Research School Network: Preparing for Literacy What were you doing at the age of five? Were you thinking about your future job prospects?

What were you doing at the age of five? Were you thinking about your future job prospects? I was – I was going to be a firefighter, police officer, teacher, sailor and mountain rescuer (not necessarily in that order and not all on the same day!). 

If you have young relatives under the age of five are you thinking about their success at GCSE and A level, perhaps what they will do beyond school and their job prospects? Or are you wallowing in the joy of being in the company of young, enthusiastic and inquisitive minds who have their whole lives ahead of them? 

Working for the last four years in an infant and nursery school I have had the pleasure of being surrounded on a daily basis by the delight and optimism that pervades from an early years setting. It can be easy to forget that these years are the most important in a child’s life and whilst we won’t be spending too much time on careers advice, what we do now will shape each child’s future long after we bid them farewell. The responsibility is huge.

There is a significant amount of evidence that a child’s future can be strongly predicted by their achievements at the age of five and language and literacy skills are an important component of this. The gap between our most disadvantaged children and their peers starts early. I remember the first time I heard that ​’30 million word’ claim [1]I was sceptical – how can this be the case? Then I worked it through:

Child: ​‘Dad, can I have a snack?’
Response 1: ​‘No’
Response 2: ​‘Not at the moment sweetheart, we had a late lunch and we’re having pizza for tea which is your favourite and you don’t want to spoil your appetite do you?’

Child: ​‘Mum, can I go and play?’
Response 1: ​‘Yeah, sure’
Response 2:​‘Yeah of course you can. If you’re going outside though make sure you put a coat on as it’s cold and you’re only just getting over your runny nose.’

Then we think about bedtime routines – the child that always has a story (or several) read to them before they go to sleep compared to the child that doesn’t. That’s up to 1000 words per evening multiplied by 365 days of the year and the idea that this supports child language development is widely supported[2].

Then we can start to consider diversity of language – we can all think of the children who come to our settings with a wide variety of life experiences upon which they have built their language and then also those that don’t.

Further research has contested the size of this gap (and whether it should be called a gap) and the strength of its correlation to income but there seems to be general agreement that there is a link between direct language to a young child (as opposed ambient language) and their early language and literacy skills which is nicely summarised in this blog from Timothy Shanahan. So we know that language rich environments are a crucial element of developing early language and literacy skills.

Such is the strength of evidence around the importance of early language development, in 2017​‘The Early Intervention Foundation’ called[3]
for language to be prioritised as a child wellbeing indicator which would recognise the importance of language at the same level as vaccination, mental health and obesity. There is starting to be some recognition from Public Health England that more work is needed in this area: for example that the current 2 year old check does not do enough to identify early language problems and I believe that their planned work for 2019 is encouraging in this regard.

The government’s social mobility action plan[4]
has four ambitions; the first of which is to ​‘Close the ​‘word gap’ in the early years’. Underneath this catchy headline is the statement ​‘Good early years education is the cornerstone of social mobility’. My personal translation of this is that ​‘Good early years education is the cornerstone of good education’. It’s called Early Years Foundation Stage for a reason – it builds the foundations upon which a strong and successful educational career can be built and without which, at some point, the whole thing might fall down.

We know that a well-trained workforce can make a huge difference to outcomes for our youngest children but a recent Education Policy Institute analysis[5]
demonstrates that recruitment and retention in this sector is an increasing challenge. I believe that, for many, new curriculum and assessment arrangements from Key Stage One upwards have meant a lack of focus on early years development in school based provision in recent times whilst the financial climate has also put pressure on PVIs capacity to support professional development.

The Education Endowment Foundation have recently published their guidance report ​‘Preparing for Literacy: Improving communication, language and literacy in the early years’ which is a ​‘must read’ for any professional interested in evidence informed approaches to developing literacy skills in the early years. It supports leaders and practitioners working in the early years to access what the available evidence tells us is likely to have an impact on supporting children achieve a strong start with early literacy skills. Given the compelling case for a focus on these skills to support children’s best life chances, there seems a moral duty to give this some thought. The report, with its seven recommendations, can be found here.

On Tuesday 12^th February 4.30 – 6pm at Huntington Research School we will be running a free twilight session that will unpick further the main findings from the report. To book your place email huntresearchsch@​gmail.​com
with your name, school and job title. We are also offering a three day programme around the guidance report during the spring and summer 2019– details available here.

My own experience tells me that the early years workforce is a dedicated, passionate and incredibly resilient group without whom our education system would topple. They are the people that set us up in life to go on to achieve (perhaps just one of) our future dream jobs and together we can make a huge difference.

Author: Rob Newton

[1] Hart, B., & Risley, T. R. (1995). Meaningful differences in the everyday experience of young American children. Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Company.
[2] Law, J et al (2018) Parent-child reading to improve language development and school readiness: A systematic review and meta-analysis Nuffield Foundation
[3] Law, J; Charlton, J and Asmussen, K (2017) Language as Child Wellbeing Indicator, Early Intervention Foundation
[4] DfE (2017) Unlocking Talent, Fulfilling Potential:A plan for improving social mobility through education
[5] Bonetti, S (2019) The early years workforce in England: a comparative analysis using the Labour Force Survey Education Policy Institute