Paste youReducing Inequality in Early Childhood Education
Introduction
Inequality in early childhood education is caused by four primary factors. These factors include: educational and linguistic outcomes of bilingualism; various cultural beliefs that determine socialization and parenting styles; lack of sufficient stimulation of language and cognitive development in family engagements; and accumulation of psychological and socio-economic risks (McGinnity, McMullin, Murray & Russell 2017, 105). The most affected children are those from immigrant families, ethnic minority, and low-income groups. This article addresses the four causes and probable solutions to address the issue of inequality in early childhood education in Ireland and other countries in Europe.
Keywords: ECEC- Early Childhood Education and Care, L1-First language, L2-Second Language, OECD- Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development
Four Major Causes of Inequality
The Influence of Bilingualism on Language Development
Bilingualism remains a detrimental condition in unfavorable social circumstances. Only children with linguistic and cognitive benefits enjoy “balanced” bilingualism, especially in areas of linguistic awareness and attention control. Balanced bilingualism means that the child has exceptional proficiency in mother tongue (LI) and second language (L2) and has reached the age-appropriate or mature level (Murray 2017, 90). Such children develop both qualitatively (like in social prestige and higher levels of complexity) and quantitatively (like in exposure and adherence to the instruction time).
Bilingual development happens both successively and simultaneously. In successive bilingualism, the child acquires L2 to a specific level before commencing to learn L2 (Murray, McGinnity & Russell 2016, 103). The predominant language used at school is L2 while L1 is the primary language used at home. Simultaneous bilingualism happens when the language begins to acquire both the first and the second languages at the same time.
Parenting Styles and Child Rearing Beliefs
Child rearing belief systems mainly comprise of religious notions about the best ways to teach children. The traditional roles of teachers and parents play a central role in shaping children development. Belief systems are dynamic frames of teaching models and cognitions that provide robust strategies, goals, values, and interpretations in child rearing (Murray 2017, 99). There is always a need to make a precise distinction between “conventional collectivistic” and “contemporary individualistic” beliefs.
Murray et al. (2016) point out that the modern views focus more on artistic and intellectual excellence, competitiveness, self-will and emotional independence (105). Immigrant parents from traditional non-schooled cultures tend to combine strong individualistic and collectivistic child-rearing beliefs to secure the best school careers for their children. The conventional collectivistic views are closely related to lower social integration, lower school achievement, psychological issues, lower IQ, and cognitive delays.
School Preparation at Home
Surveys on patterns of informal education like parenting teaching approaches show vast differences between households that correlate with immigrant and socioeconomic statuses. The same distinctions account for the variation in children’s academic motivation, school achievement, language development, cognitive development, and intelligence acquisition (McGinnity et al. 2017, 107). Based on parents’ literacy skills and education, differences exist between families that in turn influence language and literacy development in children. Children from immigrant and ethnic minorities are less prepared for both formal and informal schooling.
Accumulation of Socioeconomic Risks
The elevated risks present in social-economically marginalized families adversely affect intellectual skill development, social adjustment, social-emotional competence, and school achievement. Some of the socioeconomic risks include health problems and low birth weight. Other factors include confrontations with violence and crime, poor housing conditions, frequent changes of residence, single parenthood, marital conflict, and parents with depression (Murray et al. 2016, 107). Children from the ethnic minorities more often feel disrespected, discriminated against, and marginalized by the majority society.
Poverty also happens to be an overarching problem to the widespread socioeconomic issues. A study performed by several experts in the education sector revealed that the social networks of Moroccan and Turkish families in the Netherlands were smaller compared to those of Dutch households (Murray 2017, 104). The study showed the direct consequences of immigration to a new society that leave majority of close friends and relatives in the home country. Even in Ireland, children from immigrant families lack sufficient social networks and face increased socioeconomic risks.
Recommendations
The OECD has issued a policy brief that discusses the importance of ECEC and the solid policy structures that can be employed in many countries in Europe to break the vicious cycle of inequality and assure quality education to all schooling children in the region. High-quality ECEC will enhance cognitive and social development, especially in children from ethnic minority and socioeconomically marginalized backgrounds. Affordable ECEC will also provide parents with an opportunity to engage in the national workforce actively and make additional income to rear and educate their children. Only 70 percent of children aged between three and five years are in ECEC while only a 33 percent of children aged below three years are in ECEC (McGinnity et al. 2017, 109).
In some nations like Denmark and Iceland, the rates of children participating in ECEC are quite high (over 60 percent) including children from disadvantaged backgrounds. However, the gap is quite higher in other European countries like France and Ireland. The affected nations can increase participation in ECEC by expanding the current legal rights to guarantee quality education to all children regardless of their backgrounds (Siraj-Blatchford & Pramling-Samuelsson 2016, 13). Other initiatives can include lowering the childcare expenses for low-income households, minimizing participation taxes for second household taxpayers and encouraging more women to participate in the national workforce. Tax credits and cash benefits can also help to reduce the cost of ECEC.
Conclusion
Inequality in early childhood education and care is caused by the four major factors discussed in this research. Countries like Ireland and France need to adopt the policies suggested by OECD to ensure equality in ECEC. Every child deserves quality and affordable education. The suggested policies should empower both children and parents from socio-economically disadvantaged groups.
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