Islamic studies as early childhood education in countries affected by conflict: The role of mosque schools in remote Afghan villages Dana Burde a, *, Joel A. Middleton b , Rachel Wahl c a New York University, Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Program in International Education, 246 Greene Street, Suite 3, New York, NY 10003, United States b University of California, Berkeley, Department of Political Science, 210 Barrows Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720, United States c University of Virginia, Curry School of Education, 407 Emmet Street South, Charlottesville, VA 22904 1. Introduction Conventional Western views of Islamic education in Afghanistan assume that radical madrassas play a prominent role in educating Afghan children. In fact, the importance and prevalence of madrassas in Afghan society is dwarfed by another type of religious school commonly known among Afghans as mosque-based early education, or ‘‘mosque schools’’ for short. Because mosque schools are often confused with madrassas, it is important to highlight the differences between them. Mosque schools offer religious classes held in a mosque, taught by the local mullah, or religious leader. In Afghanistan, young children—up to age eleven or twelve—usually attend mosque schools to study the Qur’an and related religious texts and attend in the early morning for a couple of hours per day, often six days per week. Madrassas typically cater to older students, offer longer and more varied classes, and are sometimes boarding schools. Although no statistics are available on the total numbers of madrassas in Afghanistan, most qualitative and anecdotal reports indicate that while there may be several of them in cities, provinces often have only one per district, as was true in our study of community-based education in Ghor Province discussed below. 1 Indeed, madrassas in Afghanistan appear to play a negligible role in rural children’s religious education. In contrast, mosque schools play a prominent role in every day Afghan life and in educating young children. Of the 819 6–11 year-old children in our study described below, for example, only four (0.5%) attended a madrassa during the 2007–2008 study period while 688 (83.8%) attended a mosque school. 2’3 International Journal of Educational Development 41 (2015) 70–79 A R T I C L E I N F O Keywords: Development Literacy Educational policy Islamic education Early childhood education Education and armed conflict A B S T R A C T This paper examines the relationship between an early Islamic education and academic achievement in Afghanistan. Fears of political indoctrination have dominated discussions of Islamic schooling among many Westerners, making some policy-makers hesitant to support the kind of education to which most children in Afghanistan have access. In addition, misunderstandings of Islamic education as well as assumptions about the lack of educational benefits from pre-primary or primary Islamic schools have helped sideline them in policy discussions. But mosque schools may play an important role in preparing children for academic success. Children who attend mosque schools score better on tests of literacy than those who do not. This is particularly significant in countries like Afghanistan where many children do not have access to formal education. These findings suggest that mosque schools merit more careful attention. ß 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. * Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 212 998 5052. E-mail addresses: Dana.burde@nyu.edu (D. Burde), joel.middleton@berkeley.edu (J.A. Middleton), rlw4ck@virginia.edu (R. Wahl). 1 A number of these are ‘‘official’’ madrassas, managed by the Ministry of Education and sponsored by the state. Community-based schools, also registered with the government, are housed in existing local infrastructure—in the case of this study, usually in the mosque, but while mosque schools only provide religious education, community-based schools offer a full range of math, science, and language lessons from government textbooks. 2 It is likely that madrassa attendance in the region is overestimated in the popular press. In neighboring Pakistan, for example, according to some reports, madrassa enrollment may account for less than one percent of total enrollment in schools. In spite of such low enrollment, much has been made of the dangerous role these schools play in the country (Andrabi et al., 2006). 3 Although the children included in this study range in age from 6-11 and therefore are older than most who participate in early childhood education programs, we believe that because this is their first schooling experience, our findings are relevant to this type of education. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect International Journal of Educational Development jo ur n al ho m ep ag e: ww w.els evier .c om /lo cat e/ijed u d ev http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2014.10.005 0738-0593/ß 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.