1

FOREWORD
As countries across the globe increase their investment in early through a careful 3-year process, with piloting in multiple countries

childhood development (ECD) programs and policies, data on both with thousands of children, the IDELA was released for public use

children’s learning and development and the characteristics of the in 2014. It has been assessed in programs in 45 countries. It has

contexts they live in are important in guiding investments. The clearest also shown strong psychometric properties across the domains

policy context for this currently is the implementation of the Sustainable of motor development, emergent language and literacy, emergent

Development Goals related to ECD. In particular, Indicator 4.2.1 in numeracy, and social-emotional development. The IDELA as a leading

Sustainable Development Goal 4 (the proportion of children that are assessment of ECD is ready for use by an even larger number of

developmentally on track in health, learning, and psychosocial well- countries.

being) represents an unprecedented global commitment to a multi-

domain conceptualization of child development and learning in the first The IDELA has shown sensitivity to intervention impacts not only for

years of life. It sets an expectation that countries report nationally on programs that Save the Children implements but also for programs

the status of their young children’s development and learning, as a spur implemented by other NGOs and governments. In addition, it is

to policies for human and sustainable development. In this way, the starting to be used in some countries as a national monitoring tool, in

SDGs have recognized that a sustainable planet will not be possible nationally representative samples. This report represents an important

in coming years and decades without investment in learning and overview of the instrument and a set of case studies that show the

development starting from birth. range of uses for ECD program and policy implementation that the
IDELA can facilitate. As such, it is an invaluable resource for policy

Unfortunately, there have been very few direct child assessments that makers and practitioners engaged in supporting the developmental

are feasible to use at large scale in global contexts (e.g., across a potential of the world’s children.

range of low- and middle-income countries). Although parent or adult

report measures are an important component of an ECD measurement
strategy, direct child assessment is an extremely important supplement Hirokazu Yoshikawa

due to the independent nature of observation. Save the Children’s Courtney Sale Ross Professor of Globalization and Education and

International Development and Early Learning Assessment (IDELA) is University Professor, New York University

an important contribution to this limited area. Having been developed Co-Director, NYU Global TIES for Children Center
This report was jointly written by Save the Children colleagues working on IDELA: Nikhit D’Sa, Amy Jo
Dowd, Lauren Pisani, Renee Perez, Marianne O’Grady, and Sara Poehlman. Please direct all correspondence
regarding this report to Nikhit D’Sa ([email protected]).

For more information about the International Development and Early Learning Assessment (IDELA) please
navigate to www.idela-network.org

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This report would not be possible without the contribution of Save the Children colleagues and the external
partners using IDELA. Special thanks to Aisha K.Yousafzai, Frannie Noble, Gabriel Smith, Helen Kamal, Johan
Bentinck, Katie Murphy, Khosneara Khondker, Lauren Giffen, Olena Globa, Karma Dyenka, and Zannatun

Zahar for their contributions to this report.

Cover photo:
Children participating in learning activities at a community ECE center in Vietnam.
© Karin Kuhns
TABLE OF CONTENTS

2 Executive Summary
3 Investing in the first 2000 days
5 How is IDELA being used?
7 Impact: Exploring what works for children
© Save the Children

11 Equity: Understanding who is being left out and why

14 Collaboration: Building a common narrative around ECE
17 Advocacy: Working for change in ECE policy
20 Conclusion
21 References
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Evidence about the importance of learning opportunities in early children experiencing distress and displacement by providing nurturing,
childhood has been mounting in recent years, culminating with the safe, and consistent learning experiences through play, exploration, and
inclusion of pre-primary education in the Sustainable Development social interactions. The pilot PHC program demonstrated impressive
Goals (SDG). Despite the known benefits, global investment in Early gains across all the IDELA developmental domains and in the 2016-
Childhood Education (ECE) remains limited. A key constraint to 2017 academic year IRC expanded its reach to 3,000 refugee children.
investment is the lack of data on which ECE programs work for
children and why. Save the Children’s International Development and Collaboration: Building a common narrative around ECE
Early Learning Assessment (IDELA) is a tool aimed at plugging this With partners using IDELA from across and within sectors and
data gap, with a view to ensuring appropriate ECE programs are in countries, it provides us with a common language, enabling us to easily
place globally. collaborate. This can influence scale-able change for children that
goes above and beyond any one organization’s capacity to implement
What is IDELA? programs. One of the most powerful examples of organizations
IDELA is a direct child assessment that spans four developmental areas: coming together across contexts has been with excluded groups of
motor functioning, language and early literacy, numeracy, and socio- Roma children living in the Balkans and Eastern Europe. Together, Open
emotional development. The assessment can be used with children Society Foundations, Results for Development, Roma Education Fund,
aged 3-6 years and takes ~30 minutes to administer. The majority of Save the Children, Step-by-Step Foundation, and the World Bank have
the assessment is done through tasks and games, for example on letter been building evidence on ECE programming for Roma children in 14
and number identification or measurement and comparison. countries in the region. While each team will have strong evidence for
local programming, together their evidence in the region can be used
How is IDELA being used? at the highest levels of national and international decision-making.
Since IDELA’s public launch in September 2014, it has been used by
Save the Children and 22 partners (research institutions, international Advocacy: Working for change in ECE policy
aid organizations, civil society organizations, and government bodies) As countries set out to fulfill their commitment to providing quality
in projects across 45 countries—the uptake is growing by 1 country early childhood care and development opportunities for all children,
each month. Work in varied contexts proves that IDELA can be IDELA can help them identify areas for investment and solutions
adapted to new settings, program needs, and diverse cultural and with promise. It also gives us evidence to articulate the mismatch
language contexts. between current systems and what children actually need to succeed.
For example, The Ministry of Education, UNICEF, Save the Children,
Impact: Exploring what works for children and other national partners in Bhutan collaborated on an impact
Governments, academics, international NGOs, corporations, evaluation of the national ECE program. This national assessment has
private schools, and local NGOs use IDELA to learn if and how led to new government and civil society initiatives to reach the most
ECE interventions work for children, with a view to improving and socially, culturally, and geographically marginalized children.
expanding future interventions. For example, using IDELA, a pilot
conducted by EQUIP-Tanzania in 2015 found that the introduction of The future of IDELA
a 12-week school readiness intervention was comparable to results One of IDELA’s greatest strengths and what sets it apart from other
from the more traditional 2-years of pre-school programming. This available ECE tools is its proven feasibility, adaptability, and rigor
success led to an expansion in the number of school readiness centers in varied contexts. IDELA can be administered consistently in low-
and community teaching assistants, benefiting 150,000 children across resource settings and can quickly identify which strategies will most
seven regions in Tanzania. effectively improve results for children. To shift the reality of children
in LMICs we need to leverage measurement that proves what works;
Equity: Understanding who is being left out and why IDELA is such a lever.
IDELA allows partners to identify groups of children who may lag
behind peers or not have program access at all. For example, Lebanon In 2017 and beyond, we look forward to seeing a continued and
is now sheltering over one million registered Syrian refugees; of the increased uptake of IDELA, and an improvement in ECE across the
126 thousand refugee children of pre-school age, 90% have critically globe as a result. By doing this, significantly more young children will
unmet ECE needs. To respond to this the International Rescue reach their developmental potential and enter school more prepared
Committee (IRC) began piloting a 4-month program, Preschool to succeed.
Healing Classrooms (PHC). PHC responded to the needs of young

2
 © Save the Children
INVESTING IN THE
FIRST 2000 DAYS
Young children learning to count Evidence about the importance of stimulation investment in Early Childhood Education

at an ECE center in Bangladesh and learning opportunities in early childhood (ECE) remains limited. Across high-income
has been mounting in recent years, culminating countries, pre-primary education investment
with the inclusion of pre-primary education stands at 0.6% of members’ collective Gross
in the 2015 Sustainable Development Goals Domestic Product (GDP) and varies from 0.1%
(SDG). Early stimulation and learning in Australia to 0.8% in Denmark and Spain
opportunities through quality pre-school can (Putcha & van der Gaag, 2015). In LMICs, public
support lifelong development and success, pre-primary investment differs similarly from
especially in Low and Middle-Income Countries 0.5% of GDP in Mexico to .01% of GDP in
(LMICs) (Britto et al., 2016; UNICEF, 2015). Indonesia (Levin & Schwartz, 2012).
There is substantial evidence regarding the
importance of investing early to support future A key constraint to increased investment is
outcomes such as improved learning, improved the dearth of information about which ECE
inter-generational health, and breaking cycles programs work for children, why they work,
of violence (Heckman & Masterov, 2007; and how to most efficiently diversify programs
Yoshikawa et al., 2013). for varied sub-populations. In LMICs, there is
limited guidance on the “how to” of programs:
The global education community has a how to get a return on investment and how to
significant distance to go to meet SDG 4.2: all boost children’s early development, especially
girls and boys having access to quality early for children from socio-cultural minorities. Key
childhood development, care, and pre-primary questions to be addressed include:
education. Despite the known benefits, global

7
• Which ECE programs work, when, and for which children? Chavan & Yoshikawa, 2013). It also needs to explore the multiple
• How do we understand which populations are being left out developmental domains—cognitive, social & emotional, academic,
from ECE programs, or which populations are not advancing motor functioning—that children need to develop before they
despite participation in ECE? enter primary school (Snow & Van Hemel, 2008). Skills that
• How do we capture the current status of ECE in order to children develop across these developmental domains, not just in
advocate for more investment and better quality programs? the academic domain, are important for future success, especially
for children from low-resource contexts (Heckman, 2006; Izard et
An important issue in addressing these questions is the need for al., 2017).
better data. Despite the existence of tools designed to measure
early learning and development internationally, few tools have The International Development and Early Learning Assessment
proven to be appropriate and feasible in LMIC contexts while (IDELA) is a holistic, rigorous, open source assessment for
also being psychometrically rigorous. The possible solutions to 3-6-year olds. IDELA is a direct child assessment that measures
achieving SDG 4.2 are going to vary; researchers, practitioners, motor development, emergent language and literacy, emergent
and policy makers need a tool to measure children’s development numeracy, and social-emotional development. In Table 1 we
feasibly and with rigor across different investment options. present an overview of the main constructs and items covered
by IDELA in these four domains. IDELA also includes optional
To ensure that this happens, the tool needs to be low cost, questions related to executive function (short-term memory
easy to use, reliable, and culturally relevant (Barrett, Sayed, and inhibitory control) and approaches to learning (persistence,
Schweisfurth, & Tikly, 2015; Bartlett, Dowd, & Jonason, 2015; motivation, and engagement).

MOTOR DEVELOPMENT EMERGENT LITERACY EMERGENT NUMERACY SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL

DEVELOPMENT

Hopping on one foot Print awareness Measurement and Peer relations

comparison
Copying a shape Expressive Emotional awareness
Classification/
vocabulary
Drawing a sorting Empathy
human figure Drawing a
Number Shape identification
human figure
Folding paper identification
Perspective taking
Letter identification
Shape identification
Self-awareness
Emergent writing
One-to-one Conflict resolution
Initial sound correspondence
discrimination
Simple operations
Listening
Simple problem
comprehension
solving

Table 1. Overview of constructs and items covered by IDELA

In practice, this means that assessors play a series of games students can be trained to reliably administer the assessment.
with children where the child is asked to do things like draw This flexibility means that IDELA can be easily adapted and
pictures, listen to a story and respond to comprehension contextualized to different national and cultural contexts.
questions, count different quantities of beans, and identify ways Evidence from IDELA gives us the ability to look into the impact
to solve a conflict with a friend. Local materials can be used and of different types of programs for young children to determine
community members like teachers, health workers, and university what works and which investments to test at scale.

4
 © Colin Crowley
HOW IS IDELA
BEING USED? Four-year-old Jacenta at an ECE center in Rwanda

Since IDELA’s public launch in September 2014, its uses and users us understand protocols for adapting IDELA to better evaluate
have expanded, growing on average by one country each month. the social and emotional abilities of children, and for addressing
IDELA has now been used or is being used by Save the Children issues children raised in their answers, like being sad when their
and by 22 partners (research institutions, international aid parents hit them. IDELA is a living tool that continues to grow
organizations, civil society organizations, and government bodies) and expand in line with the increased attention to and investment
in projects in 45 countries. See map below for an overview of in young children across the world.
countries where IDELA has been and is being used. Because of
this expansive use, IDELA was highlighted in the Lancet’s early Over the last few years, IDELA users posed a common question
childhood development series as an influential development in the across programs: how do we know if our work helps young
ECE field (Black et al., 2016). children reach their developmental potential and enter school
more prepared to succeed? IDELA, with the consent and
Although IDELA is built around a set of 22 core items, work in collaboration of thousands of children across the world, has
varied national and cultural contexts proves that IDELA can provided users with the data they need to answer this question
be adapted to new settings, program needs, as well as cultural well. It has supported program evaluations, randomized control
and language contexts. For example, using IDELA with the trials, iterative program improvement cycles, comparison of
Government of Bhutan added to the bank of questions around different ECE interventions, school entry assessments, national
spiritual and moral development. Working on the first Chinese monitoring data, analysis of equity gaps, and evidence-based
version added learning on how to adjust to character-based advocacy. In the rest of this report, we provide a description of
rather than alphabet-based languages. Collaborating with four major ways IDELA contributes to our knowledge about ECE
partners like Universidad del Norte in Colombia (see box), helped programming.

5
 also seeks to reduce the impact of risk factors such as violence,

UNDERSTANDING maltreatment, or neglect on children.

CHANGE IN SOCIAL In order to document the impact of the Pisotón program on the
children participating in the pilot implementation of the training

AND EMOTIONAL process, UNINORTE conducted a research study focused on

children’s psycho-affective development across 7 departments

DOMAIN IN COLOMBIA of the country. Researchers used IDELA in a pre-post impact

evaluation with two groups of children: those participating in
the program and others not engaged in Pisotón. A detailed
During 2016 the Universidad del Norte (UNINORTE) in
analysis of the study data is still in process, but preliminary
Barranquilla, Colombia trained, in partnership with the
findings show positive results of the implementation of Pisotón
Colombian Institute of Family Welfare (ICBF), 800 early childhood
for the psycho-affective development of boys and girls. In the
teachers in 8 departments of the country (San Andrés, La Guajira,
future, it is expected that IDELA will be used both to evaluate
Casanare, Putumayo, Cauca, Arauca, Caquetá, and Vichada) in
the characteristics of the children participating in the program
the application of the Program of Psycho-affective Development
and to continue evaluating program impact. Further research will
and Emotional Education (Pisotón). Through its play-based
also include all IDELA domains as primary outcomes of interest
techniques, Pisotón seeks to reinforce strategies that help children
in order to account for possible effects of the program on other
to recognize, express, and manage their emotions in order to
areas of development.
adequately solve the common conflicts they face. The program

6
© Susan Warner

IMPACT: EXPLORING WHAT

WORKS FOR CHILDREN
Story time at a Head Start Governments, academics, international traditional 2-years of pre-school programming

center in the United States NGOs, corporations, private schools, and (see box). Understanding this successfully in
local NGOs use IDELA to learn if and how a small trial can often lead to programming
ECE interventions work for children. They at a larger scale and retesting to ensure the
also look to learn how to improve future benefits remain. With more programs running
implementation. Comparisons can mean more trials with the same metric, solutions
considering impact across different delivery and consensus for ensuring young children’s
mechanisms, like understanding the effect of development will emerge faster than with
a 12-week school readiness intervention for many players using different yardsticks to
children in Tanzania as compared to the more demonstrate and evaluate progress.

11
 significantly shorter than the traditional one- or two-year pre-

IMPACT OF 12-WEEK school program and was also different in its use of community
support and volunteerism to enable its start-up and operation.

SCHOOL READINESS Using IDELA, the impact study demonstrated that children who

PROGRAM IN participated in the 12-week school readiness program were on

par with the children who had one or two years of pre-school

TANZANIA programming across emergent literacy, emergent math, social-

emotional, and motor development. The children’s average scores
were also considerably higher than children who had no access
EQUIP-Tanzania designed a school readiness pilot study in
to a preschool program. This success has led to an expansion
2015 with an aim to address the under provision of preschool
in the number of EQUIP-Tanzania school readiness centers
education services and the need to support children prepare for
and community teaching assistants so that as many as 150,000
entry into primary school in Tanzania. The 12-week program
children will benefit from quality learning opportunities close
provided a basic introduction to Kiswahili, essential because of
to their homes through approximately 3,000 school readiness
the high proportion of children in the target population who
centers in seven regions of the country.
did not speak Kiswahili at home. This preparation program was

Along with research partners from University of Maryland and

RANDOMIZED Daystar University in Nairobi, the UBONGO team conducted a

randomized control trial to assess the impact of Akili and Me on

CONTROL TRIAL OF pre-primary children in Morogoro, Tanzania. The study took place
in nine government primary schools and children were selected

EDUTAINMENT for the study based on the following criteria: (a) child was
between the ages of 4-5 years, (b) Kiswahili was spoken by the

PROGRAM IN child as a first language, and © child was from a low or middle-
income family. The children were assessed using IDELA before and

TANZANIA after a five-week intervention completed in the classroom.

After controlling for differences in age, gender, and children’s

Having identified the challenges that children face when entering
baseline knowledge, the research team found that the average
primary school, UBONGO developed an ECE-focused education
child in the intervention group demonstrated impressive gains in
program for pre-primary children. This show Akili and Me was
most of the IDELA developmental domains as compared to peers
designed in part around the IDELA competencies and created in
in the control group. For example, children who watched Akili and
conjunction with a Tanzanian creative team to ensure that the
Me demonstrated a 9% gain in fine motor skills and a 13% gain in
educational cartoon complied with international pre-primary
emergent literacy as compared to children in the control group.
standards and was in an environment familiar to viewers in
Tanzania.

8
© Asad Zaidi

Gul learning to read at a community

ECE center in Pakistan

Implemented in partnership with the National Commission

PREPARING YOUTH for Human Development in the district of Naushero Feroze,

Sindh, Pakistan, this training, and mentorship program fostered

TO SUPPORT SCHOOL knowledge and competencies among female youth to deliver

quality ECCE as well as support their professional and personal

READINESS IN growth. The program used an evidence-based ECCE curriculum,

adapted to be locally relevant. Female youth delivered ECCE

PAKISTAN during one year to children aged 3-6-years. Each youth leader
delivered two sessions per day lasting three hours (morning and
afternoon shift).Young children attended class five days per week.
Target 4.2 of the SDGs states that by 2030 we need to ensure
that all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood
The pilot program evaluated benefits to both youth leaders and
development, care, and pre-primary education so that they are
young children.Youth leaders were accepted as ECCE providers in
ready for primary education. The shortage of early childhood
the local community and their personal and professional growth
trained educators in the workforce challenges the achievement of
was enhanced. Children’s school readiness, assessed using IDELA,
this goal. The LEAPS1 project (Youth Leaders for Early Childhood
showed significant benefits in the intervention group compared
Assuring Children are Prepared for School) was designed by
with the children not participating in this program. The pilot
the Aga Khan University in collaboration with researchers at
project shows promise for a model that can benefit children’s
Harvard and Yale Universities to address the early childhood
school readiness by addressing gaps in the ECCE workforce.
care and education (ECCE) workforce gap in Pakistan by training
female youth, 18-24 years, to deliver community-based ECCE
services.

1 LEAPS was supported by grants from UNICEF and the Saving Brains Program, Grand Challenges Canada.
9
© Save the Children

Five year old Vokti writing in a notebook in an ECE class in Bangladesh

When attempting to measure the impact of ECE programs it is ASQ in a sample of 138 children in Bangladesh in 2015. IDELA’s
important to consider whether the tool can validly measure child four developmental domains had strong and positive correlations
development and whether it is sensitive to changes through the with the domains measured by the ASQ (r = .33 - .61). This
course of an intervention. In the case of IDELA, is the tool able to suggests that IDELA is measuring similar developmental domains
measure child development at least as well as other international as the ASQ. In addition, the IDELA tool displayed more normal
child development assessments? One of the most commonly used distributions and was more sensitive to factors related to child
assessments in low and middle-income contexts is the Ages and development during multivariate regression analyses (see Figure
Stages Questionnaire (ASQ). IDELA was tested alongside the 1 below).

IDELA literacy score distribution (measured as percent correct) ASQ communication score distribution
% of sample

IDELA social-emotional score distribution (measured as percent correct) ASQ personal-social score distribution
% of sample

Figure 1. Comparing IDELA and ASQ scores for the same sample of 138 children from Bangladesh

Additionally, IDELA has been found to be sensitive to numerous and stimulation levels (Wolf & McCoy, 2017). IDELA has also
environmental factors, intervention modalities, and intervention been used to test the impact of programs focused on promoting
intensities. For example, the tool was able to detect the effects literacy and math skills like the Ready Set Go (RSG) program
of a purely home-based (caregiver focused) intervention from the World Bank and Roma Education Fund in Romania, as
(Borisova, Pisani, Dowd, & Lin, 2017) and differentiate between well as social-emotional skills through programs like Pisotón
environmental predictors of child development, such as poverty developed by the Universidad del Norte in Colombia.

10
© Victoria Zegler

EQUITY: UNDERSTANDING
WHO IS BEING LEFT OUT AND WHY
Adamou and his friends in As a tool for continuous program disability. The findings help practitioners and

the Maradi Region of Niger improvement, IDELA allows leaders to reflect policy makers better understand whether
deeply on programmatic strengths as well girls or boys, rich or poor, or those who
as identify groups of children who may lag speak a minority language are falling behind
behind peers or not have program access in early learning and development.
at all. In its earliest uses, IDELA shed light
on the early learning and development of This equity lens can illuminate the need for
children with and without access to ECE course correction, rendering interventions
opportunities. In one such longitudinal study, more effective for more children over time.
children without access to ECE in Ethiopia For example, finding that children from
barely registered a change in developmental minority language groups in Laos and
status over five months, a shocking finding Vietnam score significantly lower in literacy
for a group of 5-year-old children (Dowd, development than peers from the majority
Borisova, Amente, & Yenew, 2016). language group facilitates advocacy and
additional inputs so the children reach the
Beyond binary access/no access comparisons same skill level as their peers who speak
of ECE programs, IDELA uses a Home the language of instruction in the formal
Environment Tool to ask the caregiver about schooling system (Save the Children, 2017).
the context in which the child is growing. Attention to these equity issues at a young
These data enable analyses relating to age when children’s brains are most primed
equity vis-à-vis household socioeconomic for learning is essential so that they can
status, parental education, sex, language, and develop to their full potential.
MEASURING EARLY Four-year-old Natasha attends a Child Friendly
Space in Eastern Ukraine

LEARNING AND
DEVELOPMENT FOR

© Save the Children

ROMA CHILDREN IN
UKRAINE
Education levels within the Roma population in Ukraine are pressures in their daily work as well as how to prevent their
persistently low. 24% of adults report having no education at all, formation in children.
and one in three Roma children do not attend school. Officially,
primary and secondary education in Ukraine is free, but many One important step in this initiative was an assessment to identify
Roma families report that they cannot afford the expenses the knowledge and skills of children and investigate how the
associated with school such as books, stationery, and unofficial project could reduce gaps between Roma children and their non-
“contributions” for school renovations. In addition, approximately Roma peers. In cooperation with regional education departments,
12% of Roma families indicate discrimination as a reason for USSF used IDELA to measure the school readiness skills and
not sending their children to school. Providing equal access to development of children aged 4-6 years in the Transcarpathia and
quality education for all children, in particular for Roma children, Odesa regions. Large differences were found between the skills
in the context of child-centered, inclusive education, is one of the of Roma children and their non-Roma peers at the beginning of
main strategic focuses of the Ukrainian Step by Step Foundation the school year and these gaps persisted over time. With regards
(USSF). to basic math and literacy, Roma children showed roughly 20%
lower results than their non-Roma peers. The lowest difference
Under the “Ensuring quality education for Roma children in found during the assessment was in the motor skills domain (both
pre-schools and primary schools” project, USSF has established gross and fine) where the difference was 7%.
parenting and teacher focused interventions to holistically
support early education for Roma children in Ukraine. The Staff engaged with the program reflected on these findings, noting
parenting initiative encourages Roma caregivers to be more that it would be difficult for the Roma children to catch up with
effective teachers and advocates for their children and raises their peers, and also that it could be discouraging to compare
awareness about simple yet effective strategies to increase themselves with peers who had stronger school readiness skills. In
children’s interest and confidence in learning. To create supportive addition, they observed that many Roma children struggled with
educational environments, USSF works with pre-school and learning Ukrainian as a second language. While the study results
primary school teachers to implement inclusive child-centered displayed that there is still more work to be done to support
approaches, as well as introduce Roma classroom assistants Roma children’s early education in Ukraine, the team felt that the
and active cooperation with Roma parents. In this work, USSF IDELA tool helped to identify the most challenging domains and
discusses the issues of stereotypes, prejudices, and social stigma areas of development for the Roma children they served.
with teachers and helps them understand how to reduce these

12
 3-5) living in tented communities in Northern Lebanon (Akkar

SUPPORTING THE and Bekaa regions). The project aligned with the Government of
Lebanon’s national NFE Framework and the UN Lebanon Crisis

DEVELOPMENTAL Response Plan (LCRP). The curriculum drew from the Lebanese
Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE) preschool

NEEDS OF REFUGEE curriculum and was focused on strengthening social-emotional

skills to build young children’s resiliency.

CHILDREN IN LEBANON PHC responded to the needs of young children experiencing

distress and displacement by providing nurturing, safe, and
After more than six years of conflict, the Syria crisis is the largest
consistent learning experiences through play, exploration, and
humanitarian crisis of our generation. Lebanon, a nation of
social interactions. Classes of approximately 22 children were
approximately four million citizens, is now sheltering 1,067,785
co-led by 1 Lebanese teacher and 1 Syrian facilitator, all of
registered Syrian refugees, 54% of whom are children between
whom received a 4-day training, weekly lesson plans, and regular
3-18 years of age (Government of Lebanon & the United
monitoring and coaching. The program ran for 3.5 hours per day,
Nations, 2017). This includes 126,406 young children of pre-school
5-days a week, and provided children with play-based activities,
age (3–5 years old). To address this challenge, the Government of
using daily routines that included theme-based learning centers,
Lebanon developed and implemented the “Reaching all Children
circle time activities, free play, read alouds, and morning and
with Education” (RACE) Plan to deliver education opportunities
closing meetings.
for all children, including Syrian refugees. The objective of the
plan was to ensure all children have access to quality learning
As a pilot program, the evaluation strategy did not include a
opportunities in safe and protective environments. Despite having
control group, but rather a pre-post evaluation using IDELA.
achieved significant results, considerable challenges remain.
The aim was to understand if PHC could effectively support
Around 287,000 Syrian children between 3-17-years remain out
the developmental needs of refugee children. The pilot PHC
of school, including 114,000 young children with critically unmet
program demonstrated impressive gains across all the IDELA
ECE needs.
developmental domains. The findings suggested that quality
preschool programs can help improve young children’s school
To respond to this need, in April 2016 International Rescue
readiness by developing critical cognitive, physical, and social-
Committee (IRC) began piloting a 4-month program, Preschool
emotional skills. In the 2016-2017 academic year, IRC expanded
Healing Classrooms (PHC), with 300 Syrian young children (ages
its reach to 3,000 preschool-aged children in Akkar and Bekaa.
© Save the Children

Four-year-old Farah playing outside in a refugee camp in Bekaa Valley, Lebanon

13
© Save the Children

COLLABORATION: BUILDING A COMMON

NARRATIVE AROUND ECE
ECE facilitator engages children One of the aims of IDELA is to create a IDELA in impact evaluations (11) or program

in outdoor activities in Bhutan platform for dialogue across partners including monitoring (7), and fewer are using it for
practitioners, policymakers, researchers, and national monitoring (2) or to inform program
donors. By using common measures and design (1). Most IDELA uses have focused on
indicators, partners form a shared language learning in pre-primary centers or schools (14),
across and within sectors where none might while a few looked exclusively at the home
otherwise exist. IDELA supports building (2), and a handful combined home and center
a narrative of evidence, of successes and in their investigations (5). In partners’ studies,
failures in supporting child development, which IDELA uses have spanned many different
crosses multiple programs, implementers, and types of programs and sectors, including
interventions. This common narrative can cash transfers, child protection, education
influence scale-able change for children that in emergencies, health, inclusion, primary
goes above and beyond any one organization’s education, technology, and youth. Many
capacity to implement programs and thus different types of programs affect children’s
better ensure that all children learn and early learning and development and it is clear
develop to their full potential. IDELA meets these programs wide breadth of
evaluation and monitoring needs.
An analysis of 21 partner projects (see Figure
2 below) shows that the majority are using

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 Figure 2. Different ways in which partners report using IDELA (n=21)

In order to ensure this breath of partner experience results in No tool has yet proven to reliably measure learning and
collaborative understanding around ECE programs, we have development for 3-6-year olds in a consistent way across
to ensure that IDELA validly measures the four developmental contexts. IDELA is currently better suited to an in-country
domains and that it measures the same underlying constructs in comparison of scores rather than comparisons across countries.
the same way across contexts. In other words, it may not be appropriate to compare the
emergent literacy score of Roma children in a project in the
In 2016, researchers from New York University (NYU), with Ukraine with the emergent literacy score for Roma children in a
funding from the World Bank, completed a study on IDELA’s project in Albania, especially if the tool is in a different language
construct validity. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses and has been adapted separately. However, this should not, and
using data from a project site in Ethiopia established that IDELA has not, stopped partners from using the common language of
items were organized into the four hypothesized developmental IDELA to start conversations about children’s developmental
domains—motor development, emergent language and literacy, needs, the kinds of programs that support children’s early
emergent numeracy, and social-emotional development—and development, and the children who are being left behind.
that scores from these domains could be reliably pooled into a
total IDELA score (Wolf, Halpin,Yoshikawa, Dowd, & Pisani, 2017). One of the most powerful examples of different organizations
Further analyses confirmed this factor structure in datasets from coming together across contexts to use IDELA evidence to
project sites in four additional countries: Afghanistan, Bolivia, further advocacy and promote investment for a disadvantaged
Uganda, and Vietnam (report forthcoming). group of children has been around Roma children living in the
Balkans and Eastern Europe. Together, the Roma Education
Additional analyses by colleagues at NYU focused on whether Fund, with support from the World Bank, and the Step-by-Step
IDELA measured the same skills in the four developmental Foundation with support from Open Society Foundations,
domains in different countries. Because IDELA was designed to trained teams in 14 countries in the region to use IDELA to build
be adaptable, each team that uses it goes through a rigorous evidence within their programs. The benefits of this work will be
process of adaptation and contextualization. Given this, it was two-fold: on their own, each team will have stronger evidence
important to understand if IDELA was still measuring the same for local advocacy, and together, evidence across 14 countries
underlying skills in different contexts. The results displayed that in the region can be used at the highest levels of national and
while some items were consistent across countries, overall the international decision-making.
assessment was measuring slightly different constructs in the
different contexts where the tool was adapted. Building a strong body of evidence takes time, but we are already
seeing collaboration and progress from these initiatives. For

15
 example, a panel at the 2017 World Organization for Early program is implemented in 15 communities throughout Serbia
Childhood Education (OMEP) conference in Opatija, Croatia in collaboration with Deep Dive and the Centre for Interactive
shared a range of ways that IDELA is being used to measure the Pedagogy and Romanipen. At the same conference Save the
effectiveness of ECE programs for improving the school readiness Children presented findings from a study of an inclusive and
of Roma children. Included in the panel was the evaluation of integrated ECE program in Albania, funded by the Roma
programming for Roma children in schools and communities Education Fund and the MEDICOR Foundation. The IDELA study
in the Ukraine which is highlighted earlier in this report. The tested whether the program can address significant differences
panel also included an example from Results for Development between the school readiness skills of Roma children and their
(R4D), which is using IDELA and a home environment tool non-Roma peers.
in an impact evaluation of a Roma parenting program. The
© Save the Children

Six-year-old Othman learning to play

football in a refugee camp in Lebanon

16
 © Save the Children

ADVOCACY: WORKING FOR

CHANGE IN ECE POLICY
Children playing with blocks at IDELA provides a way to discuss intervention More importantly, IDELA helps us conduct

an ECE center in Bhutan options for Indicator 1 of SDG 4.2: the data-driven advocacy that can push
proportion of children under 5 years of age governments to accomplish Target 4.2. By
who are developmentally on track in health, helping civil society and research institutions
learning, and psychosocial well-being, by sex. understand the effect of different program
As countries set out to fulfill their commitment modalities and explore equity dimensions of
to providing quality early childhood care and the current ECE system, IDELA allows the
development opportunities for all children, ECE community to further effective data-
IDELA can help them identify areas for driven advocacy to ensure that all young
investment and solutions with promise across children receive quality ECE programming
four key developmental domains: motor and/or pre-primary education. For example,
development, emergent language and literacy, in Bhutan, IDELA allowed all ECE providers to
emergent numeracy, and social-emotional come together with the Ministry of Education
development. to understand the effect of different program
modalities and explore which children were
being left behind (see box).

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 (CSOs), Community, and Private—as well as a sample of non-

PROGRAM EXPANSION formal education (NFE) parenting programs and a comparison

group of children who had no access to ECE programming. The

AND DIVERSIFICATION aim was to explore which type of ECE center program, if any,
supported stronger learning and development gains for children

AFTER NATIONAL ECE (Pisani et al., 2017).

STUDY IN BHUTAN This national study resulted in two government initiatives to

help address school readiness and ensure that Bhutan can meet
its SDG 4.2 target. First, the national study showed that early
literacy and math skills were among the weakest skills and that
a focus on these areas would be critical to preparing children for
school. As a result, Save the Children launched a national Early
Literacy and Math (ELM) program reaching all the ECE centers in
© Save the Children the country, with the support of the Ministry of Education.

Second, the study brought to the fore the importance of ECE

and the fact that the most socially, culturally, and geographically
marginalized children had the lowest access to ECE
programming. This suggested the need to focus on alternative
models to ECE that strengthen parenting or community support
for early learning for those most in need. The Government is
now exploring different ways of reaching disadvantaged children

Phuntso playing with a in rural communities through alternative models. In 2017, Save
the Children initiated a partnership with the Ministry of Health
puzzle board at an ECE center in Bhutan
to pilot ELM at Home in combination with UNICEF’s Care for
ECE center programming has been steadily expanding in Bhutan,
Child Development program in areas where children do not have
in accordance with the Government’s Realizing Vision 2020:
access to ECE centers.
Education Sector Strategy. Although this policy states that “All
children aged 0-5 years will be supported to enhance their
More broadly, this initiative highlighted the power of using the
intellectual, emotional, and physical development through a
same tool across implementing partners in a national monitoring
program that enables them to grow in their familiar and natural
study. With the limited government funding allocated to ECE,
environment,” no systematic evaluation had been completed
there are often multiple groups delivering ECE services based
to gauge the most impactful and sustainable model(s) for the
on the needs of children in different communities. A national
country.
monitoring study like this delivers information about children’s
early learning and development across implementing partners
The Ministry of Education, UNICEF, Save the Children, and
and provides a common metric and language for all actors to use
other national partners in Bhutan collaborated on an impact
to advocate together for further investment from the government
evaluation of the national ECE center program to understand
and other funders. It also provides a benchmark against which to
the impact of various types of ECE program models across the
measure the success of future initiatives.
country on children’s learning. This study drew a random sample
of different types of ECE centers—Civil Society Organizations

18
 While the government of Bangladesh made strides to provide

LEVERAGING AN ECE quality universal pre-primary education, there were still

important challenges that needed to be addressed. First,

NETWORK TO REACH there was limited national-level evidence about the progress
being made in ECE. Second, the children who were socially or

ALL CHILDREN IN geographically marginalized in the country had the least access
to the universal pre-primary program.

BANGLADESH BEN explored alternative pathways to reach children without

access to formal ECE centers. Through the BEN platform, Save
Though the Government of Bangladesh has a long-standing
the Children pursued scale-up efforts of several programming
commitment to ECE, in 2002 the UNICEF-supported ECE
models for children from marginalized communities, including
programs in the country reached only a small proportion of
ECE for garment factory children, school based pre-primary,
young children. This led UNICEF and Save the Children to
Early Years Pre-primary for 3-4-year olds (EYPP), Early Literacy
form a national network of organizations working for young
& Math (ELM), parenting education, alternative school readiness
children. In 2005 this network grew into the Bangladesh ECE
camps, and Reading for Children (RfC). Save the Children has
Network (BEN). It conducts advocacy, shares information and
drawn on IDELA-generated evidence of these programs to
experiences, supports cooperation, and builds the capacity of
advocate for urgent transitional strategies. As Save the Children
ECE stakeholders through its 172 member organizations.
continues to advocate for the youngest and most marginalized
children with the Government, IDELA will help build the body
Advocacy from BEN played a key role in the government
of evidence needed to support children with strategic focus and
announcing a new National Education Policy in 2010, a policy
investment.
that establishes pre-primary as the first stage of the education
system. The aim of the policy was to include all 5-year olds in
pre-primary programming, followed by all 4-year olds once the
initial target has been reached.

© Susan Warner

Coloring time at a community ECE center in Nepal

As our partners generate data they enrich a growing body mismatch between current systems and what children actually
of evidence to mobilize ECE stakeholders. Not only do we need to succeed. To shift the reality of children in LMICs we need
learn how to answer important questions about children’s to leverage measurement that proves what works; IDELA is such
development, but IDELA also gives us evidence to articulate the a lever.

19
 Children at a childhood center in
© Save the Children Sikasso, Mali

CONCLUSION

With an ever growing network of partners, IDELA actively enables underfunded government ministries as well as small
supports the use of evidence to inform decision making and community service organizations to use the same tool as
improve practices for dozens of ECE program stakeholders academic and multilateral institutions, thereby bringing them into
around the world. It is used to establish impact and explore the conversation. The established rigor gives all parties confidence
equity, to harmonize the evidence base and leverage more that the results are meaningful and valid, enlivening partnerships
voices for change. Using IDELA as a common platform builds toward the common goal of all children being ready for school
evidence for ECE that has the potential to push programming and and reaching their potential.
investment toward high quality, inclusive options. Its accessibility

20
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 © Save the Children

Children coloring and drawing at an ECE center in Egypt