What do people think about the new Early Years Foundation Stage and changing what is already in place?

Question

What do people think about the new Early Years Foundation Stage and changing what is already in place?

Answer 1

My daughter is a foundation stage teacher, as part of the training to introduce the foundation stage to our local school she went to other schools to see how it worked there. The main problem in my opinion from talking to her and visiting the school as a governor is that many schools are putting their own interpretation on the way things are done. No two teachers are the same and therefore results will vary. Our school has just been adjudged the most improved in the country on it's results and the foundation stage was highly recommended. I have met both my daughters colleagues and it's easy to see why, they work as a team, and love the job. Unlike what I hear from some of the answers here the children are taught to read and write from day one. Most can write their own names and a few other words before year 1. I believe that the quality of teachers is far more important than the actual method used.

Answer 2

I am a foundation class teacher and have taught nursery and reception together for 3 yrs.  Prior to that our school had a nursery class and reception were taught with Y1, and sometimes Y2.  I hated that, the reception children were not ready for a formal day of school work.

The children we work with now are much more independent, and have much better work/problem solving skills.  They are also much more confident and socially developed than the reception children 'taught' with Y1.  

I believe that we are 'producing' much more able/well rounded children.

Each day, inaddition to the activities in class there are focus activities with Reception activities being 'harder' / 'more developed' than nursery activities and we do encourage them to read and write.  Our children dont just 'play'  although parents may think they do -  young children learn through play.

As someone who has taught both ways - I much prefer foundation stage class, and although some of our parents were unsure we have had no complaints or concerns, but we have had lots of praise.

Answer 3

My daughter hated it!  She went to big school wanting to learn, and was very disappointed not to be taught to read and write!!  She had been playing at nursery for years and wanted to learn!  Also her older brother and sister could read and write and that is what she wanted to do.  She was delighted to get into year 1 and get on with it!!

Answer 4

Personally i dont like it my daughter was in reception year with Nursery aged children when she herself had just moved up from nursery to me theres no new learning she'd been repeating herself!!

Answer 5

The first few years of school can be really boring and inappropriate for young children - they might think they want to learn like "big kids" but sitting still and listening is just something that they are not ready to do.  Behaviour management therefore becomes the most important thing in the younger years and lots of teaching and learning time is lost through training children to behave in an unnatural way.  Formal learning can start later when they are ready for it.

Answer 6

To be honest, its no different to what most of us are doing already. The children in my setting are either on the Birth-3 profiles or the Foundation Stage profiles

Answer 7

The new Early Years Foundation Stage isn't a new idea we have been piloting it in our county for a while now and like all new ideas it depends on how you adopt the changes, in our school the changes are quite subtle it seems to work for the average child, but it doesn't suit the above average child so what we do to combat this is give this type of child more learning skills such as we introduce simple books anyway so the more the child learns the harder the book. We simply adapt the learning to the child by letting the child lead us. Any change can work if it is adaptable and only the children within each setting alongside the Early Years team can make it happen.