Accessibility and Effects of Quality Early Care and Education for Children with a Cumulative Risk in South Korea

• In Event: Poster Session 05
  In Poster Session: PS 05 Topic - School Readiness/Childcare

Abstract

School readiness is one of the strongest predictors of children’s academic achievement and future success (Duncan et al., 2007). Unfortunately, children with multiple risks (e.g. poverty and maternal depression) lack family resources and a supportive home environment and are cognitively and socioemotionally less prepared for school entry (Pratt et al., 2016). This situation is a dire obstacle to promote the developmental outcomes essential for at-risk children’s later achievement. To mitigate discrepancies in school readiness, providing high-quality early care and education (ECE) is vital (Duncan & Magnuson, 2013).
Recently, the childcare enrollment rate has increased dramatically following the development of the comprehensive ECE system in Korea. Well over 90% of 5-year-old Korean children are in childcare on a regular basis (Statistics Korea, 2019). The disadvantaged children are disproportionally enrolled in poor quality arrangements in the U.S. (Henly & Gina, 2018), but this finding needs to be confirmed in the Korean context, where a generous childcare subsidy is provided to all children. In addition, little attention has been paid to examining the extent to which high-quality ECE buffers the negative impacts of multiple risks on children’s school readiness. The present study aims to address the following two questions: (1) Are children with cumulative risk less likely to experience high-quality ECE in Korea? (2) Is high-quality ECE a promotive/protective factor for school readiness of children with cumulative risk?
Data are from the Panel Study on Korean Children, longitudinal data with a nationally representative birth cohort. The sample included children aged 5 in 2013 (N=1,662). Multiple risks were measured with cumulative risk by dichotomizing each risk factor with the cutoff at the top quartile and then summing the scores (Evans et al., 2013). Individual risk factors include maternal depression measured with the Kesseler Depression Scale (Kessler et al., 2002), parenting stress measured with the scale by Kim and Kang (1997), parent-child interaction surveyed through questionnaires from ECLS-K, marital conflict measured via the Prevention and Relationship Enhancement Program (Markman et al., 1994), poverty (income-needs ratio below 1), and early childhood home environment (Caldwell & Bradley, 2003).
Triadic splits of ECE quality are based on the composite score in two spheres: (a) structural quality (children-teacher ratio, center qualification, classroom size, sufficient play space, and class environment); and (b) process quality (teaching efficiency measured by the Teacher Self-Efficiency Scale (Bandura, 2006) and teacher-child interaction measured with the Early Childhood Observation Instrument (Bredekamp, 1985)). School readiness is measured in three domains: language and cognitive development measured with the scale developed by Lee et al. (2008) and aggressive behavior measured with the Behavior Checklist (Oh & Kim, 2009).
For the analyses, a chi-squared test examines the relationship between cumulative risk and ECE quality. Hierarchical regression analyses investigate (1) the association between cumulative risk and school readiness, and (2) promotive and protective effects of high-quality ECE on each domain of school readiness with controlling family and ECE covariates. The present study provides early childhood practice and policy recommendations for improving the developmental trajectory of at-risk children in Korea.

Author

• Jiwan Lee, Seoul National University
  Presenting Author