Properly timed literacy improves student performance throughout school

Properly timed literacy is essential for a student’s good performance throughout their school life.

Students literate up to the 2nd year are 2.6 times more likely to reach an advanced level of learning in the 5th year of Elementary School, according to a study carried out by the Laboratory for Studies and Research in Social Economy (Lepes), at the University of São Paulo and from the Federal University of Ceará, with support from the Lemann Foundation and the Natura Institute.

Considering the subjects of Portuguese Language and Mathematics, the results showed a direct influence of the literacy period.

• The probability of a student reaching an advanced level in Portuguese in the 5th year is 55% if they were literate at the appropriate time and only 21% if they were not.
• In the case of Mathematics, the percentage is 40% among students who were literate until the 2nd year of elementary school and 15% among those who did not learn at this stage.

“The considerable difference between the learning performance of students who were literate at the appropriate time and those who were not gives us a warning sign that reinforces the importance of children reading and writing by the 2nd year of elementary school”, says Daniela Caldeirinha, director of Literacy at Fundação Lemann.

The director also states that the study corroborates the view that literacy at the correct time is essential for the student to fully develop.

Methodology

The study analyzed the performance of the same students when they were in the 2nd year and then in the 5th year of Elementary School.

The survey was carried out based on evaluations of students in Ceará’s education networks in 2016 and 2019, in addition to 2019 data from the Basic Education Assessment System (Saeb).

For the study, data was collected from more than 70 thousand students. Although the survey uses figures from Ceará as a reference, which provided information to enable the analysis, the researchers carried out an exercise to approximate the results of schools that, on average, have characteristics similar to those in the rest of Brazil.

In this scenario, in a national analysis, students adequately literate up to the 2nd year of Elementary would be 3.2 times more likely to be at an advanced level of Portuguese and 4 times more likely to be at an advanced level of Mathematics.