Experimental Impacts of the Quality Preschool for Ghana - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Experimental Impacts of the ‘Quality Preschool for Ghana’ Interventions on T eacher Professional Well-being, Classroom Quality, and Children’s School Readiness Presenter: Edward Tsinigo Sharon Wolf, J. Lawrence Aber & Jere Behrman Global TIES for Children: Transforming Intervention Effectiveness and Scale

Outline of Presentation § Context § Video summary § QP4G interventions § Evaluation design § Results § Conclusions and policy lessons 2

Outline of Presentation 3

Context • The 2012 GES report indicates that the 2004 KG curriculum is sound, but that teacher behavior has not adapted to reflect new pedagogy. • Key priorities - • Train 27,000 untrained teachers in KG-specific pedagogy. • Engage parents and raise their awareness of KG- specific pedagogy. 4

The QP4G Project 5 • In partnership with Ghana Education Service , National Nursery Teacher Training Center , University of Pennsylvania, New York University and Innovations for Poverty Action : • Develop and test a nationally scalable model for teachers and parents with the goal of improving KG quality and children’s school readiness. • Two main parts – Teacher Training and Parental Awareness Interventions .

Intervention I – Teacher Training Program In-service teacher In-classroom monitoring and training coaching • Led by the NNTTC trainers • Led by the district education • Five-day training at the start coordinators of the school year • Classroom visits • Refresher trainings 4 and 8 months later

Intervention II – Parental Awareness Program Discussion with focus on: (1) play-based learning, 3 sessions of (2) parents’ role in child parental awareness Video learning, and meetings ( 1/term ) screening (3) encouraging parent- implemented teacher and parent- through PTA school communication meetings

Research Design School-randomized 240 KG schools Randomly assigned control trial to one group only: • 108 public • Stratified by public • Control group • 132 public and private KG • Teacher training schools program • Teacher training plus • Across 6 districts in parental awareness the Greater Accra program Region 8

Implementation: Are teachers integrating practices from the training in their classroom? Checklist with 15 teaching practices that were in the training. Teachers were videotaped teaching for 30-45 minutes. 6.0 5.0 Number of activities observed Teachers used 1.5 additional 4.0 “developmentally appropriate” activities 3.0 4.8*** during the lessons. 4.6*** 2.0 3.2 1.0 ES = 0.56 (TT), 0.61 (TTPA) 0.0 Control TT TTPA 9

Classroom quality: Does QP4G improve the 10 quality of teacher-child interactions? Developed based exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, we assess impacts 1.00 on three dimensions of classroom quality. ** ** 0.80 0.66 0.64 YES * 1 3 0.52 2 0.60 QP4G improves the quality of Facilitating deeper Supporting student 0.40 learning expression Effect Size (d wt ) 0.20 some teacher-child interactions: 0.09 Facilitating deeper Supporting student Emotional support & 0.00 Scaffolding (concept Student ideas considered • • learning behavior management expression -0.20 -0.11 development) Reasoning/problem solve • -0.16 a. emotional support/behavior Quality of feedback • • Connections to life • Positive climate -0.40 • Scaffolding (concept Student ideas considered • Objectives explicit Language modeling • • management, and • Negative climate -0.60 development) • Reasoning/problem solve • Teacher sensitivity/tone -0.80 b. supporting student expression • Quality of feedback Connections to life • • Behavior management Language modeling • • Objectives explicit -1.00 • Consistent Routine Facilitating deeper Emotional Supporting student learning support/behavior expression management TT TTPA

T eacher professional well-being: Does QP4G improve 11 teacher well-being? 1.00 NO 0.80 0.60 No improvement in 0.35 0.32 0.40 Effect Size (d wt ) teacher motivation and 0.11 0.11 0.20 0.00 job satisfaction . -0.20 -0.40 -0.40 -0.60 * YES -0.59 -0.80 ** Large reductions in -1.00 Motivation Burnout Job Satisfaction teachers’ burnout TT TTPA

T eacher attrition: Does QP4G reduce the likelihood 12 that teachers’ leave the school mid-year? Private Schools 0.45 YES 0.407 0.4 Predicted probability of attrition 0.35 The probability of a teacher * 0.3 leaving the school in the 0.268 * 0.25 0.223 private sector was reduced 0.2 by 45% . 0.15 0.1 Notably, the effects were 0.05 larger in the private sector . 0 Control TT TTPA

School readiness: Does QP4G improves children’s school 13 readiness? Which areas are impacts concentrated? 0.25 YES ** ** 0.18 0.20 0.16 Only the teacher training 0.15 0.13 * * 0.11 0.11 0.11 program improves 0.10 0.04 Effect size (d wt ) overall children’s school 0.05 0.03 0.00 readiness -0.05 -0.03 -0.03 -0.10 Impacts are -0.15 concentrated on -0.20 academic and social- -0.25 School readiness Early literacy Early numeracy Social-emotional Executive emotional outcomes function TT TTPA

One year later: Are teachers still using the practices from the 14 training? Does improvement in classroom quality still persist? YES 1 Teachers are still using 0.8 0.60 0.6 some of the training ** * 0.37 0.4 0.24 0.22 practices 0.2 0 NO -0.2 -0.26 -0.4 Improvements in -0.39 -0.40 -0.6 * classroom quality have * -0.8 -0.74 faded out or become -1 *** Fidelity checklist Facilitating deeper Emotional Supporting student negative learning support/behavior expression management TT TTPA

One year later: Are there sustained impacts of the 15 QP4G program on children school readiness? 0.3 YES + * 0.2 + 0.13 0.13 Marginal impacts on 0.11 0.08 0.1 children’s school 0.03 0.01 readiness 0 -0.05 -0.05 -0.06 -0.1 -0.07 Positive impacts on children’s social- -0.2 emotional skills persist . -0.3 School readiness Early numeracy Early literacy Social-emotional Executive function TT TTPA

16 Conclusions and Policy Lessons • QP4G is one of the first impact evaluations in sub-Saharan Africa to show an in-service teacher training can improve KG quality and school readiness. • The important role of refresher trainings and coaching visits is consistent with research in high-income country contexts. • Findings are consistent with related research , which find medium to large effects on classroom process quality and a small effects on child outcomes.

17 Conclusions and Policy Lessons • It would be important to assess if these effects persist to support children’s transition to primary school. • QP4G took place in the peri-urban communities. It is critical to consider if and how different contexts would require adaptations to ensure program success.

Thank you! Partners: New York University, University of Pennsylvania, National Nursery Teacher Training Center (NNTTC), Ghana Education Service (GES), Sabre Charitable Trust Funders: UBS Optimus Foundation, World Bank Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund, Early Learning Partnership Support and guidance: QP4G Steering Committee Research participants : All of the KG teachers and Head Teachers, and KG children and their caregivers that participated in this study. 18