What Should our Priorities for Under-5s be?

‘No learning at home for 100K under-5s, DfE research finds.’

 

So reads a TES headline (8^th April, 2019). 

 

‘About 100,000 children under the age of 5 have never practised learning at home with their parents, a survey has suggested.’



 

So says the opening sentence in the article.  

 

Examining the Technical Report and Statistical First Release (SFR) of the findings of the Childcare and Early Years Survey of Parents, 2017 (the survey referenced in the article), it is apparent the home learning environment is adjudged on how often (if at all) someone at home undertakes the following activities with a child aged 0 to 5

 

• looks at books with, or reads to the child;
• helps the child to learn the alphabet or recognise words;
• helps the child to learn numbers or to count;
• helps the child to learn songs, poems or nursery rhymes;
• paints or draws together with the child.

 

A child aged 0 – 5.

 

Note the absence of play.  Note the focus almost entirely on the cognitive domain.

 

 Prior to 2017, home learning environment was evaluated more broadly with questions asking,

 

whether the parent, or their partner, engaged in a range of home learning activities with the selected child, including looking at books, reciting nursery rhymes, recognising letters, words, numbers or shapes, painting or drawing, going to the library, playing indoor and outdoor games, and using a computer. (See p. 15)

 

 

The impact of such a narrow focus is alarming, for it sends the message other learning is not valued in the same way.  What about a child’s physical and motor skills?  What about their play skills?  What about their social skills?  What about their self-care skills? 

 

 

School readiness encompasses more than just the cognitive domain.  Indeed, Kagan, Moore and Bredenkamp (1993) enumerate the following components:

 

• Physical well-being and motor development;
• Social and emotional development;
• Approaches to learning;
• Language development;
• Cognition and general knowledge, including mathematics.

 

The importance and of reading and of sharing songs, poems, and rhymes on the development of language skills cannot be underestimated and examining these facets as a measure of the home learning environment is extremely worthwhile. 

 

Reading and a love of books should be promoted at every opportunity as, without doubt, children who are not exposed to reading are at a significant disadvantage.

 

Whilst saying the alphabet and a count sequence are helpful, are they more important than being able to follow increasingly complex instructions or being able to ask questions or being able to follow a conversation? 

 

Why such a narrow focus?  Where are the indicators for other vital skills?

 

Before a child can paint or draw (i.e., use fine motor skills), they must develop their gross motor skills.  Why is the home learning environment survey failing to recognise children being supported to:

 

• Stand (then hop) on one foot;
• Walk up and down stairs alternating feet;
• Run around an object;
• Kick, throw, and catch balls;
• Pedal a tricycle;
• Achieve any of the other myriad of physical skills children in the 0 – 5 age range must acquire?

 

Where are the indicators regarding a child’s development of play skills?  Why is the home learning environment survey failing to recognise children being supported to:

 

• Play with others and take turns;
• Use inanimate objects in their play and assign meaning to them;
• Create imaginative play scenarios;
• Negotiate shared outcomes in play;
• Follow the rules of a game.
• Achieve any of the other myriad of play skills children in the 0 – 5 age range must acquire?

 

Where are the indicators regarding a child’s development of social skills?  Why is the home learning environment survey failing to recognise children being supported to:

 

• Greet others appropriately;
• Express their emotions;
• Make a choice;
• Indicate their wants;
• Understand the feelings of others, e.g., parental approval / disapproval?
• Achieve any of the other myriad of social skills children in the 0 – 5 age range must acquire?

 

Where are the indicators regarding a child’s development of self-care skills?  Why is the home learning environment survey failing to recognise children being supported to:

 

• Dress and undress independently;
• Feed themselves an increasingly wide range of foods;
• Look after their belongings and put them away properly;
• Use the toilet independently;
• Develop an awareness of danger;
• Achieve any of the other myriad of self-care skills children in the 0 – 5 age range must acquire?

 

 

The EYFS Areas of Learning are:

 

• Communication and language
• Physical development
• Personal, social and emotional development
• Literacy
• Mathematics
• Understanding the world
• Expressive arts and design

 

Why is the home learning environment survey failing to recognise development in each domain?  Why has the TES not questioned this?

 

Children in the 0 – 5 age range are hard-wired for learning.  Parents and carers promote this learning in a wide variety of ways.  In writing this post, my intention is to acknowledge this and to caution against the narrow focus on literacy and numeracy that sees children placed under huge pressure from a very early age to meet targets that may not be developmentally appropriate. 

 

Separately and importantly, addressing the needs of disadvantaged children is a complex matter.  DfE provision of a few free learning apps (as mentioned in the article), perhaps aimed at teaching the alphabet and a count sequence, may do more harm than good if they promote to parents this narrow version of learning to the exclusion of all other domains.

 

We must proceed with caution and with holistic development to the fore.