool showed gains They were also more likely to practice daily routines with the on overall school readiness, as measured through child, although there was no significant increase in playing tests of cognitive, socio-emotional, and fine motor games or reading books with the child. development. Compared with the control group, children in the treatment group showed a 5.3 percent increase in communications skills; a 6.4 percent increase in problem solving skills and an increase of 6.3 percent in a test measuring fine motor development. Results were particularly strong in the area of cognitive development, as measured in a survey of first-grade primary school teachers. Children in the treatment group showed a 12.1 percentage point increase—or 87 percent—over those in the control group. Areas in which children did better in- cluded memory, interest in mathematics, ability to sort and classify objects and being able to count to 20. Children in the treatment group also showed improved emotional matu- rity, including self-regulation. Communities did not shy away from involvement in Preschool didn’t only help targeted children—other the project. household members benefitted as well. Communities had to agree to provide space, labor and, where Sending children to preschool freed up time for caregivers and possible, materials, to build preschool classrooms (up to three seems to have given their older siblings more time to go to school per community, each with capacity for 35 children), and they themselves. In households where a younger child attended pre- had to form committees to manage and supervise the pre- school, older children aged 10 to 15 years old were 5 percent schools. Save the Children also gave communities materials more likely to have gone to school—perhaps because they did for playgrounds, child-sized latrines and a washing station with safe water for drinking and hand washing. Each class had two volunteer teachers – who had to meet About the preschools: certain minimum requirements and were each paid about 93 percent of teachers were female $10 a month by Save the Children—picked by the commu- Their average age was 33 nity management committee. At the outset, teachers received Their average education was 6.2 years More than half had a child enrolled in the preschool training from Save the Children on learning techniques to stimulate children’s learning, and later had refresher courses; facilitators visited the schools monthly to coach and mentor; After two years of seed funding from Save the Children, com- and every month teachers in the same district would meet to munities had to agree on the monthly fee that each household share tips and prepare for the next month. would contribute to maintain the preschools. The fee ended up At the same time, Save the Children sponsored monthly being between U.S. 0.50 cents and U.S. 0.80 cents per month, parenting meetings with the involvement of community health or about a third of what families in the control group paid to activists and the preschool teachers. Discussions focused on nu- send their children to a preschool. trition, health and literacy. Conclusion Making policy from evidence Policymakers and development experts know that educating uation, caregivers were more likely to work and older siblings children is key to alleviating poverty and helping people build were more likely to go to school. And at $2.47 per child per better lives. And that’s why helping countries achieve universal month—which included the $10 monthly stipend to teach- primary education is a United Nations Millennium Develop- ers—preschool programs can be affordable. ment Goal. But it’s also important to make sure children are The importance of evidence for governments seeking to ready for primary school when they start. As this evaluation craft effective policies is clear: In this case, the Mozambique EDUCATION showed, preschools are an effective way to help children pre- Ministry of Education is now planning to extend commu- pare for school – and children who attend preschool are more nity-based preschools to 600 communities. While there re- likely to enroll in primary school and start at the right age. main other areas to study, for example, constraints that held Having children in preschool can also be a boon for their back families from enrolling their kids in preschool, the value caregivers—including older siblings. In this Mozambique eval- of early childhood education is clear. The Human Development Network, part of the World Bank Group, supports and disseminates research evaluating the impact of development projects to help alleviate poverty. The goal is to collect and build empirical evidence that can help governments and development organizations design and implement the most appropriate and effective policies for better educational, health and job opportunities for people in developing coun- tries. For more information about who we are and what we do, go to: http://www.worldbank.org/sief. The Evidence to Policy note series is produced by SIEF with generous support from the British government’s Department for International Development. THE WORLD BANK, HUMAN DEVELOPMENT NETWORK 1818 H STREET, NW WASHINGTON, DC 20433 Produced by Office of the Chief Economist, Human Development Network, Communications/Aliza Marcus