Enabling Environments: Movers - Move on up!

Physical activity is often overlooked in early years settings, or seen through the narrow lens of whether children play outdoors. Now settings can draw on the Movement Environment Rating Scale (MOVERS) to raise the quality of their environment and pedagogy in this vital area of young children’s development.

The MOVERS is about children moving and playing, being physically active, and thriving in the world of the child, and provides settings with the tools to achieve this by self-assessing their current practice, identifying areas for improvement and planning for professional development.

Significantly, the scale incorporates critical thinking, so offering a wider perspective of children’s engagement in this Prime curriculum area and enabling practitioners to see the crucial links between cognitive and physical development.

Environment Rating Scales (ERS) are used widely internationally to assess and improve quality in provision and practice, and many early years practitioners in the UK will be familiar with some of them – most probably the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scales (Revised) (ECERS-R) and ECERS-E (Extension). These were among the methods used to define quality practice and provision in the Effective Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education (EPPSE) project (Sylva K et al,1997-2014), the UK’s first major study to focus on the effectiveness of early childhood education (see www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/research/featured-research/effective-pre-school-primary-secondary-education-project).

Building on ECERS was first the scale for Sustained Shared Thinking and Emotional Well-being (SSTEW) (Siraj et al, 2015) and now MOVERS (Archer and Siraj, 2017).

Ideally, practitioners should use ECERS-E, SSTEW and MOVERS together, as combined they cover the three key inter-related developmental domains for children aged two to six years of age: the cognitive, social-emotional and physical.

Like the other scales, MOVERS is divided into subscales; in this case:

• Curriculum, environment and resources.
• Pedagogy.
• Supporting physical activity and critical thinking.
• Parents/carers and staff.

The subscales, in turn, are divided into different items, and settings can score themselves in each on a range of one (inadequate) to seven (excellent). There are 11 items in the scale altogether.

This is the first ERS that includes photographs of children taking part in some of the movement patterns referred to in the supplementary information, such as tummy time, crawling, hanging upside down, and using fine motor skills.

THE ADULT ROLE

The role of the practitioner runs through the entire MOVERS, since it is pedagogical practice that influences children’s learning and development, and can expand or limit children’s experiences.

Through the MOVERS, we aim to show adults how they can support learning and provide an environment in which children can make choices about what they want to do and how their bodies need to move and be physically active at any time they feel the urge to do so.

We advocate a wide-ranging perspective on environments indoors and outdoors, such as the inclusion of different surfaces – for example, grass, earth and wood chippings; a place for children to dig for worms or splash in their wellington boots in the mud; a place outdoors for both fixed and portable equipment; and natural environments for planting, growing and harvesting food.

Key influences in helping us define the adult role were Alison Gopnik and Lev Vygotsky, along with the developments in how best to support children’s critical thinking.

Gopnik, a developmental psychologist, advocates for a ‘playful view’ of childhood for the pre-school child (2016). She suggests that young children flourish the most in an environment in which they are free to explore and discover the possibilities of the provision for themselves. The adult’s role in this environment is to know when to step in to play with children, to support a tricky move, or stand back and be available nearby, or to know when the child is ready to face the challenge safely alone.

Vygotsky’s (1978) concept of the Zone of Proximal Development highlights the difference between what a child can do independently and what they can do with adult guidance. According to Vygotsky, the adult’s role, therefore, is to assist the child in their playful exploration in order to extend and enhance their learning (Siraj-Blatchford, 2009). This can also be achieved between peers.

SUSTAINED SHARED THINKING

The interplay between the adult and child is crucial to the emergent development of the child. Effective pedagogical interactions are sustained through shared thinking, defined as when ‘two or more individuals work together in an intellectual way to solve a problem, clarify a concept, evaluate activities or extend a narrative’ (Siraj-Blatchford, 2009).

Sustained shared thinking (SST), conceived by Siraj, involves the co-construction of high-quality interactions between adults and children and among children. Since then, SST has been further developed and applied to non-verbal interactions, relating to younger children and babies or children with English as an additional language (Siraj et al, 2015).

In our study (Archer and Siraj, 2015b), we observed periods of sustained movement ‘conversations’ when peers engaged in movement-play together in small groups, such as during rough-and-tumble play.

During such activities, children moved together, exploring the potential of their own bodies, concentrating and persisting as they encountered new movements, extending their ideas through collaborative learning in movement.

Adults nearby watched eagerly, valuing the children’s exploration of movement, and it is this understanding and appreciation of children’s interactions that we aim to achieve through MOVERS.

CASE STUDY: TRAINING

Training in movement and physical activity is key to ensuring staff are knowledgeable and confident in delivering this vital curriculum area. In-service training ensures that all staff have heard the same message and develop a consistent approach (Archer and Siraj, 2015a). The importance of training was reinforced when we piloted an early version of MOVERS.

To assess the quality of movement-play before and after training, staff teams in some settings received no training, while others, including managers and deputies, received one day of movement training and four follow-up sessions.

Before the training, children were engaged in low levels of physical activity with little or no adult involvement (Archer and Siraj, 2015b). After the training and follow-up sessions, there were significant improvements, with adults encouraging, prompting and joining children in their movement activities.

This readiness to embrace a more interactive role meant that most adults adopted a Vygotskian approach, becoming active agents in supporting children’s range of movements. The improved quality of support, in turn, helped the children to expand the range and scope of their physical activity.

Where settings used only the scale and did not receive training, the adults still tended to stand back and observe children rather than engage with them in their movement activity.

MORE INFORMATION

Movement Environment Rating Scale (MOVERS) for 2-6-year-olds provision. Improving physical development through movement and physical activityby Carol Archer and Iram Siraj (Trentham Books: IOE Press, £14.99). To order a copy, visit: www.ucl-ioe-press.com/books/early-years-and-primary-education/movement-environment-rating-scale-movers-for-2-6-year-olds-provision/

REFERENCES

Archer C and Siraj I (2015a) Encouraging Physical Development Through Movement-Play. Sage

Archer C and Siraj I (2015b) ‘Measuring the quality of movement-play in early childhood education settings: Linking movement-play and neuroscience’, European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 1 (1)

Evangelou Met al(2009) Early Years Learning and Development: Literature Review. DCSF

Gopnik A (2016) The Gardener and the Carpenter. Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Siraj I, Kingston D and Melhuish E (2015) Sustained Shared Thinking and Emotional Well-being (SSTEW) Scale for 2-5-year-olds provision. Trentham Books: IOE Press

Siraj-Blatchford I (2009) ‘Conceptualising progression in the pedagogy of play and sustained shared thinking in early childhood education: A Vygotskian perspective’, Educational and Child Psychology, 26 (2), 77-89

Vygotsky LS (1978) Mind in Society. Harvard University Press

Carol Archer is an early years advisory teacher at the London Borough of Camden. She can be contacted at: movement0to6@gmail.com

NW SHOW 2018

Carol Archer will be among the seminar speakers at our Nursery World Show in London on 2 and 3 February 2018. The show is now open for registration and the full masterclass and seminar programme is available at: www.nurseryworldshow.com/london/seminar-and-masterclass

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