This chapter presents findings on the emergent literacy and emergent numeracy of five-year-olds in England, Estonia and the United States. It shows how children’s scores in each of these early learning domains relate to their individual characteristics, family backgrounds, home learning environments and early childhood education and care participation.
Early Learning and Child Well-being
A Study of Five-year-Olds in England, Estonia, and the United States
Chapter 6. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy
Abstract
There were clear differences in children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy across and within the three countries participating in the International Early Learning and Child Well-being Study (IELS). Children in England and Estonia had similar average scores for emergent literacy, which were higher than those in the United States. Children in England, however, had higher average scores for emergent numeracy than children in Estonia, which were in turn higher than those of children in the United States.
Within countries, differences in emergent literacy and emergent numeracy were related to the socio-economic status (SES) of children’s families, the language/s spoken at home and whether children had experienced learning or behavioural difficulties. Gender clearly related to emergent literacy scores in each country, with girls’ emergent literacy, on average, significantly higher than that of boys. Mothers’ education levels also predicted their children’s early skills, as did the nature and frequency of the activities parents undertook with their children.
The study found that children from both advantaged and disadvantaged backgrounds in the United States who had participated in early childhood education (ECEC) had higher emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores than children who had not attended ECEC. In the United States, ECEC participation rates were higher amongst children from high socio-economic backgrounds compared to children from low socio-economic backgrounds. In England and Estonia, almost all children in the study had attended ECEC.
This chapter describes:
the critical importance of children’s early cognitive skills for their well-being and later development
the findings of the study in relation to emergent literacy and emergent numeracy.
The findings are based on a representative sample of just under 7 000 five-year-olds in England, Estonia and the United States.
Early cognitive skills matter
In their early years, children’s learning in different areas is inter-related and mutually reinforcing. Development in any one area supports development in related domains. For example, emergent literacy skills help children to interact well with other children. These interactions build children’s prosocial skills, which in turn further strengthen their emergent literacy.
The skills children develop in early childhood are important for their immediate well-being and for their success in life. Decades of longitudinal research have shown that early literacy and numeracy are strongly predictive of later cognitive and educational outcomes (Duncan et al., 2007[1]).1 Early literacy and numeracy skills are also associated with a range of social-emotional and economic outcomes throughout people’s lives. By the time children start school, differences in their cognitive skills have already started to emerge, determined by their individual characteristics, home environments and ECEC experiences. Once these gaps exist, they become increasingly difficult and costly to close. Early intervention can address these gaps and improve the cognitive development of children in both the short and the longer term (Reynolds et al., 2002[2]; Schweinhart, 2013[3]).
Gaps in emergent literacy skills warrant early attention
Children’s emergent literacy skills are a fundamental determinant of their later success in schooling and beyond, and also of their overall sense of well-being. Emergent literacy levels predict later educational achievement and attainment, employment and earnings, and overall socio-economic status. The development of children’s emergent literacy skills is also linked to upward social mobility (Heckman, 2006[4]).
Emergent literacy skills also help children to communicate with others, enabling them to express themselves, understand others, and make friends. These skills are therefore integral to children’s social-emotional skills and to their sense of connectedness and well-being.
The consequences of not addressing gaps in emergent literacy early on are serious. Adequate literacy levels are integral to successful functioning in most societies worldwide, yet approximately one in four (23%) 15-year-old students across OECD countries failed to reach a baseline level of proficiency2 in reading (OECD, 2019[4]). Similarly, around one in five adults on average across OECD countries have low reading performance (OECD, 2013[5])3. These adults have poorer labour market outcomes and poorer self-reported health than their peers with greater proficiency in literacy. They are also more likely to feel they have little impact on the political process and are less likely to report that they trust other people (OECD, 2013[5]).
The roots of poor adult literacy are found in childhood. Children’s emergent literacy skills are developed through the natural processes of learning, and through interacting with their parents, other family members and other children. As skills beget skills, children who fall behind early are likely to continue to fall further behind over time (Kautz et al., 2014[6]; Rigney, 2010[7]). Measuring children’s emergent literacy skills can provide important information about where policy makers, teachers and parents could focus attention and resources in order to promote positive and equitable early literacy development and, in turn, improve children’s life chances. The emergent literacy skills measured in IELS are those most closely related to and predictive of later literacy achievement, as well as other positive educational and later life outcomes.
Early numeracy is also strongly predictive of a range of later outcomes
Although emergent numeracy has been subject to less research attention than emergent literacy, longitudinal research has also identified emergent numeracy skills in early childhood as important predictors of later outcomes throughout schooling and into adulthood. Studies have shown that numeracy competence as assessed at school entry is the strongest predictor of later mathematical achievement and strongly predicts achievement in other academic domains (Duncan et al., 2007[1]). Better emergent numeracy skills in childhood are associated with higher socio-economic status in adulthood (Ritchie and Bates, 2013[8]) and with better self-reported health outcomes (OECD, 2016[9]).
On average, 24% of adults in OECD countries fail to develop numeracy skills that go beyond the ability to undertake the most basic numerical operations (OECD, 2016[9]).4 In most countries, adults with worse information processing skills, including numeracy skills, are less likely to be employed and, when employed, tend to earn lower wages (OECD, 2016[9]). While the cost of innumeracy to individuals and societies is high now, it is likely to grow higher still in an increasingly technological and scientific world (Raghubar and Barnes, 2017[10]). Given its established importance for later outcomes, emergent numeracy was selected as an important learning domain to be assessed in IELS.
Developing a comprehensive assessment of emergent literacy and emergent numeracy
Emergent cognitive skills can be broadly categorised as either constrained or unconstrained. Constrained skills are those that are finite, such as knowing the alphabet, and these are typically easily assessed. Unconstrained skills are not limited in the same way. Unconstrained literacy skills include vocabulary knowledge and listening comprehension. Unconstrained skills develop over a longer period and are built on constrained skills (Snow and Matthews, 2016[11]). A comprehensive assessment of emergent literacy skills should assess both types of skills, and this was the approach taken in IELS. While unconstrained emergent literacy skills are generally more challenging to assess, they tend to be more strongly associated with later reading success and were therefore the primary focus of the IELS emergent literacy assessment. The assessment used innovative, play-based methods and was delivered on tablet devices.
IELS assessed three skills deemed fundamental to later literacy competence: the unconstrained skills of listening comprehension and vocabulary knowledge, and the constrained skill of phonological awareness. The direct assessment of listening comprehension in IELS had two main components: story-level listening comprehension and sentence-level listening comprehension. The former involved children listening to a story and responding to a series of audio-recorded items relating to that story, while the latter involved listening to a series of standalone sentences and responding to a single item about the meaning of each. The assessment of vocabulary knowledge in IELS required children to identify from a range of very common everyday word options (“Tier 1 words”) the synonym of a more complex (Tier 2) word.5 Finally, the phonological awareness items required children to identify the first, middle and final phonemes (sounds) of short words. IELS did not assess print knowledge, focusing instead on the early literacy and language skills that are predictive of later reading success.6
The general principle of focusing on the assessment of unconstrained skills in IELS was also applied to the assessment of emergent numeracy skills. The study defined emergent numeracy as the ability to recognise numbers and undertake numerical operations and reasoning in mathematics. The emphasis in the direct assessment of the children was on simple problem solving and the application of concepts and reasoning in the following content areas: numbers and counting, working with numbers, shape and space, measurement, and pattern. As with literacy, the emergent numeracy assessment was delivered on a tablet and involved children engaging with game-like activities. The emergent numeracy assessment used a mixture of drag-and-drop technology, where children moved items around the screen to construct solutions to problems, and hot-spot technology, where children tapped objects to indicate their preferred option when responding to an audio question (Figure 6.1).
Figure 6.1. Children were asked to “Touch who is first in line”
The metric for all learning outcome scales in IELS is the same. There is theoretically no minimum or maximum score in IELS. The results are instead scaled to have approximately normal distributions, with the means around 500 and standard deviations around 100. The overall mean score of 500 points represents the standardised mean of all participating countries. A 1-point difference on the IELS scale therefore corresponds to an effect size of .01 of a standard deviation and a 10-point difference to an effect size of .1.
Overall findings
Children in England and Estonia have stronger emergent literacy than children in the United States, while children in England have stronger emergent numeracy than children in the other two countries
There were clear differences in children’s emergent literacy as assessed in IELS within and across the three counties participating in the study. Table 6.1 sets out the mean scores from the direct assessments of children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy in England, Estonia and the United States, with the distributions shown in Figure 6.2.
Table 6.1. Mean emergent literacy and numeracy scores, by country
Figure 6.2. Distribution of emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores by country
Children in England had the highest average emergent literacy score across the three countries, although the mean score in England was not significantly different from that in Estonia. The United States had the narrowest distribution of scores for emergent literacy, with a smaller percentage of children at the highest levels and a relatively larger proportion at the lowest levels than in the other countries. Estonia’s results lie between those of the other two countries, although more closely resemble England’s profile than that of the United States.
Children in England had higher average emergent numeracy than children in the other two countries. England also had the largest proportion of children with the highest levels of emergent numeracy. Estonia’s results on emergent numeracy sit between those of England and the United States. The mean score for emergent numeracy in the United States was well below the means of the other two countries, with the United States having fewer children than the other two countries who demonstrated high levels of emergent numeracy.
Children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy increase with age
Children develop and learn quickly during their early years. The differences in scores by age give an estimate of expected learning progressions. Figure 6.3 sets out the mean emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores of children in England, Estonia and the United States by their ages in months.
Figure 6.3. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores by age of child in months by country
For emergent literacy, scores for the youngest children in the United States were lower than in the other countries, rapidly increased with age up to 5 years, 6 months, then levelled off among the older children in the group. The gradient among children in the United States in this second 6-month age group was similar to that among children in England and Estonia. However, the gap between children in the United States and children in England and Estonia had not closed among the six-year-olds.
In emergent numeracy, the indicative rate of progress across age in months was broadly similar across the three countries, although it was slightly lower in Estonia.
The average increase in emergent literacy scores for each month of age was 8 points in the United States, 8 points in England and 5 points in Estonia. The corresponding averages for emergent numeracy are were 10 points in the United States, 11 points for England and 7 points for Estonia. The strength of the relationship between age and learning was similar in all SES quartiles and for boys and girls, in both domains.
In addition to directly assessing children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy, parents and teachers were also asked to rate each child’s expressive language development (defined as the degree to which the child uses language effectively, can communicate ideas, etc), receptive language development (the extent to which the child understands, interprets and listens), and numeracy development, relative to other five-year-olds. Figure 6.4 sets out the mean percentages of children rated as below average, average or above average in each domain by their parents and teachers across the three participating countries.
Figure 6.4. Receptive language, expressive language and numeracy development as reported by parents and teachers
The indirect assessments of children’s literacy and numeracy by parents and teachers were broadly aligned with the results of the direct assessments, i.e. children who were reported to have above average development in these areas by their parents and teachers had higher average scores on the direct assessments than other children.
Parents rated their children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy more highly than teachers in all three countries. There may be many reasons for this. For example, children can behave differently at home than at their ECEC centre or school. At the same time, teachers have knowledge of a wider group of children than parents to inform their assessment of each child.
There were many similarities across the three countries in the factors associated with higher and lower levels of emergent literacy and emergent numeracy, discussed in the following sections.
Girls do better in emergent literacy but the same as boys in numeracy
Girls in all three countries demonstrated higher average emergent literacy than boys (Figure 6.5). These findings are consistent with other international studies of children’s literacy, albeit at older ages, such as the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study7. The size of the gender difference in emergent literacy was similar in all three countries.
Figure 6.5. Emergent literacy scores by gender
Note: The gender differences at the 25th percentile, the mean and the 75th percentile are statistically significant.
There were no significant gender differences in emergent numeracy in any of the three participating countries at age five. This stands in contrast to the findings of several large-scale assessments of the mathematics achievement of older children and students (e.g. in PISA), where differences in favour of boys are found in many countries.
The reports from parents and from teachers on the children’s literacy development also identified clear gender gaps in both expressive and receptive language development, as well as gender gaps in numeracy (shown in Figure 6.6).
Figure 6.6. Expressive language, receptive language and numeracy development as reported by parents and teachers, by gender
As Figure 6.6 shows, girls were more likely than boys to be considered to have above-average numeracy development, and this was most pronounced in the teachers’ assessments. This is in contrast with the direct assessment of children’s emergent numeracy, which found no significant differences between girls and boys at the mean, at the 25th percentile or at the 75th percentile.
Socio-economic status is less strongly related to children’s learning in Estonia than in England or the United States
Many studies have found that the socio-economic status of children’s families is associated with their learning outcomes. The extent to which children’s backgrounds are associated with their education outcomes varies widely across countries, with some education systems more successful in mitigating disadvantage than others. By understanding which countries do this best and how, policy makers and education leaders can learn from these experiences, set expectations and put strategies in place to achieve more equitable outcomes for children.
The emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores of the children taking part in IELS were significantly associated with their socio-economic background, as Figure 6.7 shows. The relationship between learning and SES was similar for girls and boys, for both emergent literacy and emergent numeracy.
Figure 6.7. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores by socio-economic quartile
Children in Estonia had the smallest differences in both emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores across the socio-economic quartiles. This is consistent with findings in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), where Estonia achieved greater equity in outcomes than England or the United States. The relationship between SES and children’s learning was similar in England and the United States for emergent literacy, whereas the association between SES and emergent numeracy was stronger in the United States than in England.
Reports from parents and teachers for both emergent literacy and emergent numeracy were generally aligned with the findings from the direct assessments. Thus, although parents and teachers tended to rate some children more highly than their direct assessment scores suggested, the different levels of development of children in each socio-economic quartile indicated by the direct assessment were discernible by both parents and teachers.
Figure 6.8. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy development as reported by parents and teachers by socio-economic quartile
There were no differences between children based solely on their immigration background
The study found no significant differences in overall scores for children from families with an immigrant background, once socio-economic status and home language were taken into account. An immigrant background is defined in IELS has having both parents born in a different country.8 Across the three countries, on average 12% of children had an immigrant background.
At the individual country level, however, there were small significant differences for children with an immigrant background in England. Children in England from families with a migrant background had lower emergent literacy scores than those from non-immigrant backgrounds, even after adjusting for SES and home language. No such differences were found in the United States or in Estonia.
Home language is associated with children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy
The parents of children in the study were also asked to indicate whether one or both of the child’s parents spoke a language at home that is different from the language of the ECEC centre or school that the child attends. On average, 13% of children across the three countries had a different home language: 20% of children in the United States, 16% in England and 6% in Estonia.
The direct assessments were carried out in English in England and in the United States, and in Estonian or Russian in Estonia. Having a home language that is different from the assessment language was negatively associated with emergent literacy scores and numeracy scores, as shown in Figure 6.9. This was true in all three participating countries.
Figure 6.9. Children’s emergent literacy and numeracy scores, by home language
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
Children with a home language different to the assessment language were also more likely to be rated as having below average language and numeracy development by their parents and teachers than other children (Figure 6.10). The gap between parents’ and teachers’ ratings were wider for children with a different home language than for other children.
Figure 6.10. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy as reported by parents and teachers by home language, combined results
Children with learning or behavioural difficulties have lower emergent literacy and numeracy
Parents were also asked whether their child had a low birth weight9 or was born prematurely, had learning difficulties (e.g. speech or language delay, intellectual disability) or social, emotional or behavioural difficulties. On average across countries, 24% of children had experienced at least one of these challenges. An average of 9% of children were reported to have had low birth weight or have been premature, 11% had experienced learning difficulties and 10% had social, emotional or behavioural difficulties.
Overall, parents in England and Estonia reported slightly fewer children with these challenges than parents in the United States. Estonian parents reported the smallest proportion of children who had low birth weight or who were premature, while parents in England reported the smallest proportion of children with behavioural difficulties.
There was no significant gender difference in the proportion of children who had a low birth weight or were premature. Boys were twice as likely as girls to be reported by their parents as having experienced learning difficulties and also significantly more likely than girls to be reported by their parents as having social, emotional or behavioural difficulties.
Children with learning difficulties and children with social, emotional or behavioural difficulties had lower mean scores in both emergent literacy and emergent numeracy than children without these difficulties, after accounting for SES. Additionally, after accounting for socio-economic status, children who had had a low birth weight or were premature had a significantly lower mean emergent numeracy score than other children, but there was no corresponding association with emergent literacy in any of the three participating countries. The score-point differences between children with and without these challenges are shown in Figure 6.11 below.
Figure 6.11. Children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy, by early learning challenges
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
Parents’ activities with their children are associated with their children’s learning
The activities parents undertake with their children are significantly related to their children’s learning. In this study, parents were asked whether and how often they read to their children from books. There were positive associations between frequency of reading to children from books and children’s emergent literacy scores, after accounting for SES, as shown in Figure 6.12. Children who were read to on at least five days each week had the highest mean scores. Parents reported that they read with their daughters as much as with their sons.
Figure 6.12. Emergent literacy scores by engagement in literacy-related activities at home
Note: Statistically significant differences are shown in a darker tone.
A higher proportion of parents in England (59%) reported that they read to their children 5-7 days a week than parents in Estonia (38%) or the United States (43%). Children from advantaged backgrounds were much more likely to be read to 5-7 days a week (60% on average across the three countries) than children from disadvantaged backgrounds (30%).
The study also found that the number of children’s books in children’s homes was positively associated with both emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores, after accounting for socio-economic status (Figure 6.13). Children in England were more likely to live in homes with more than 100 children’s books than children in the other two countries. Across all three countries, children from high SES backgrounds were twice as likely to have more than 100 children’s books in their homes than children from low SES backgrounds.
Figure 6.13. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores by number of children’s books in the home
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
A further factor that was positively associated with children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy development was the extent to which their parents were involved in their ECEC centre or school (Figure 6.14). Teachers were asked how involved parents were with the ECEC centre or school the child attended, ranging from not involved to slightly, moderately or strongly involved. Teachers in Estonia reported that 80% of parents were moderately or strongly involved, compared to 69% of parents in England and 65% in the United States. Children whose parents were rated as more strongly involved had higher mean emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores than other children, regardless of socio-economic status. More parents from high SES groups (84%) were reported to be involved in their child’s ECEC centre or school than parents from low SES groups (67%). Parents were as likely to be involved in the ECEC centre or school of their son as that of their daughter.
Figure 6.14. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores by level of parental involvement in children’s ECEC centres or schools
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
Taking children to special activities outside the home, such as sports or scouts, was also positively associated with emergent literacy and emergent numeracy development, as shown in Figure 6.15. Overall, children who attend special activities had higher mean scores in emergent literacy and emergent numeracy than those who did not, after accounting for socio-economic status.
Figure 6.15. Differences in emergent literacy and numeracy scores by engagement in special activities outside the home
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
Children in Estonia were more likely to attend special activities at least 3 times a week (25%) than children in England (18%) or the United States (18%), whereas children in the United States were more likely to never attend or attend less than once a week (46%) than children in the other two countries (36% in Estonia and 35% in England). Boys and girls were, on average, equally likely to be taken to such activities. Children from low socio-economic backgrounds were more likely to never attend such activities or do so less than once a week (56% on average across the three countries), compared to children from high socio-economic backgrounds (26%).
Mothers’ education levels are positively associated with their children’s learning
Parents with higher levels of education are more likely to engage their children in activities that help them to learn, such as reading from books (Sylva et al., 2008[14]). Studies on children’s early development have also found independent positive effects from mothers’ education in particular.
As noted in Chapter 3, the mothers of the children in Estonia in the study were more likely to have a bachelor’s degree (53%) than in either England (40%) or the United States (39%). The mean emergent literacy and numeracy scores of children across all three countries were significantly higher for children whose mothers had at least a bachelor’s degree (Figure 6.16).
Figure 6.16. Emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores by mothers’ educational attainment
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
The use of digital devices had little overall significant associations with children’s emergent literacy or emergent numeracy
On average, 83% of children across the three participating countries used a digital device at least once a week, with 42% using one every day. Only 7% of children on average never or hardly ever used such devices, with 10% using one at least monthly, but not weekly.
Overall, children who never used digital devices had mean scores that did not differ greatly from those of children who did use them, after accounting for socio-economic status. In the United States, however, there were some positive associations between emergent literacy and using a digital device at least monthly or weekly, but not daily. In England, there was a positive association with emergent literacy and using a device monthly, but not weekly or daily.
Children from single-parent households do as well in emergent literacy as those from two-parent households, but less well on numeracy
On average across the three participating countries, 86% of the children in the study lived in two-parent households. There were no significant differences in emergent literacy between children in single-parent households and other children after accounting for socio-economic status. However, the emergent numeracy scores of children in single-parent households were lower, once SES was accounted for (Fig 6.17).
Figure 6.17. Emergent numeracy scores by household structure
Note: All differences are statistically significant.
System-wide provision of ECEC may provide benefits for children
In England and Estonia, almost all children attend ECEC, including children from disadvantaged backgrounds. In the United States, however, this is not the case. In 2017, 100% of three-year-olds in the United Kingdom participated in ECEC, compared to 91% in Estonia and 42% in the United States, against an OECD average of 79% (OECD, 2019[4]).
In the United States, ECEC participation rates among the children taking part in IELS varied significantly depending on the socio-economic status of their families. Children from advantaged families were more likely (91%) to have attended ECEC than children from disadvantaged families (73%). Rates of ECEC attendance did not vary significantly across different ethnic and racial groups.
In the United States, children who had participated in ECEC had significantly higher emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores than children who had not, after accounting for SES. These differences were particularly strong for emergent numeracy.
The study found no differences in children’s emergent literacy or numeracy based on the age they started ECEC. After accounting for children’s socio-economic backgrounds, there were no differences in emergent literacy and numeracy for children who started ECEC before they turned three compared with children who started ECEC as three-year-olds or older.
Children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy are related to their learning in other domains
In the early years, children’s learning is inter-related and mutually reinforcing. Development in any one area supports development in related domains. For the five-year-olds in this study, there was a large amount of overlap between emergent literacy and emergent numeracy skills and the other domains assessed in IELS, as shown in Figure 6.18 and Figure 6.19.
Figure 6.18. Correlations between emergent literacy scores and other learning domains
Note: All correlations are statistically significant.
Figure 6.19. Correlations between emergent numeracy scores and other learning domains,
Note: All correlations are statistically significant.
The correlations between emergent literacy scores and other early learning domains were similar for England, Estonia and the United States. They were also similar for girls and for boys, and across socio-economic groups.
Generally, the strength of the relationships between emergent literacy and other learning domains and between emergent numeracy and other learning domains were similar. Again, the strength of the correlations between early numeracy and other early learning domains was similar across countries, between girls and boys, and across socio-economic groups.
Conclusions
Children in England and Estonia had similar mean scores for emergent literacy, which were higher than those in the United States. Children in England, however, had higher scores for emergent numeracy than children in Estonia, which in turn were higher than those of children in the United States.
In all three countries, girls’ emergent literacy was more advanced than that of boys, both in the direct assessment and in the ratings provided by parents and teachers. There were no significant gender differences, however, in the findings from the direct assessment of emergent numeracy. Nonetheless, parents and teachers both rated girls as having higher levels of numeracy than boys.
The study found a clear relationship between children’s early learning and the socio-economic status of the child’s family. This relationship was strongest in the United States and least pronounced in Estonia.
Another factor negatively associated with children’s emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores was having a home language different from the language of the ECEC centre or school that the child attended. This suggests that supporting these children’s skills in the language of the school or centre, while also supporting their home language, is and will continue to be important for their development.
While coming from a single-parent or two-parent household did not have a large relationship with children’s learning, having a well-educated mother did. However, the activities parents undertook with their children clearly supported early cognitive development, even amongst parents with little formal education. Key activities that parents undertake that are associated with stronger cognitive development include:
reading to their children from books on at least 5-7 days a week
being involved in the child’s ECEC centre or school
providing children’s books in the home
taking to children to special activities.
While the provision of ECEC is system-wide in both England and Estonia, this is not the case in the United States. Yet children in the United States who had participated in ECEC had significantly higher emergent literacy and emergent numeracy scores than children who had not attended ECEC, after accounting for socio-economic status. These differences were particularly strong in emergent numeracy.
At an aggregate level across the three countries, children’s use of digital devices was not significantly associated with their emergent literacy or emergent numeracy skills.
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Notes
← 1. For a fuller description of relevant longitudinal studies refer to Shuey and Kankaraš (2018[13]).
← 2. Scoring at or below Proficiency Level 1 in PISA Reading.
← 3. Scoring at or below Proficiency Level 1 in PIAAC Reading.
← 4. Scoring at or below Proficiency Level 1 in PIAAC Numeracy.
← 5. Beck, McKeown and Kucan (2013[13]) propose a three-tier model of vocabulary development, where Tier 1 words are common words used in everyday speech (e.g. table, blue), Tier 2 words are high-frequency words that occur across contexts and are more common in written than spoken language (e.g. compare, coincidence). Tier 3 words are low-frequency words used in domain-specific contexts (e.g. thesis, ecosystem).
← 6. For more information, see the IELS assessment framework.
← 7. For further information see: https://www.iea.nl/studies/iea/pirls
← 8. Or one parent, where information was only available for one parent.
← 9. Lower than 5lbs 8 oz or 2.5 kg