Early childhood education and care around the world: An early start that prevails on reading literacy

This chapter delves into the interplay between family, socioeconomic status (SES) and Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC), and educational outcomes in reading literacy, highlighting the importance of high-quality early education. In previous studies, SES, encompassing economic and social indicators like parental income, education, occupation, and the availability of educational resources, is recognized as a pivotal factor shaping a child's educational journey. Further previous studies have also highlighted the importance of high-quality early education on children’s later educational outcome. Using data from the PIRLS 2021 (The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study) and PISA 2018 (Programme for International Student Assessment), this research investigates the effect of early childhood education on reading literacy achievement among 4th graders and 15-year-old students around the world. Further, we also investigated if the ECEC and SES effects on reading literacy at later ages is conditional on countries' human development. Here we use the human development index by UNESCO. According to the results, there was a clear variation between the effects of early childhood education and care on later reading literacy outcome in the measured countries around the world. These differences in the effect underscores the importance of rethinking policies and practices, especially in those countries where the effect of early education seemed to be negative. There were also statistically significant interactions between ECEC duration and ESCS when estimating reading literacy by regression on the plausible values for reading literacy for both PIRLS and PISA. This interaction was dependent on the human development index. The findings of this study are essential for policymakers as they highlight the nuanced relationship between early education, socioeconomic status, and human development across different age groups and regions.