Starting school: young children learning cultures. By Liz Brooker. (Open University Press, 15.99, 01280 823388). Reviewed by Jennie Lindon, early years consultant
Liz Brooker has written a thoughtful book, drawing on her postgraduate research in order to make practical points about home-school links and diversity of background. The author tracked 16 children and their families from Bangladeshi and Anglo families over the course of their reception year in the same class.
The author came to the research as an experienced primary school teacher, and she is supportive of the task of the reception team. Yet her close involvement with the families, as well as the class, enables her to document in detail how widely the experience differed for individual families. One issue was to what extent parents really understood what was wanted by the reception team and how the early years curriculum worked.
Some parents had more confidence to ask, but other parents were confused and continued to be anxious about their children's learning.
Liz Brooker also highlights how little the school understood about some parents' support for learning, especially in the Bangladeshi families.
There is much food for thought about possible mis-matches between school policy and practice. One example is how some parents were far more able to access the reception staff in an open system of communication. Yet the theory was that any parents would approach the reception team if they wanted to say something. Some of the children emerge from the year with more encouraging prospects than their peers. It is daunting to have re-emphasised how much this first year in school can shape the prospects of children and the expectations of their parents, as there is a transition from what the author calls the 'child in the family' to 'pupil in the school'.
