This paper presents the results of a nationwide very low-cost behavioral intervention aimed at increasing preschool attendance in Uruguay. Specifically, behaviorally-informed messages were delivered through the government's official mobile app. We document a large reduction in absenteeism, as...

This paper analyzes gender bias in teaching in low-performing schools in Chile. To carry out the analyses, the authors used videotaped classes for fourth graders and coded 237 tapings. Results show a general (although not uniform) bias in teachers' actions that resulted in less attention to...

This paper analyzes whether teachers’ attention to boys and girls differs in low-performing schools in Chile, where large gender gaps in test scores are also observed. We coded 237 videotaped classes of fourth graders, identifying specific behaviors of teachers toward boys and girls. The...

We evaluate the effects of a 10-week intervention that randomly provided access to remote coaching to parents of preschool children over the summer break in Peru. In response to learning losses during school closures induced by COVID-19, education coaches offered guidance and encouragement to...

In this article we evaluate the effectiveness of ethnomathematics education among indigenous children: the JADENKÄ program. This intercultural bilingual program has been designed to strengthen the mathematical and ethnomathematical skills of the Ngäbe preschoolers in Ngäbe-Buglé, a comarca...

Play during early childhood is key to stimulating children's physical, social, emotional, and cognitive development. However, research on play-based learning is largely limited to high-income countries, and little is known about the use of hybrid interventions (which combine in-person and remote...

This study documents the size and nature of "Hindu-Muslim" and "boy-girl" gaps in children's school participation and attainments in India. Individual-level data from two successive rounds of the National Sample Survey suggest that considerable progress has been made in decreasing the...

This paper documents disparities in cognitive development-as measured by a receptive vocabulary test-between children from households with high and low socioeconomic status (SES) in two different phases of childhood (before and after early school years) in four developing countries: Peru,...

This paper provides unique evidence of a reversal of gender gaps in cognitive development in early childhood. We find steep caste and gender gradients and few substantive changes once children enter school. The gender gap, however, reverses its sign for the upper caste, with girls performing...