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Competent children at 5: Families and early education

Author(s): 
Cathy Wylie, Jean Thompson, Anne Kerslake Hendricks

This report describes the competencies of 307 children in the Wellington region, just before they started school.

It shows how the children scored for 6 'being' competencies - communication, curiosity, perseverance, social skills with peers, social skills with adults, and individual responsibility - and for 4 'doing' competencies - literacy, mathematics, logical problem-solving, and motor skills.

The results show that low family income is the main factor associated with lower competency scores. Good-quality early childhood education experience clearly benefits all children. But to make a bigger difference for children from low-income families, ECE services need more resources, so that they can provide a higher standard of support.

5 years old and competent is a handy summary to this report.

Year published: 
1996
Publication type: 
Research report
Publisher: 
NZCER
ISBN: 
1-877140-00-7
Full text download: 
not full-text
Anne Kerslake Hendricks
Jean Thompson