An evaluation of Pratham’s early years program focused on improving foundational skills

Early childhood is a critical period for acquiring foundational skills essential throughout a child’s education. The importance of mothers in supporting skill acquisition is recognized, but much remains to be known about how to effectively support both mothers and early childhood professionals to deliver high-quality early education. Pratham, J-PAL, and the Harvard Laboratory for Developmental Studies are partnering to evaluate the effectiveness of Pratham's early childhood education program's play-based curriculum that jointly supports mothers and preschool and early grades classroom teachers. The program targets physical, cognitive, social-emotional, and language skills. In addition to testing Pratham’s current approach, and answering critical implementation questions (including the impact of the length and age of exposure), this project will assess the feasibility and impact of integrating a novel Math Games curriculum into the program (previously found effective when delivered in schools), via activities distributed to mothers.