Critical Analysis of the Gap between Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) Children's Communicative Skills and their Learning Behaviour

Abstract

The early years of life are crucial for the development of language and communication. Within Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) frameworks, communication is an indicator and determinant of success in learning. Despite this, there is still a gap between the development of a child’s communication skills and the effective demonstration of learning behaviours. This study attempts to close this gap by examining the developmental, pedagogical, and sociocultural aspects. Applying mixed-methods, this research combines quantitative observational checklist data with qualitative data from interviews with teachers and parents. Findings indicate the potential of communication to predict a child’s engagement in learning, while a multitude of contextual factors, including socio-economic status, the level of interactions between teachers and children, and the degree of parental involvement, act as barriers. This gap can be reconciled with strategies that integrate responsive pedagogy, family engagement, and practices that embrace cultural diversity. Communication is the primary way young children start to make sense of their world, interact with others, and become ready to learn. During the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) phase, the foundations for later academic achievement and social success are built.  Research has shown that acquisition of essential communication skills during the formative years includes the development of expressive and receptive language, as well as the use of gestures and other nonverbal sign systems like facial expressions. These skills are the basis of participation in classroom discourses, curiosity venting, and peer relations building. Vygotsky (1978) and Snow (1999) highlight the significance of early language competence not only for academic learning, but also for the development of socio-emotional skills. A gap exists between what early childhood education (ECCE) frameworks hope to achieve and what is actually seen in children’s communication and learning outcomes. There are children with strong language skills who have little attention and motivation and children with speech delay who are highly inquisitive and persistent in their work. These cases point to important issues about communication and learning behaviors and why they are at odds. The global context of early childhood education (ECCE) adds complexity to the situation described above. In many developing situations, the opportunities for communication to happen meaningfully are very restricted due to large class size, multiple home languages, and inadequate teacher training. Even in cases where policy documents highlight the importance of language-immersive learning, poor implementation due to resource constraints and mismatched cultural expectations can undermine the goals of the policy. Therefore, addressing the gap between communication and learning, inequitable and ineffective early childhood education can delay the fundamental gaps left by ECCE.