Experimental Impacts of the ‘Quality Preschool for Ghana’ Intervention: Implications for System-level Reform Sharon Wolf, J. Lawrence Aber & Jere Behrman Global TIES for Children: Transforming Intervention Effectiveness and Scale
Outline 2 Part I: Background o Early childhood education o The Ghanaian context o Quality Preschool for Ghana (QP4G) o Research design and Theory of change Part II: Impacts of QP4G o Classroom quality and teacher well-being o Children’s school readiness o Differences in public and private schools and child characteristics Part III: Conclusions & Next Steps
Early childhood education (ECE) • Early behavioral and social skills have lifelong consequences for children. • Potential return on ECE investment is large. • Emotional climate of ECE classrooms: important for early adjustment and learning. 3
4 The policy context in Ghana • The 2012 GES report that the 2004 KG curriculum is sound, but that teacher behavior has not adapted to reflect new pedagogy. • Top priority: Train 27,000 untrained teachers in KG-specific pedagogy. • Another priority: engaging parents in schools and raising their awareness of KG-specific pedagogy. • Private schools must comply with the national curriculum and standards.
5 Quality Preschool for Ghana (QP4G) • In partnership with Ghana Education Service , National Nursery Teacher Training Center , University of Pennsylvania, NYU and Innovations for Poverty Action : • Develop and test a nationally scalable model for teachers and parents with the goal of improving KG quality and children’s school readiness.
6 The In-Service Teacher Training Program • 5 days in September, followed by refresher trainings in January (2 days) and May (1 day) implemented by NNTTC trainers. • Classroom visits paired with monitoring / feedback from district coordinators. 5 areas: (1) How children learn—developing a child-friendly environment (2) Classroom management (3) Integrating play into language and literacy instruction (4) Integrating play into early numeracy instruction (5) Assessment and planning
7 The Parental Awareness Program • 3 sessions (1/term) held at school PTA meeting, open to all parents with KG children. Parental awareness training about KG learning. • Video screening followed by discussion, led by district coordinators, focused on (1) play-based learning, (2) parents’ role in child learning, and (3) encouraging parent-teacher and parent-school communication.
QP4G: Research design 6 disadvantaged districts in the Greater Accra Region Stratification 240 KG schools (108 public and 132 private) Randomization 82 79 79 (36 public, 46 private) (37 public, 42 private) (35 public, 44 private) T1 T2 Control group Teacher training and Teacher training and coaching program coaching program Parental awareness about KG learning Summer of 2015 8
QP4G Theory of Change Intervention Classroom-level mediators Child outcomes Classroom Quality Teacher training School + readiness Monitoring/ support Teacher professional Parental intervention well-being 2015-16 academic year September 2015 (baseline), June 2016 (follow up 1), June 2017 (follow up 2) 9
+ Part II: Impacts of QP4G 10
11 Measures 1. Classroom quality – implementation and quality 2. Teacher professional well-being 3. Teacher attrition Classroom 4. Child school readiness Quality Teacher School training readiness Impacts are assessed: + Monitoring/ support • End of implementation year Teacher • One year later professional well-being
12 Implementation: Are teachers integrating practices from the training in their classroom? Checklist with 15 teaching practices that were in the training. For example: Teacher praises children for positive behavior Teacher uses one or multiple songs to facilitate learning Teacher threatens children with or uses a cane on children at least once The lesson consists of a game that facilitated the lesson objectives Teacher explicitly reminds children of the class rules Teacher incorporates found items as Learning Teacher asks students at least two open-ended Materials (e.g., bottle caps, milk cartons) questions during the class
13 T eachers integrate training practices in their classrooms Teachers were videotaped teaching 6.0 for 30-45 minutes. 5.0 Number of activities observed On average, teachers in both 4.0 treatment conditions implemented 1.5 additional 3.0 4.8*** “developmentally 4.6*** 2.0 appropriate” activities during 3.2 1.0 the observed period of teaching practice . 0.0 Control TT TTPA TT= Teacher training; TTPA = Teacher training + Parental awareness training
14 Classroom quality: Does QP4G improve the quality of teacher-child interactions? Developed based exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, we assess impacts on Emotional support Classroom organization three dimensions of classroom quality. • Positive climate • Behavior management Negative climate Productivity • • Facilitating deeper Emotional support & Supporting student Teacher sensitivity Instructional learning • • learning behavior management expression • Regard for student formats perspectives Scaffolding (concept Positive climate Student ideas considered • • • development) Negative climate Reasoning/problem solve • • Quality of feedback Teacher sensitivity/tone • • Connections to life • Objectives explicit Behavior management Language modeling • • • Consistent Routine •
15 QP4G improves the quality of some teacher-child interactions Developed based exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, we assess impacts on Emotional support Classroom organization 1.00 three dimensions of classroom quality. 0.80 0.64* • Positive climate 0.62* • Behavior management 0.60 0.48* Negative climate Productivity • • Facilitating deeper Emotional support & Supporting student Teacher sensitivity 0.40 Instructional learning • • learning behavior management expression 0.21 Effect Size (d wt ) • Regard for student formats 0.20 perspectives Scaffolding (concept Positive climate Student ideas considered • • • 0.00 development) Negative climate Reasoning/problem solve • • -0.20 -0.15 Quality of feedback Teacher sensitivity/tone • -0.20 • Connections to life • -0.40 Objectives explicit Behavior management Language modeling • • • -0.60 Consistent Routine • -0.80 -1.00 Facilitating deeper Emotional support/behavior Supporting student learning management expression TT TTPA
16 T eacher professional well-being: Does QP4G improve teacher well-being? Developed based on both new and previously validated survey measures, and analyzed using factor analysis: 1.00 0.80 Construct Measures Sample items 0.60 Motivation Adapted from Bennell & I’m highly motivated to: 0.35 0.40 Akyeampong (2007) …help children learn to read and write • (5 items, α = .64) 0.22 …help children develop well socially. • Effect Size (d wt ) 0.12 0.20 0.00 Burnout Maschlach Burnout Inventory How often have felt mentally drained from your • -0.20 -0.13 (Maschlach et al., 1996) work. (11 items, α = .0.85) -0.40 • How often do you feel fatigued when you wake up in -0.40* the morning. -0.60 -0.55*** Job dissatisfaction Adapted from Bennell & I want to transfer to another school • -0.80 Akyeampong (2007) I want to leave the teaching • (4 items, α = .72) -1.00 profession • Motivation Burnout Job Satisfaction TT TTPA
17 T eacher attrition: Does QP4G reduce the likelihood that teachers’ leave the school mid-year? Private Schools 0.5 YES 0.435 0.45 Notably, this occurred entirely Predicted probability of attrition 0.4 in the private sector . 0.35 0.3 0.25 The probability of a teacher 0.174* 0.2 leaving the school in the private 0.123** 0.15 sector was reduced by 82% . 0.1 0.05 0 Control TT TTPA
QP4G improves children’s school readiness, primarily social- 18 emotional development Construct Measures Sample items 0.25 0.20 Overall school readiness International Development and Early literacy, Early numeracy, Social-emotional, and 0.17* 0.15* Early Learning Assessment Executive Function skills (composite score) 0.14* 0.15 (IDELA); Save the Children, 2015. 0.11* 0.11 0.10 0.07 Early literacy IDELA Print awareness Oral comprehension 0.05 Effect size (d wt ) 0.05 Letter identification Phonological awareness (6 item sets, α = .73) 0.02 0.00 Early Numeracy 0.00 IDELA Shape identification One to one correspondence Number identification Size / length differentiation (6 item sets, α = .71) -0.05 -0.03 Social-emotional IDELA Emotion identification Conflict resolution -0.10 Empathy Personal awareness (5 item sets, α = .69) -0.15 Executive function IDELA Working memory -0.20 Inhibitory control (2 item sets, r = .27) -0.25 School readiness Early literacy Early numeracy Social-emotional Executive function TT TTPA
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