The equivalent of a third of a school year: this is what the children would have lost because of the drastic measures taken at the start of the Covid pandemic.
Many of them have indeed suffered substantial delays in their learning processes without catching up afterwards, according to a major study published Monday in the journal
Nature Human Behavior
.
These conclusions "confirm the fear that the pandemic has given rise to significant learning deficits", indicate this work, which is based on around forty studies carried out in around fifteen countries in Europe, the United States and Africa. from South.
"A crisis of inequality"
However, according to the researchers, there are significant disparities, in particular according to the background of the children.
The most disadvantaged thus tend to be the furthest behind.
“This learning crisis is a crisis of inequalities,” summed up researcher Bastian Betthauser, lead author of the study, during a press conference.
These delays are due to the measures taken at the start of the pandemic, in 2020, to combat the spread of the virus.
In many countries, they have included lockdowns and school closures.
A “real generational problem”
Even if the delays are limited to a few months, they can have major consequences later, to the point where Bastian Betthauser evokes a “real generational problem”.
"Education is one of the factors - perhaps the main one - which determines what will be the entry into working life, success in the job market, the ability to ensure one's subsistence" , he listed.
Some of the results of the study - which is the most comprehensive work to date on the subject even if it includes major gaps in the situation of poor countries - give an idea of how the delays have set in.
Thus, they tend to be much more important for math than for reading.
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