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Trial Title
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Before
Engaging Parents and Children in Remote Learning: a Randomized Controlled Trial in China
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unavailable experiment
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Abstract
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Before
The COVID-19 pandemic led to prolonged school closures, severely disrupting early childhood learning and development. In response, I implemented an educational intervention via social media during the 2020 school closures, engaging 2,317 households across 100 kindergarten classes in Central China. This intervention emphasized the novel intersection of parental involvement and school-based education. Specifically, teachers provided structured weekly tasks to foster joint parent-child participation, while an extended group received additional teacher supervision. Over 10 weeks, the randomized controlled trial significantly improved children’s academic performance, non-cognitive skills, and reduced behavioral issues, with stronger effects in the extended group. Long-term follow-ups over three years revealed enduring effects, particularly in literacy. These gains were driven by increased parental involvement and shifts in parental beliefs. Notably, the intervention yielded greater benefits for children from lower socio-economic status, highlighting its potential to bridge educational gaps. At a cost of just 5 USD per child, the intervention demonstrates exceptional cost-effectiveness and strong scalability. Overall, these findings suggest that engaging parents during educational disruptions can effectively safeguard human capital and mitigate crisis-induced learning losses for early childhood populations.
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JEL Code(s)
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Before
C93, I21, I24
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Last Published
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Before
March 03, 2025 08:50 AM
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After
March 04, 2025 09:43 AM
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Study Withdrawn
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Before
No
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After
Yes
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Study Withdrawal Date
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Before
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After
March 04, 2025
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Data Collection Complete
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Before
Yes
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After
No
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Primary Outcomes (End Points)
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Before
Cognitive Skills:
Literacy: Measured through assessments of Chinese character recognition, Pinyin understanding, and basic word recognition.
Numeracy: Measured through basic arithmetic skills, including number recognition, addition, and subtraction.
Non-Cognitive Skills:
Big Five Personality Traits: Assessed through teacher evaluations based on children’s behavior during play and interactive activities, focusing on traits such as emotional regulation, self-control, agreeableness, and social interaction.
Academic Performance (Long-term):
Primary School Grades: Specifically, final exam scores in Chinese language and mathematics during follow-up assessments in the three months and three years after the intervention.
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Experimental Design (Public)
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Before
This study uses a randomized controlled trial (RCT) to evaluate the impact of educational interventions on children's cognitive and non-cognitive development during the COVID-19 pandemic. The intervention consisted of weekly educational instructions provided through a mobile platform (WeChat), with one subgroup receiving additional teacher supervision to ensure completion of tasks.
The trial involved 100 kindergarten classes from urban and rural schools across C City. These classes were randomly assigned to either a control group (no intervention) or one of two treatment groups: (1) a group receiving only educational instructions, and (2) a group receiving both educational instructions and teacher supervision.
Key outcomes include cognitive skills (literacy and numeracy), non-cognitive skills (measured using the Big Five personality traits), and long-term academic performance (final exam scores in Chinese language and mathematics). Data were collected at multiple time points: during the intervention, immediately after, and at follow-up assessments three months and three years later, when the children entered primary school.
The experimental design allows for the comparison of treatment effects on academic and personal development outcomes across different intervention conditions, with an emphasis on both immediate and long-term effects. The study aims to assess the potential for mobile-based educational interventions to mitigate learning disruptions during the pandemic.
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Randomization Method
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Randomization done in office by a computer
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Randomization Unit
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class
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Was the treatment clustered?
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Before
Yes
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No
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Planned Number of Clusters
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100 classes
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After
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Planned Number of Observations
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2317 children
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Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
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50 classes control, 25 classes received instruction only, and 25 classes received both instruction and supervision
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Additional Keyword(s)
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Remote Education, COVID-19, Randomized Controlled Trial, China
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Keyword(s)
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Education
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Other
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Public locations
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Before
Yes
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No
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