EYFS best practice in schools - Here and now

It could be argued that early years provision in school largely fits into three categories: the good, the bad and the ugly. As I have argued in this guide, the ‘ugly’ is the type of provision that pays no account to the child’s experience or to evidence about effective pedagogy. It is driven solely by external factors, such as high-stakes assessment data, or a wrong-headed drive to have a consistent style of learning across every age group so that nursery children end up with maths and writing books just like everyone else.

But it is much more common to find the ‘bad’: early years provision which is well-intentioned, but simply not very effective. Typically, this is the sort of provision which is informed by a desire to do the right thing. Practitioners may have attended training on play-based provision, or free-flow environments. But the problem is implementation.

FREE-FLOW PLAY

‘Free-flow’ is generally understood to mean that the children can move freely wherever they want within the provision. However, the ‘12 features of free-flow play’ set out by Tina Bruce (1991) actually make no reference to this. Instead, Bruce is advocating for play which is ‘intrinsically motivated’ with no ‘external pressure’ on the child. It might be initiated by either child or adult – but it will not be directed by an adult agenda. Bruce’s 12 features were elaborated, in part, to differentiate this type of play from structured, adult-directed play.

Developing provision that includes time for free-flow play involves careful consideration of what we mean by play, and what sort of subtle pedagogical approaches will lead to what the theorist Lev Vygotsky argued was ‘the highest level of pre-school development’. Practitioners will need to plan for the children to have many rich, first-hand experiences to support free-flow play. For example, in the Froebel Early Education Project directed by Chris Athey and with Ms Bruce as the teacher, the children took part in many visits – to the police stables, the farm, Kew Gardens, a helter-skelter in a fairground, and the Natural History Museum.

When setting out her definition of free-flow play in 1991, Ms Bruce drew particular attention to children’s play, drawing on their ‘previous first-hand experiences’ and using the ‘technical prowess, mastery and competence [they] have previously developed’. In other words, free-flow play may take place in a context where children can move freely between different areas but must have very carefully planned support. If the children have not developed ‘technical prowess, mastery and competence’, their play will not be rich.

So, where children are simply rocketing from one place to another, they are not engaged in free-flow play at all. Ms Bruce and Ms Athey very carefully planned to build on the individual interests of children, so that they extended their thinking and their pretend play, and so that their individual needs could be addressed. To quote the current chief inspector of schools, this was indeed a curriculum which was ‘broad, rich and deep’.

INVOLVEMENT

Another example of early years provision that is well-intentioned, but may also be ineffective, is where practitioners prioritise children’s ‘involvement’. This can lead to provision that is very calm and orderly, but also unchallenging. The fact that children appear to be ‘involved in their learning’ is not necessarily a sign that they are engaged in worthwhile education.

There is not space in this short guide to do justice to the largest-scale research project on early years education in England, the Effective Provision of Pre-school Education (EPPE) project. But, in brief, the project found that the most effective practice was characterised by high-quality learning environments, well-qualified staff led by qualified teachers, carefully planned play, and adults skilfully engaging with and sustaining shared thinking with children.

This type of pedagogy includes some direct instruction, as well as what the researchers call ‘reflexive co-construction’ (Siraj-Blatchford et al 2002) in which children’s ideas are taken as the starting point for extended and mutual investigation. The EPPE researchers argue that a simple measure of involvement ‘provides no basis for assessing the content of the engagement, e.g. to what extent the teacher’s intervention may be considered “worthwhile” or, with regard to “content”, whether the “correct” information is imparted’ (Siraj-Blatchford et al 2002).

For example, imagine if children were involved for an extended period of time experimenting with floating and sinking in the water tray; and imagine that this was brought together in a lovely class book which concluded by saying ‘children found that light objects float, and heavy objects sink’.

This would not have been a worthwhile educational process for the children, despite the time spent involved and the attractive resource produced at the end, because the scientific information is incorrect. However, imagine that a child had said ‘I think that heavy things sink’ and the practitioner had used this as the starting point for an extended joint-investigation.

That sort of ‘reflexive co-construction’ might have led to very worthwhile and deep scientific knowledge. Ms Athey and Ms Bruce took their group of children on boat trips along the Thames – I wonder how the idea that ‘heavy things sink’ would have struck the children as they got onto a hulking metal riverbus?

OVERSIMPLIFICATION

So, how might we turn away from the bad and the ugly, and set about developing the sort of practice which is good for children? It is important that theories such as ‘free-flow play’ (Bruce 1991), ‘involvement’ (Laevers 2003) and all the other fascinating ideas which are disseminated in conferences and through other networks are not put into action in over-simplified forms.

That is why I argue in my recent book Successful Early Years Ofsted Inspections (Grenier 2016) that we might consider the development of practice in three broad stages:

• Starting with ‘practice that works for you’.
• Developing on to ‘practice which works for you, and is consistent with the evidence base’.
• Finally, ‘developing leading-edge practice’.

It is a mistake to take ideas simplistically from the research, and crudely try to implement them in schools. All too often we end up in an ‘emperor’s new clothes’ situation where there are baffling theoretical explanations for practice which, on a closer look, is quite clearly not working well.

On the other hand, if the basic approach of the school’s early years is effective – the quality of talk and engagement is high, parent feedback is positive, and careful assessment shows that children are making strong progress from their different starting points – then the team will be ready to investigate the evidence base with confidence and develop practice further.

Helpfully, it has never been easier to do that – for example, the Education Endowment Fund has produced very helpful and accessible summaries of the evidence base, which can be used to read and learn further.

We must not look at early years from the wrong end of the telescope: as Dr Mary James says, this is not about ‘preparation for secondary schools at the age of four’. It is crucial that we consider our choices carefully and get things right for young children in our schools now.

MORE INFORMATION

Bruce T (1991) Time to Play: Play in Early Childhood Education. Hodder Education

Athey C(2007) Extending Thought in Young Children: A parent-teacher partnership. 2nd edn. Sage

Laevers F(2003) Involvement of Children and Teacher Style: Insights from an International Study on Experiential Education.Leuven University Press

Siraj-Blatchford I et al (2002) Researching Effective Pedagogy in the Early Years. Department for Education and Skills, http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/4650

For more on EPPE, see: www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/research/pdf/Effect_of_starting_pre-school_at_age_2_report.pdf and www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/research/featured-research/effective-pre-school-primary-secondary-education-project

Julian Grenier is the head teacher of Sheringham Nursery School in Newham, East London and a National Leader of Education. His latest book, Successful Ofsted Early Years Inspections, is published by Sage.Nursery World readers can receive a 25 per cent discount by using the code UK17AUTHOR when ordering from www.sagepub.co.uk/education

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