Data Confirm Lockdowns Spell Disaster for Students

YERUSHALAYIM
A school in Teverya closed due to the coronavirus. (David Cohen/Flash90)

A study on the effects of three lockdowns on the Israeli educational system confirms the severe damage to children’s development, according to The Times of Israel on Sunday.

The as-yet-unpublished data reportedly indicate a multifold disaster: the number of students having difficulties in writing, math and other studies has quintupled and the dropout rate has tripled, said a senior education official familiar with the results of tests specially designed to measure the effects of the disruption of in-person schooling.

Those in lower socioeconomic communities were hit harder than their counterparts in more affluent areas, a finding in the U.S. as well.

But the study said that First Grade students, who went straight from kindergarten to online studies, without getting to know how a school functions and without meeting their teachers or classmates, suffered more than any other group, according to Dr. Eli Vinokur, vice president of the Gordon Academic College of Education.

Vinokur said that the requirement for basic reading and writing skills has been postponed by the Education Ministry to grade 2.

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