By Emily Kowal
Australian kindergarten students whose classmates start school with core literacy and numeracy skills perform considerably better in maths and science by year 4, new research based on global test results has found.
The latest instalment of the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) asked principals to estimate how many of their year 4 students could complete 11 key literacy and numeracy skills when they started school.
St Luke’s Grammar School students Felix, Indiana, Mia, and Sally working on core skills that will support their learning in future years.Credit: Steven Siewert
The skills included recognising most letters of the alphabet, reading some words, identifying written numbers from one to 10, and doing simple addition and subtraction.
Analysis by the Australian Council for Educational Research found that, in schools where 75 per cent of students began school with at least six of the 11 skills, children went on to perform significantly better in the year 4 maths and science TIMSS tests.
On average, these children scored 570 in year 4 maths and 585 in year 4 science, placing them in the “high” benchmark for achievement.
In contrast, schools where less than 25 per cent of students started kindergarten with these foundational skills scored lower in year 4 maths and science tests: an average of 509 for maths, and 539 for science, placing them in the bottom of the “intermediate” achievement band.
Year 4 has long been considered a crucial year for student development, said Australian Council for Educational Research senior research fellow and report co-author Dr Dan Cloney.
“Learning is cumulative,” he said, adding that what a student learns from age two to four is “a really strong predictor” of their learning in upper primary and senior high school.
Researchers analysed results from 14,000 Australian year 4 and year 8 students, from 552 schools, who sat the TIMMS test. The test is held in 64 countries every four years.
They found just six per cent of Australian students attended a school where more than 75 per cent of their peers began kindergarten with most of the 11 core skills. The international average was 24 per cent, but the average Australian kindergarten student is younger than their international equivalent.
Cloney said vulnerable children were most at risk of falling behind.
“We have a system where the kids who are most vulnerable, have less early childhood programs available to them,” he said, noting it was “incredibly difficult and incredibly expensive” to remediate gaps between students as they advanced through their schooling years.
“It is much, much cheaper and more efficient to get onto these things early and make sure these gaps don’t emerge.”
Pre-school students at St Luke’s are taught some foundational literacy and numeracy skills as part of the program.Credit: Photo: Steven Siewert
St Luke’s Grammar School, at Bayview on Sydney’s northern beaches, offers a preschool where students are taught some foundational literacy and numeracy skills.
Head of Junior School Peter Scott said, as well as play-based and investigative learning, their prep students “choose their own tasks that might involve some counting or some sorting, it might involve some letter recognition or some jigsaw puzzles”.
“We are just starting to touch on basic literacy and numeracy, lots of reading stories, rhymes, getting them aware of letters and sounds,” he said.
Andrew Martin, professor of educational psychology at the University of NSW, said the results were not surprising.
“The findings reflect a large body of research that shows a strong start to school has long reach,” he said.
However, Martin said it was “not the be-all-or-end-all” if students begin school without these skills.
“These are highly learnable skills and significant change is possible in any student’s life. These children are young so they are very well-placed to be learning these skills. They can catch up in kindy,” he said.
“That said, the earlier [they learn them], the better.”
The Morning Edition newsletter is our guide to the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up here.