Social and emotional development of some of the world’s poorest children, as well as their academic progress have been “severely ruptured” because of school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new study.
Prior to the pandemic, children who felt confident talking to others or got on well with peers were less likely to do so by 2021.
Girls those who were already disadvantaged educationally and the very poorest, especially from rural areas seem to have been badly affected.
Children lost at least a third of a year in learning, as per two interlinked studies, involving 8,000 primary pupils altogether and published in the journal Longitudinal and Life Course Studies have revealed.
During the school closures, researchers in a study of over 2,000 primary school pupils in Ethiopia, found that key aspects of children’s social and emotional development, such as their ability to make friends, not only stalled but probably deteriorated.
In this research and an other one linked study of nearly 6,000 grade 1 and 4 primary school children, has also found evidence of slowed academic progress.
During lockdown, children lost the equivalent of at least one third of an academic year in learning, which researchers describe as “conservative”.
This has likely widened an already significant attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and the rest, and it is found that this may be linked to the drop in social skills.
Academics from the University of Cambridge, UK and Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia conducted both the studies.
The most visible evidence of a rupture in socio-emotional development was the lack of a predictive association between the 2019 and 2021 results. Children who felt confident talking to others before the pandemic had often changed their minds after two years.
Researchers have suggested that the negative impact on social and emotional development may be linked to the slowdown in academic attainment.
(With inputs)
