Foundation Stage Profile shows inequality gap continues to widen

At a national level, 71.8 percent of children achieved a good level of development in 2019, an increase of 0.3 percentage points on 2018.

But the inequality gap between all pupils and the lowest attaining 20 percent - which has been widening since 2016 - has increased again to 32.4 percent compared with 31.8 percent last year.

Purnima Tanuku, chief executive of the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA), said the improvement in progress is ‘testament’ to the high quality provision that private, voluntary and independent nurseries deliver to the majority of children in England.

But she described the widening gap between the lowest performing children and their peers as ‘worrying’.

She said, ‘The reduced number of two-year-olds from disadvantaged backgrounds receiving funded places and the higher numbers of nursery closures in deprived areas will not be helping this situation. High quality nurseries must be supported to be sustainable in all areas, but especially in those where the majority of children only access funded hours. This must mean that funding has to reflect increasing staffing and business costs,’ she said.

Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Early Years Alliance, said that although it is ‘undoubtedly positive’ that the majority of young children are progressing well, the ‘fact remains’ that nearly a third are still not achieving a good level of development at the end of Reception.

Referring to the figures that show a rise of just over one percentage point since 2017, as opposed to a almost nine percentage point rise between 2014 to 2016, he said, ‘It is concerning to see that the progress that has been made over recent years is beginning to stall.

He added, ‘With a consultation on the future of the EYFS imminent, these results also demonstrate the importance of seeing a child’s development in the round, rather than focussing on a narrow set of formal skills. Many in the sector are rightly concerned that a broader, observation-based approach to the early years is falling out of favour, and being replaced with a focus on easy-to-measure skills, to the detriment of children’s early learning.’

The results also revealed that girls continue to perform better than boys but the gap is decreasing and boys are improving at a faster rate than girls whose performance has plateaued.

Purnima Tanuku said, ‘NDNA will continue to support nurseries in ensuring that boys are learning and developing in ways that suit them best. We have developed specific training courses and publications which look into how to engage boys in active learning, ideally exploring outdoors and locking onto topics which interest them.’

Education Minister Nick Gibb said, 'These statistics show that more pupils are leaving the early years with better language and vocabulary and more confident in holding a conversation and listening to their teachers and their peers. 

'This improvement is testament to the childminders, nursery and preschool staff who are pivotal in putting young children on the track to succeed from the earliest opportunity. We will continue to drive up achievement through our improved Early Learning Goals and our Hungry Little Minds campaign, which is supporting parents to start their children’s learning at home.'

• Download the Early Years Foundation Stage Profile results 2018-19