Friday, June 10, 2011
Less may be more in the early years.
A government commissioned Independent Report on the Early Years Foundation Stage in England has been published.
The review was conducted by Dame Clare Tickell and can be read here.
The Tickell review received over 3,000 submissions of evidence from early years specialists, practitioners and parents as well as reviewing national and international research, including four specially commissioned research papers.
The key recommendations are that the existing 69 Learning goals are reduced to 17 grouped into the three core areas:
Physical development,
Personal, Social and Emotional development,
Communication and Language
with the recommendation that for each a simple scale is established .
The report proposes the core skills are applied in four specific areas:
Literacy,
Mathematics,
Expressive arts and design,
Understanding the world.
Across these foci, the review recommends, " that playing and exploring, active learning, and creating and thinking critically are highlighted in the EYFS as three characteristics of effective teaching and learning and" that guidance sets out that assessment should be based primarily on the observation of daily activities that illustrate children’s embedded learning. "
Click here to read the report in full.
Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) Review (2011). Website: Department for Education (DfE)