The Wall Street Journal recently published an article that shares details about a new study on the benefits of early childhood education. Multiple studies show that preschool sets children up for success in both academic and social skills, but there are still questions about what exactly the differences are between children who attend early childhood programs and those who stay home.
The study, published in The Journal of Developmental Psychology, compared children who attended pre-k with those who did not to see how the two groups stacked up against each other at the beginning and the end of kindergarten. The researchers found that children who attended pre-k outperformed the others in language, literacy, and math scores. At the beginning of kindergarten, the children who attended pre-k were more advanced on assessments of vocabulary, letter identification, short-term memory and more. These students were also approximately 8 months ahead in academic learning and 5 months ahead in listening, planning, and self-control.
By the end of kindergarten, the children who did not attend pre-k were beginning to catch up, but were still significantly behind in math and general knowledge. The article also makes the point that:
“Earlier studies on the impact of preschool programs have often shown lukewarm results in the first few years, but decades later, dramatic sleeper effects emerge. Even when controlling for their parents’ income and education levels, preschool attenders have been found to be less likely to become teenage parents or receive public assistance and far more likely to graduate from college and get good jobs as young adults.
Childhood isn’t a race, of course. Still, the pace of learning is important because knowledge builds on itself.”
