Komu sprzyja szkoła? Różnice w rozwoju kompetencji poznawczych i społecznych dzieci w młodszym wieku szkolnym

For whom is the school beneficial? Differences in the development of competences in children at early primary school ageThis paper describes and analyses changes in the level of competencies to seek, process and create new information, i.e. of cognitive and social competencies that are essential for students to build their knowledge of the world and themselves. Empirical data was gathered through a longitudinal study aiming to discover the differences in the same participants’ level of competence over four time periods. The study focused on range, speed, and dynamics of change in the level of cognitive competencies, taking into account factor of time and initial (high, medium, or low) level of particular competency achieved by the students, as well as initial level of their sense of competence. The data gathered include the scores obtained by 127 children. The research was carried out at 6-month intervals, beginning in first class and ending halfway through the third year of primary school. Results show that school favors the development of competencies in only those children who exhibit low scores at the beginning of the study (in their first year of school). The scores achieved by the children whose initial level had been found to be high showed little improvement after three years of attending school. The students’ sense of competence decreases progressively in the consecutive years of attending school