HOW TO ACHIEVE QUALITY EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION FOR ALL: GOAL 4 OF THE UNITED NATIONS SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

Obtaining a quality education is essential to creating sustainable development. The overarching Goal 4 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Program (UNSDP) ensures that all girls and boys complete free primary and secondary schooling by 2030. However, the early years represent the most important and vulnerable time period in the individual life-span and early education sets the fundamentals of achieving the overarching goal of SDG4. It is regarded as the golden time for ensuring strong foundations for life chances. Early Childhood Education (ECE) supports children’s survival, growth, development and learning, including  health, nutrition and hygiene, and cognitive, social, physical and emotional development D  from birth to eight years old in formal, informal and non formal settings. Therefore, the United Nations (UN) set a sub goal under this notion exclusively for the early childhood education; By 2030, ensure that all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood development, care and preprimary education so that they are ready for primary education (SDG 4.2). Following the United Nations’ notions, The dedicated member countries plan actions to achieve the necessities of the Goal 4 by 2030. These actions generally fall under eight categories: (1) Access and equity, (2) ECE governance, (3) Curriculum and pedagogy, (4) Teacher training, (5) Nutrition, (6) Family-School-Community partnerships, (7) Standards for learning environment, (8) Use of technology and digital materials. The presenter will provide information about these domains of improvement in order to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4.2.