Child development in the post-pandemic era An approach based on core functions

Four years after the pandemic began and two years since in-person classes resumed in schools, children’s development has been affected by lockdowns, virtual classes, and other socioeconomic factors. The objective of the research is to evaluate the development of basic functions in preschool-aged children from different schools in the city of Quito to determine the areas that are least developed, and that could have a negative impact on learning to read, write, and do math. A quantitative and descriptive methodology was used. A total of 388 students between the ages of 4 and 6 from 14 early childhood schools participated. The basic skills test proposed by the Ministry of Education was used. The results indicate that 44 percent of the children have not developed the basic skills. The main areas of difficulty are: visuomotor coordination, visual-auditory-motor coordination, pronunciation, auditory sequential memory, manual development, and laterality.