Study by Platas and Sitabkhan examines early math and literacy skills as predictors of achievement in students in Kenya

Author: CAD
August 15, 2022

Associate Professor Linda M. Platas and Lecturer Yasmin Sitabkhan of the Child and Adolescent Development Department coauthored an article, “School-entry predictors of lower primary reading and mathematics achievement in Kenya,” with colleagues in the journal Research in Comparative and International Education.

This paper shares the results of a large-scale longitudinal study in Kenya and examines to what extent school-entry early mathematics and literacy skills predict students’ later achievement. Controlling for socioeconomic status, intervention status, rural versus urban settings and parental literacy, the findings revealed that school-entry mathematics skills were significantly predictive of students’ end of Grade 2 mathematics and reading achievement in English and Kiswahili. Likewise, school-entry English early literacy skills predicted students’ end of Grade 2 mathematics and reading achievement in English and Kiswahili. As one of the first articles in this area of research in a low-income country, this article extends earlier research on links between elements of school readiness and later achievement in high-income countries.