Afghanistan ECCD Study, November 2015

This study provides a cross-sectional summary of young children’s skills and development and is the first of its kind in Faryab, Saripol, Kandahar and Kabul provinces. Save the Children’s International Development and Early Learning Assessment (IDELA) was used to measure children’s early development and learning and a caregiver questionnaire was used to interview parents. Across the four provinces, 2927 children between 3 and 6 years old and their families were included in this study, half of whom were enrolled in an Early Childhood Care and Development (ECCD) program and half of whom were living in the same villages but not enrolled in an ECCD program.

Looking at children’s early skills, this study finds that children attending ECCD centers have significantly stronger skills in all areas (motor, literacy, numeracy, socio-emotional, executive functioning and learning approaches) compared to children who are not enrolled in ECCD centers, even after controlling for children’s age, gender, home learning environment, family possessions, reading materials at home and father’s literacy. This study is cross-sectional so the results cannot be attributed to the ECCD programming these children received but the significantly stronger skills found for children in ECCD centers across all domains do suggest that children are benefitting substantially from attending ECCD programs.