Poster #68 - Associations between Family Engagement and Early Childhood Development Outcomes: Results from a National Study in Colombia

• In Event: 1-169 - Poster Session 04
  In Poster Session: PS 04 Section - Education, Schooling

Integrative Statement

Introduction: Interest on the links between family engagement and children’s development has increased in recent years (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2017; National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2016). Family engagement —conceptualized as a multi-dimensional construct— includes parental behaviors both at home and at school to support children’s development. A wealth of studies has shown that higher levels of family engagement are positively associated with the development of social and academic skills. In addition, there is evidence to suggest that high levels of family engagement may reduce developmental gaps associated with socioeconomic differences (Dearing, Kreider, Simpkins and Weiss, 2006). Although some studies have explored these associations in low-income children, evidence from low- and middle-income countries in which families often have inflexible and extended work schedules is scant. This study contributes to this literature by exploring whether center-based and home-based family engagement are linked to children’s outcomes in a nationally representative sample of early childhood centers in Colombia.
Methods: The sample for this study was composed of 3,687 low-income children (50.5% girls; mean age = 4.36, SD = .64) enrolled in 312 public centers and their parents. We used the International Development and Early Learning Assessment (IDELA) to assess children’s developmental outcomes (i.e. mathematics (α=.87), language (α=.75), socioemotional skills (α=.73), motor development (α=.87) and executive functions (α=.84)). Two scales were generated to assess parental engagement at home and in the centers. The first was a home-based family engagement scale, that characterizes the activities parents apply in the home to promote their children’s development (e.g. read, count, name, sing, play, draw (α=0.74)). The second was a center-based family engagement scale, that includes activities parents engage in at the center (e.g. attending parent-teacher meetings, attending school events, visiting or observing classes, and receiving orientation to support children’s development (α=0.65)). Multilevel models (for center, classroom and child, with center and classroom random effects) were used to estimate the association between home-based and center-based family engagement and children’s outcomes. A set of classroom (teacher’s education, instructional quality, cognitive-content activities) and family characteristics (parental education, household assets index) were included as controls in the models.
Results: Both home-based and center-based engagement scales were significantly associated with higher average scores of cognitive (i.e. mathematics and language), socioemotional and motor development, even after controlling for child-gender, age, household-level and classroom-level characteristics. Associations were stronger for the home-based family engagement scale. No associations were found between family engagement (either home- or center-based) and executive function development.
Conclusion: These findings support the existing evidence that family engagement can contribute to enhancement of critical developmental domains during early childhood. To our knowledge, this is the first study to characterize family engagement and child outcomes using a nationally representative sample in Colombia. This is also one of the only studies linking home and center-based family engagement while controlling for instructional quality in the centers. The evidence supports the inclusion of families both at home and within the centers as a central aim from educational policy and programming perspectives.

Authors

• Maria Catalina Rey Guerra, Universidad de los Andes
  Presenting Author

• Carolina Maldonado-Carreno, Universidad de Los Andes
  Non-Presenting Author

• Liliana Angelica Ponguta, The Yale Child Study Center
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ana Maria Nieto, Lego Foundation
  Non-Presenting Author