The Early Developmental Status and Differences of Young Children in China: A Report from the EAP—ECDS Validation Study

Abstract

The study explores the status and differences in early learning and development of 1,785 children between 3 and 6 years of age in China. By adopting the East Asia-Pacific Early Childhood Development Scales( EAP-ECDS), the study examines child development in seven domains,including cognitive, social-emotional, motor, language and emergent literacy, health, hygiene and safety, cultural knowledge and participation, and approaches to learning. Findings demonstrate that children in China achieve a good level in early learning and development. Chinese children gain significantly better scores in six developmental domains except for motor development than those from other five countries in the East Asia-Pacific Region. In addition, there are regional and urbanrural differences in child development in China. Children from economically advantaged provinces and municipalities in the East and urban areas exhibit higher level of performances in different domains while those from the West and rural areas show significantly lower scores. However, there are differences in strengths and weaknesses in child development in different regions. Further,children from high quality kindergartens are more likely to show better performance in child development. The study indicates that there are economic and cultural differences in early learning and development in young children in China. Thus, to promote quality of all kindergartens might be an important pathway to improve development of children throughout China