Abstract

Early childhood development (ECD) initiatives are championed globally due to their proven ability to help children at risk of developmental delay attain their developmental potential. A comparative study was conducted using a mixed research approach to assess child development disparities among rural and urban children across the domain of child development. The study was conducted in Ilemela municipal and Mvomero districts representing urban and rural settings. Quantitative data were collected using the adopted ZamCAT tool administered to 334 children randomly selected from the 2017 children enrolled in the community-based early childhood development (CBECD) initiative. While qualitative data were collected using focus group discussions with the parents (n = 4) and in-depth interviews (n = 14) with the key informants. Quantitative data were analysed using the SPSS (version 25), and a content analysis was employed to analyse the qualitative data. Findings indicated a significant difference in child development status between rural and urban children (p = 0.009). A noteworthy difference was in favour of rural children with a large effect size (η2 = 0.142). Most children (90%) from rural settings were developmentally on track compared to urban children (79.7%). Furthermore, rural children outperformed urban children significantly in literacy numeracy (p = 0.000) and learning domains (p = 0.000). The observed disparities were due to more time invested by the parents from rural than the urban set-up on childcare. The study recommends that the government and ECD stakeholders engage in capacity strengthening for parents to ensure children attain their development potential.

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