A Systematic Review of Pre-primary Education Interventions in Africa

Abstract

In this paper, we synthesise evidence on the effects of pre-primary education interventions on children's cognitive and socioemotional development outcomes in low- and middle-income African countries. These interventions focus on improving the access to pre-primary education or the quality of classroom instruction by offering training to teachers in schools and early-childhood development centres. Additionally, five of the six programmes integrated a parent-based education component aimed at improving parenting practises or knowledge through psychosocial stimulation, behaviour management and/or involvement in children's school-related activities. In general, the pre-primary programmes targeted children between the ages of 3 and 6 years, and the corresponding studies use experimental evaluation methods to estimate the effects of the programmes on children's outcomes around 1–2 years after the programme started. We find that, on average, these programmes are successful in improving children's cognitive outcomes by 0.10 standard deviations (p-value < 0.01). Similarly, on average, the pre-primary interventions are successful in improving children's socioemotional development by 0.09 standard deviations (p-value < 0.01). Overall, evidence points to the importance of the classroom as well as the home environment in mediating the effect of pre-primary education interventions on children's cognitive and socioemotional development outcomes.