Starting behind and staying behind in South Africa

Nicholas Spaull () and Janeli Kotze

International Journal of Educational Development, 2015, vol. 41, issue C, 13-24

Abstract: This study quantifies a year's worth of mathematics learning in South Africa (0.3 standard deviations) and uses this measure to develop empirically calibrated learning trajectories. Two main findings are (1) only the top 16% of South African Grade 3 children are performing at an appropriate Grade 3 level. (2) The learning gap between the poorest 60% of students and the wealthiest 20% of students is approximately three Grade-levels in Grade 3, growing to four Grade-levels by Grade 9. The paper concludes by arguing that the later in life we attempt to repair early learning deficits in mathematics, the costlier the remediation becomes.

Keywords: Mathematics; Learning trajectories; South Africa; Hierarchical Learning; SACMEQ; TIMSS (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:injoed:v:41:y:2015:i:c:p:13-24

DOI: 10.1016/j.ijedudev.2015.01.002

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