Tan TX, Wang JH, Zhou Y. COVID-19 school closures and Chinese children's school readiness: Results from the natural experimental data.
BRITISH JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY 2024;
94:976-994. [PMID:
38839578 DOI:
10.1111/bjep.12699]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/14/2024] [Revised: 05/22/2024] [Accepted: 05/28/2024] [Indexed: 06/07/2024]
Abstract
AIMS
To determine the associations between COVID-19 school closures and school readiness skills for Chinese kindergarteners.
DESIGN
We utilized the natural experimental condition created by local COVID-19 outbreaks in 2022 (Study 1) to compare school readiness skills of children whose kindergartens were closed for 5 months (Group 1) with children whose kindergartens stayed open (Group 2). We further compared the school readiness skills of one pre-COVID-19 cohort (Cohort 2019) with one COVID-19 cohort (Cohort 2021) from a fifth kindergarten (Study 2).
SAMPLES
For Study 1, Group 1 included 445 children and Group 2 included 584 children aged 4-6 years. For Study 2, Cohort 2019 included 156 children and Cohort 2021 included 228 children aged 3-6 years.
MEASURES
For both studies, survey data on four school readiness skills were collected from parents. Additionally, Study 1 collected parental locus of control data from parents.
RESULTS
Controlling for covariates, Study 1 revealed that Group 1 and Group 2 did not differ in terms of language and emergent literacy or approaches to learning. However, Group 1 scored lower than Group 2 on health and well-being and arts and imagination. Study 2 revealed that Cohort 2021 scored higher than Cohort 2019 on language and emergent literacy but lower on the other three skills.
CONCLUSIONS
The associations of COVID-19 school closures with Chinese children's school readiness skills were not uniform, with a positive relation with language and emergent literacy and negative associations with health and well-being, approaches to learning, as well as arts and imagination.
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