Safeguarding within Early Years Practice

A number of the documents referenced are under continuous review by their authors. It is to the best of my knowledge that the information provided is correct at time of submission.

Due to the content’s nature, some sources are anonymous.

How young children are kept safe has changed (Edmundson, 2020). To prevent the spread of Covid-19, on March 18th 2020 the Education Secretary for England announced the closure of early years settings to all, except the children of key workers and those the State considers vulnerable (Merrick & Busby, 2020). In a short space of time, parents and carers were left to consider both the implications of this change and of those created by ensuing emergency legislation (Coronavirus Act 2020, 2020), alongside their capability to support their families and see through what is, in every practical sense, a biological humanitarian crisis (Humanitarian Coalition, n.d.). As a recent, on-going emergency, neither the short nor long-term effects of this unprecedented episode are known. However significant concern has been raised about its impact on children (Edmundson, 2020). In particular there is uncertainty regarding how best to protect children from abuse and neglect during what has become one of the world’s most restrictive mass quarantines (Headteacher, 2020; Kaplan, Frias & McFall-Johnsen, 2020). It is a unique challenge, one this blog, after reviewing statutory policy, early years practice and recent developments will consider early years practitioners to be particularly well-equipped to meet.

Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, England’s most recent safeguarding and child protection policies  were set out within ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ (DoE, 2018) created to support the Children and Social Work Act (Children and Social Work Act, 2017). Neither safeguarding nor child protection are fixed concepts, and as an updated version of previous guidance, this document was created to reflect recent policymaker decisions. Successive governments regularly aim to improve upon and enhance prior child protection structures and policies, although a number are in retrospect to high profile abuse cases and subsequent reports – the enactment of The Vulnerable Groups Act (The Vulnerable Groups Act, 2006) a case in point.

With this it is possible to understand the ‘why’ and ‘how’ behind the advancement of English child protection policy. It is a logical, linear pathway that underpins the procedures and policies of relevant agencies. Within early years practice, section three of the Statutory Framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage (DoE, 2017) sets out the safeguarding and welfare requirements for early years settings. Legislation underpins the everyday safeguarding processes of individual early years premises; processes that are inspected by the government organisation Ofsted to ensure regulatory compliance.

A consideration here, and with relevance to the Covid-19 crisis, is whether ‘good’ safeguarding practice is achieved through unwavering compliance to process. Munro (2020) does not believe this to be the case. Although her views focus mainly on social service agencies, Munro argues that professionals make better judgements to support children and families by combining procedures with personal experience and context (Munro, 2020). Yet unwavering compliance to child protection procedure falls in line with an increasingly authoritarian approach to the management of safeguarding and child protection within legislation and inspection (Burton & Reid, 2018). The Safeguarding Lead Practitioner (SLP) of an early years setting in rural Cornwall (personal communication, 13 February, 2020) has a pragmatic perspective. Their particular setting is situated within a community ranked amongst the poorest 10% of neighbourhoods in England (Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, 2020). A neighbourhood where intergenerational poverty has created a close-knit community distrustful of official support networks and general societal interference. This has, the SLP believes, led to a localised way of life that is accepting of child protection standards below those expected within more affluent society.

With this in mind, the SLP sees the role of early years practice as one of ‘trusted partner’. A place where families are heard and supported with what means the setting is able to provide. As the SLP explained, unless immediate action is required, the setting’s first line of inquiry when child protection concerns arise is ‘How can we help?’. Experience and context have taught them that an event, such as an unexpected bill, disproportionately harms a financially stretched family, and in being a trusted partner, a setting may be able to mitigate safeguarding concerns before they truly develop. Before due process is required.

The ability to use professional judgement to determine appropriate safeguarding response is established across early years practice (early years professionals, personal communication, 2019 & 2020). This enables settings to consider child protection as unpredictable and complex, with each case requiring distinctive response. It is an ability set outside those of linear process, and in doing so makes the ‘one size fits all’ procedural approach feel cumbersome as a response to the complexities of safeguarding young children, while using tacit knowledge (Polanyi, 1973) allows practitioners to recognise child abuse and neglect, and take effective action in whatever that may mean for the unique child. This does not imply that early years practice throws away due process. Rather it is indicative of early years practitioners distinct ability to balance logical and analytical process with intuition and experience, and due to their unique position within communities and relationship to the young children in their care, they arguable do so to greater effect than other safeguarding agencies who are limited in capability by strict compliance to due process.

Therefore, at a time when other agencies share concern that “the coronavirus lockdown has left children and family specialists…without any national rules or advice on how to adapt their approach.” (Brindle, 2020), by modifying current process when gaps appear, tacit early years practitioners have adapted practice to meet the challenges of safeguarding young children during the pandemic (personal experience, 16-20 March, 2020).

Presently, young children deemed vulnerable by the State can remain in early years settings. These include children who are not yet “formally recognised as such” (DoE, 2020a, p. 7) but were referred to social services prior to national lockdown. Yet for others potentially ‘at-risk’, there is a continuing obligation for them to be assessed as “being in need, or meeting Section 17 of the Childcare Act 1989.” (DoE, 2020b, p.3). This requires social services to continue to accept and process cases, a service that, in the current climate, is increasingly understaffed (Cornwall Council, 2020). Yet ambiguity within recent government policies (DoE, 2020a; DoE, 2020b) allows “those on the edges of receiving children’s social care support” (DoE, 2020b, p. 4) to be offered a place. This grey area could allow practitioners to support: young children on the edge of social care support; those temporarily at risk; and, those whose family’s stability has drastically changed during the crisis. New ‘at-risk’ categories, not explicitly embraced by recent policies, align with those highlighted by Prof Rand Conger (Newkirk II, 2020) in his work concerning economic crisis where he states that higher levels of child neglect and abuse “tend to track with greater traumatic events, economic instability and stress.” (Newkirk II, 2020, n.d.). And as the Covid-19 pandemic upsets people’s ability to access food, shelter, transportation and medical care, the foundations of the nation’s hierarchy of needs (Maslow, 1954), its basic physiological and safety requirements, are shaken. By way of example, during both the 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic in Australia and the 2003 SARS outbreak in Canada, the Alliance for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action (ACPHA) (2019) reported heightened levels of anxiety, frustration, depression and worry amongst caregivers that in turn increased levels of family instability. Currently, the global increase in domestic violence, and uptick in severe physical abuse related injuries in young children are considered to be a stress response to the current infectious disease pandemic (Cook Children’s Checkup Newsroom, 2020; Graham-Harrison, Giuffrida, Smith & Ford, 2020).

Therefore, as the nation continues to live behind locked doors, an interesting context to Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory (Aubrey & Riley, 2019), an increasing number of ‘unknown to the state’ young children become at risk. The only safeguarding professionals with insight to family situations across communities, who are able to assess the uncertainty current circumstances have on individual young children, are early years practitioners. And as tempers fray and situations become desperate, families are more likely to answer a call, have an appropriately distanced doorstep chat, and accept support from someone who is trusted within the community; someone who knows them and understands their lifestyle and their predicaments. In these unprecedented times, early years practitioners are well-equipped to offer such support.

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To date, multi-agency safeguarding initiatives have been known to neglect early years professional input (Bradwell, 2020), a scenario Burton & Reid (2018) put down to the ill-held belief that early years practitioners neither have the skills nor qualifications to give educated insight to such matters. Perhaps by demonstrating their ability to meet current safeguarding challenges head-on, such beliefs will change and early years practitioners will be recognised as the professionals they truly are.

Aubrey, K., & Riley, A. (2019). Understanding & using educational theories (2nd ed.). London: Sage.

Bradwell, M. (2020). Safeguarding in Early Years Practice. Presentation, Marjon University.

Brindle, D. (2020). ‘I can’t know the children are safe’: social workers’ fears over lockdown. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/apr/02/children-safe-social-workers-fears-lockdown-coronavirus

Burton, S., & Reid, J. (2018). Safeguarding and protecting children in the early years (2nd ed.). London: Routledge.

Cook Children’s Checkup Newsroom. (2020). Spike in Severe Child Abuse Cases Likely Result of COVID-19. Retrieved from https://www.checkupnewsroom.com/spike-in-severe-child-abuse-cases-likely-result-of-covid-19/?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=OrganicSocial&utm_campaign=AbuseSpike&utm_term=March_2020&utm_content=AbuseSpike

Cornwall Council. (2020). Retired or former social workers needed to support Cornwall’s most vulnerable – Cornwall Council. Retrieved 1 April 2020, from https://www.cornwall.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/council-news-room/media-releases/news-from-2020/news-from-march-2020/retired-or-former-social-workers-needed-to-support-cornwall-s-most-vulnerable/

Department of Education. (2017). Statutory framework for the early years foundation stage. London: HMSO.

Department of Education. (2018). Working Together to Safeguard Children. London: HMSO.

Department of Education. (2020a). Coronoavirus (COVID-19): Early years and childcare closures. London: HMSO.

Department of Education. (2020b). Coronavirus (COVID-19): Guidance on vulnerable children and young people. London: HMSO.

Edmundson, A. (2020). For many children, home is far more dangerous than school right now – we must do all we can to protect them. The Independent. Retrieved from https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/coronavirus-latest-schools-close-key-workers-boris-johnson-a9413671.html

Graham-Harrison, E., Giuffrida, A., Smith, H., & Ford, L. (2020). Lockdowns around the world bring rise in domestic violence. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/mar/28/lockdowns-world-rise-domestic-violence

Headteacher, A. (2020). ‘I am deeply scared for so many children’: diary of a headteacher in lockdown. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/mar/28/i-am-deeply-scared-for-so-many-children-diary-of-a-headteacher-in-lockdown

HMSO. The Vulnerable Groups Act (2006). London.

HMSO. Children and Social Work Act (2017). London.

HMSO. Coronavirus Act 2020 (2020). London.

Humanitarian Coalition. What is a Humanitarian Emergency?. Retrieved 1 April 2020, from https://www.humanitariancoalition.ca/what-is-a-humanitarian-emergency

Kaplan, J., Frias, L., & McFall-Johnsen, M. (2020). A third of the global population is on coronavirus lockdown — here’s our constantly updated list of countries and restrictions. Business Insider. Retrieved from https://www.businessinsider.com/countries-on-lockdown-coronavirus-italy-2020-3?r=US&IR=T

Maslow, A. (1954). Motivation and personality (1st ed.). New York: Harper & Row.

Merrick, R., & Busby, E. (2020). Coronavirus: Schools across UK to shut down from as early as Friday. The Independent. Retrieved from https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/coronavirus-uk-schools-update-boris-johnson-news-a9409291.html

Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. (2020). The English Indices of Deprivation 2019. London: HMSO.

Morris, S. (2003). How the police fed the media beast. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/media/2003/dec/22/mondaymediasection.soham

Munro, E. (2020). Effective child protection (3rd ed.). London: Sage.

Newkirk II, V. (2020). The Kids Aren’t All Right. The Atlantic. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/03/what-coronavirus-will-do-kids/608608/

Polanyi, M. (1973). Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-critical Philosophy. Taylor & Francis Ltd.

The Alliance for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action. (2019). Guidance Note: Protection of Children during infectious disease outbreaks.

Assessment within the EYFS

Accountability dominates English state education, an ideology bolstered by student performance in standardised assessments. From September 2020 children will be required to complete six different statutory standardised tests before secondary school; three of which form part of the Early Years Foundation Stage and take place between the ages of two and five.

A concern with condensing a young child’s learning experience into an ideology propped by scorecard metrics, is that such tests do not typically determine how much a child has learned, how well they have learned and in respect of the anonymity ruling in the Reception Baseline Assessment (RBA), who has learned what (Meisels, 2006, p. 2). While this discourse is not opposed to testing and acknowledges the requirement for accountability in public resource management, it argues by favouring decontextualised comparative developmental stage assessment, policymakers place the needs of an exclusive, commercial culture (Apple, 1996) before those of society’s youngest citizens.

Standardised accountability is evident throughout EYFS statutory documents (DoE, 2017; DoE, 2020), as are elements that consider a young child’s “…interests and learning styles” (DoE, 2017, p. 13). However such elements run in opposition to performative agencies like the early years national statutory summative assessment (NSSA), created “to understand a child’s performance in relation to national expectations and comparisons.” (DoE, 2020, p. 9).

National comparative assessments rely on the efficacy of standardised measures of attainment (Ball, 2003). These are first applied within the EYFS during the statutory progress check at age-two. The efficacy of this assessment is debatable due to its extensive overlap with the ASQ-3 and ASQ:SE-2 assessments carried out within the Healthy Child Programme (HCP) (DoH, 2016). The HCP is conducted by local health visitors: registered nurses or midwives who have completed four years professional training before working “with families to give pre-school-age children the best possible start in life” (NHS, n.d.). Their depth of professional knowledge; combined with an ability to access the spheres of influence experienced by young children, and the comprehensiveness of the ASQ-3 and ASQ:SE-2, mean the gravity of the HCP objective far outweighs that of the EYFS. By comparison, the EYFS’ narrow focus on three areas of universal performativity, make the progress check’s value-add difficult to determine. Unless its intentions look beyond those of a young child’s “best possible start in life.” (DoE, 2017, p. 5).

By defining and imposing assessments such as the developmental stage progress check at age-two, policymakers hold early years settings accountable to specific returns. Whether developmental stage testing is capable of delivering such accountability is questionable. Research in cognitive development neuroscience reveals young children to think and reason in a similar way to adults, with life experience the only differentiating factor to knowledge and know-how (Goswami, 2015). Such developments suggest neuroscientists “no longer widely believe[d] that there are different developmental stages in learning to think”. (Goswami, 2015, p. 1). Further, as such assessments are based solely on what is considered preferential development, their design appears to promote characteristics contained within a narrow field of judgement (Ball, 2003). A field based on exclusive notions of educational normality: one created with little consideration to factors such as gender, race, class, religion, language and/or location (Bradbury, 2011). Factors deemed highly correlated to a young child’s learning journey (Raudenbush, 2005).

These considerations make the September 2020 rollout of the RBA a curious development. This scorecard test assesses age-four ability as a benchmark to progress achieved by age 11. In doing so policymakers aim to hold primary schools accountable for student knowledge; knowledge linked to the characteristics of educational norms policymakers deem appropriate, and exclusive of the highly correlated factors previously outlined. Its inability to measure student learning growth rates, means this “misleadingly objective and hyper-rational” (Ball, 2003, p. 217) aspiration is ignorant of the value added by an institution’s processes and practice; and assumes continuity between the EYFS and the National Curriculum by determining that, for example, age-four results in synthetic phonics directly correlate to age 11 reading ability. There is evidence to suggest this is not the case (Davis, 2013; Lyle, 2014; Rosen, 2012); something policymakers are not oblivious to (Hazel, 2019).

These are perpetual lines of enquiry with illusive resolve. That policymakers push for flawed accountability assessment strategies, strategies too rigid to translate “complex social processes and events” (Ball, 2003, p. 217) and authentic learning development, appears irrational. However data required by the OECD for both the heavily criticised (Urban & Swadener, 2016) International Early Learning Study (IELS), and Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) follow similar flawed strategies (Urban & Swadener, 2016). The perpetual lines of enquiry with illusive resolve are globally relevant. In buying into the neoliberal narrative of competitive educational excellence on a global scale, policymakers use educational strategy as an indicator of England’s global economic viability (Stevens & Weale, 2003). This makes these strategies an investment decision, one designed to alleviate society’s compulsion to compete “in the global race” (DoE, 2013, p. 9). Intentions are clear. The needs of society’s youngest citizens are eclipsed by those of an exclusive, commercial culture.

It is now understood why undeviating continuity between the EYFS and National Curriculum is required. Maintaining conformity to a structure of perpetual international comparison requires seamless and specific data flow, and as economic performance corresponds to educational performance (Stevens & Weale, 2003), any transition within a school environment requires order to maintain high levels of performativity. A requirement made apparent at the flection point between the two curriculums, the point where the early years NSSA is poised.

The NSSA spans from the final term of the year in which a child reaches age-five, to their last primary school year. Assessment within the early years NSSA is developmentally staged with every child ranked within ‘school readiness’ subjects, against a criteria of ‘expected’, ‘emerging’ and ‘exceeding’ (DoE, 2020, p. 14). This assessment is the first time a child faces the potentiality of failure: the first time results are used to shoe-horn children into decontextualised learning trajectories based on exclusive notions of educational normality. Judged and ranked, the young child’s learning is shaped into appropriate forms. School ready, National Curriculum ready, all “in the hope of producing certain desired effects and averting certain undesired events.” (Rose, 1999, p. 52).

Yet a quiet revolution is afoot. Spurred by elements of the EYFS considered at the outset of this discourse, early years assessment is having a contextualised value-led rebellion. Beyond the decontextualised accountability of standardised assessments, the EYFS Framework (DoE, 2017) enables day-to-day and termly interaction to focus on child-led evaluations that are based on ‘how’ a child learns rather than ‘what’ they know. Such Characteristics of Effective Learning (DoE, 2017) are recorded in-the-moment by evidence such as photos, videos, artwork and critical reflections: documented ‘wow’ moments that are a far cry from formal developmental stage accountability assessments focused on economic returns. These qualitative evaluations recognise diverse skill development, and acknowledge young children as complex, diverse citizens who do not come in standardised forms (Robinson & Aronica, 2015, p. 160). Such EYFS elements are gaining traction beyond early years practise into Key Stage One as primary schools seek funding beyond the State (Groundwork, n.d.) to enable such contextualised value-led interaction (Ephgrave, 2012).

It appears the structural continuity required between the EYFS and National Curriculum flows both ways, and in doing so their rigid assessment structures may, one day, be required to become a little more messy, slightly more complex and uniquely child-led.

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Apple, M. (1996). Cultural politics and education. Buckingham: Open University Press.

Ball, S. (2003). The teacher’s soul and the terrors of performativity. Journal Of Education Policy18(2), 215-228. doi: 10.1080/0268093022000043065

Bradbury, A. (2011). Learner Identities, Assessment and Equality in Early Years Education (Ph.D). University of London.

Bradbury, A. (2013). Understanding early years inequality. London: Routledge.

Davis, A. (2013). To read or not to read: decoding Synthetic Phonics. Impact, (20), 19-29. doi: 10.1111/2048-416x.2013.12000.x

Department of Education. (2013). More Great Childcare. Retrieved 30 November 2019 from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/219660/More_20Great_20Childcare_20v2.pdf

Department of Education. (2017). Statutory framework for the early years foundation stage. London. Retrieved from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/596629/EYFS_STATUTORY_FRAMEWORK_2017.pdf

Department of Education. (2020). Early years foundation stage profile handbook. London: Standards and Testing Agency.

Department of Health. (2016). Developing a public health outcome measure for children aged 2 – 2½ using ASQ-3™. London: Department of Health.

Ephgrave, A. (2012). The Reception Year in Action, revised and updated edition (2nd ed.). London: Routledge.

Goswami, U. (2015). CHILDREN’S COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT AND LEARNING. York: Cambridge Primary Review Trust. Retrieved from https://cprtrust.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/COMPLETE-REPORT-Goswami-Childrens-Cognitive-Development-and-Learning.pdf

Groundwork. Retrieved 14 February 2020, from https://www.groundwork.org.uk/national-grants/grants_tesco-community-grants/

Hazell, W. (2019). Nick Gibb: The phonics wars are ‘over’. Retrieved 13 February 2020, from https://www.tes.com/news/nick-gibb-phonics-wars-are-over

Lyle, S. (2014). The limits of phonics teaching. School Leadership Today, (5.5), 68-74.

Meisels, S. (2006). Accountability in Early Childhood: No easy answers. London: Erikson Institute.

NHS. Retrieved 14 February 2020, from https://www.healthcareers.nhs.uk/explore-roles/public-health/roles-public-health/health-visitor

Raudenbush, S. (2005). Newsmaker Interview: How NCLB testing can leave some schools behind. Preschool Matters3(2), 11-12.

Robinson, K., & Aronica, L. (2015). Creative schools. London: Penguin Books.

Rose, N. (2010). Powers of freedom. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press.

Rosen, M. (2012). A major scandal? – government approved phonics schemes [Blog]. Retrieved from http://michaelrosenblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/government-approved-phonics-scheme.html

Stevens, P., & Weale, M. (2003). Education and Economic Growth [Conference Paper]. National Institute of Economic and Social Research. Retrieved 14 February 2020, from http://cee.lse.ac.uk/conference_papers/28_11_2003/martin_weale.pdf

Urban, M., & Swadener, B. (2016). Democratic accountability and contextualise systemic evaluation. International Critical Childhood Policy Studies5(1), 6-18.

Mechanisms for supporting positive behaviour in young children

Child A is engrossed in play. With their imagination they act out scenes using their hands and a jumper as props. Concentrate hard enough and you can visualise the imaginary jungle habitat they built for a gorilla family escaping dread pirates. An observation based on Development Matters guidance (Early Education, 2012) would likely categorise the four year old’s play within the 40-60+ months bracket for certain aspects of their Communication & Language, Understanding the World, and Expressive Art & Design development. Further, it is known that Child A’s creativity is part of their unique schema, a stepping-stone to story-scribe development. This is a ‘wow’ moment for Child A. Except it isn’t. It’s circle time.

In the past three minutes Child A has been asked twice to join the group, to sit on their bottom like everyone else, and listen to a story. Like circle time yesterday, and during a number of previous occasions, Child A is not interested and each time their lack of compliance is mentioned the group is disrupted. The scenario becomes increasingly stressful: the practitioner is unable to convince Child A to join them; other children fidget and chatter as their impatience to hear the story grows, and perceiving the negative attention Child A begins to communicate their frustration physically.


This observation demonstrates a grey area practitioners may find themselves. In analysing this particular interaction is Child A learning, albeit not skills the practitioner requires? Do they present behaviour that challenges, one causing a rift between them and the practitioner to the extent that the needs of neither are met and a tipping point reached? Reflections like this divide opinion amongst educational researchers. Bullock & Brownhill (2011) consider classroom routines important to a young child’s development: in refusing to join in Child A is “unlikely to be learning to their full potential” (Bullock & Brownhill, 2011, p. 2).

However there is no statutory requirement for young children to sit on their bottoms or join group activities. The ability to sit is specific to the National Curriculum (DoE, 2014, p. 25) and directed at Year One pupils for their second term. The ability to work in groups, although mentioned within the National Curriculum for Year One (DoE, 2014, p. 18), only becomes a statutory requirement in Year Three (DoE, 2014, p. 40). For young children, MacNaughton, Hughes and Smith argue that classroom routines, such as group times, are “designed to suit teachers, not children.” (MacNaughton, Hughes and Smith, 2007, p. 48). This could suggest Child A is working within their developmental stage, potentially demonstrating characteristics of effective learning as a “unique child” (DoE, 2017, p. 6) with their original actions appropriate and positive.

When considering the overarching spectrum of behaviour that challenges, the personal observation concerning Child A appears trivial. However in demonstrating it’s ambiguity, and without involving the emotive extremes of overtly aggressive behaviour, it an ideal observation to understand the structural challenges posed by defining positive behaviour in young children, and the mechanisms most apt to their support.

A behaviour management policy generally gives clear parameters to behaviour expected within a setting. These parameters aim to remove unpredictable behaviour, through regulation and enforcement, by creating a discourse for what is considered ‘normal’ child behaviour. Conformity to this discourse is required and becomes acceptable. An optimal mode of being and behaving is created (Pires, 2004). Artificially normalising behaviour in this manner requires development to be assessed and measured to ensure age-appropriate conformity and compliance to the policy. This would fall in line with educational practice preferred by developmental theorists such as Piaget and Vygotsky (Aubrey and Riley, 2019), and by the Department of Education (DoE, 2017, p. 7), and in turn a regime of truth is created for the setting, a discourse practitioners accept and make true (Foucault, 2002).

Mechanisms to support this discourse are likely to be predetermined, age-related and focused on the transmission of information from practitioner to young child. They are the indicators of appropriate positive behaviour development required and maintained in ‘normal’ young children.

Using mechanisms in this way is relatable to Foucault’s theory concerning strategies as an act of war (1994): they become a means to an end; their usefulness derived from an ability to gain advantage over an opponent (in this case a young child); and, the capability of depriving them of means to object or retaliate, for example, participation in the moral conversation (Olsson, 2009) concerning their behaviour. The mechanisms are impossible to struggle against (Foucault, 2002) and remove trust, respect and reciprocity (Dahlberg, Moss and Pence, 2013) from a relationship. Further, with the power for self-determination withdrawn, these mechanisms consider the young child: developmentally needy (Moss, 2009); unable to behave in socially acceptable ways; and subject to adults (MacNaughton, Hughes and Smith, 2007). They support adult intervention and child compliance, enforcing the idea of the practitioner as a person of power and position (Pires, 2004), committing them to “relations of power, not relations of meaning.” (Foucault, 2002, p. 116).

If positive behaviour and the mechanisms to its attainment are bound within lines of control, they limit a young child’s identity to one defined by their behavioural development, when in fact all that is defined is an indication of a young child’s malleability to instruction. This dogmatic approach to behavioural education shines a dim light on the competency of young children as well as practitioner capability.

Challenging this target driven model are the mechanisms supporting positive behaviour where learning is recognised as a nonlinear process, and a young child is considered to be an active agent in their own development (Dahlberg, Moss and Pence, 2013). Within this example the mechanisms are established on four theories:

  1. If people are unique and learn best in different ways (EYFS, 2017) the rate at which they learn will also be different (Robinson & Aronica, 2015);
  2. Learning can “fail to correspond to the calm, continuity image that is normally accredited .” (Foucault, 2002, p. 114);
  3. Respect “the right of all beings capable of speech and action to participate in the moral conversation.” (Dahlberg, Moss and Pence, 2013, p. 79); and,
  4. A child is equal but different (Moss, 2019).

The first two statements consider a constructivist approach to learning. This considers potentialities rather than developmental stages, seeing a young child becoming knowledgeable rather than needing knowledge (Scanlan, 2016). In ‘What is Philosophy?’ Deleuze & Guattari (1994) challenge theories focused on how concepts are created, they consider thought processes to be created through “possible experience on the one hand and through intuition on the other” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994, p. 7). Within this, the creation of knowledge has no order, is encouraging of difference and of thinking generatively rather than structurally (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994). In this respect learning becomes multi-layered and multi-directional, a force to break down current knowledge in order to rebuild and formulate something new, because “knowledge is not something static and unchangeable.” (Olsson, 2009, p. 183). Here a young child’s learning takes place through exploration, across planes (lines) of flight (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994) and supportive mechanisms are unrestricted. Rather than the position of enforcer, the practitioner is enabled to be a critically reflective collaborator within the young child’s learning, the questioner of ‘what if?’ scenarios, a provocateur enticing the young child to take lead in the development of their emotional skillset.

Further, understanding what a Child is, through the development of theories iii. and iv., has a practitioner recognise the young child as someone inclusive of capabilities: a whole person able to influence their own lives; control their learning process through their own thoughts and theories, and as someone worth listening to (Moss, 2019, p. 105).

Together these four theories support a nonlinear co-constructive approach that enables mechanisms of support beyond those defined by age-group and control. The approach gives space to understanding the whole child. It is perceptive to their wellbeing, and mindful of its potential to inhibit and enable cognitive processes. Without lines of control depriving practitioner understanding, mental and physical factors can be interlaced within the mechanism making it as unique as the young child it supports. Here an understanding of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and his concept of coping and expressing behaviour (Maslow, 1954) could be added. Consideration to Leuven Scales – created to individual’s experience rather than learning outcomes (Laevers and Declercq, 2018) – may be intertwined. Link these with a young child’s experience: their life outside setting; a love of gorillas and dislike of noise; their favourite jumper knitted by Grandad (who was a pirate), how they fell out of bed in the night and couldn’t get back to sleep. Include their intuition in the specific moment. Entwine these with a reflective practitioner who bases their relationship with a young child on trust, respect and reciprocity. Then the mechanisms to support positive behaviour don’t feedback to policies and stage development. They feedback to the person they matter to most. The child.


The child is engrossed in play. Using their imagination they act out scenes using their hands and a jumper as props. Practitioner A notices, once again, the child is absent from circle time. They look over to see the child captivated by what seems to be gorilla ‘hide and seek’ within their Grandad’s jumper. The child seems tired from a broken night’s sleep. Over the noise of the group and story in hand, Practitioner A quickly asks a colleague to listen in to the child’s play, maybe take some notes and a photo as, fingers crossed, this could be the ‘wow’ moment they were waiting for.


Aubrey, K., & Riley, A. (2019). Understanding & using educational theories (2nd ed.). London: Sage.

Bullock, E., & Brownhill, S. (2011). A quick guide to behaviour management in the early years (p. Chapter One). London: SAGE.

Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1994). What is Philosophy?. London: Verso.

Department of Education. (2014). The national curriculum in England Framework document. London. Retrieved from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/381344/Master_final_national_curriculum_28_Nov.pdf

Department of Education. (2017). Statutory framework for the early years foundation stage. London. Retrieved from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/596629/EYFS_STATUTORY_FRAMEWORK_2017.pdf

Early Education (2012). Development Matters in the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS). Retrieved 12 January 2020, from https://www.foundationyears.org.uk/files/2012/03/Development-Matters-FINAL-PRINT-AMENDED.pdf

Foucault, M. (2002). Power: The essential works of Foucault 1954-1984 (3rd ed.). London: Penguin.

Laevers, F., & Declercq, B. (2018). How well-being and involvement fit into the commitment to children’s rights. European Journal Of Education53(3), 325-335. doi: 10.1111/ejed.12286

MacNaughton, G., Hughes, P., & Smith, K. (2007). Rethinking approaches to working with children who challenge: Action learning for emancipatory practice. International Journal Of Early Childhood39(1), 39-57. doi: 10.1007/bf03165947

Maslow, A. (1954). Motivation and personality (1st ed.). New York: Harper & Row.

Moss, P., Dahlberg, G., & Pence, A. (2013). Beyond quality in early childhood education and care. London: Routledge.

Moss, P. (2019). Alternative narratives in early childhood. Oxon: Routledge.

Olsson, L. (2009). Movement and experimentation in young children’s learning. London: Routledge.

Pires, M. (2014). De-Territorializing the Child : Towards a Theory of Affect in Educational Philosophy and Research (EdD). Montclair State University.

Robinson, K., & Aronica, L. (2016). Creative schools. London: Penguin Books.

Scanlan, B. (2016). Working conceptually with Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophy in relation to children’s artwork. He Kupu: The Word4(3), 35-41. Retrieved from https://www.hekupu.ac.nz/article/working-conceptually-deleuze-and-guattaris-philosophy-relation-childrens-artwork

Professionalisation and the role of the professional in early years

The sense of purpose inherent within early years practice (Osgood, 2006, p. 9; Taggart, 2016, p. 9; Traunter, 2019, p. 5),  develops from the “attitude, ideology and passion” (Brock, 2006, p. 1) of educators who, beyond commercial gain, influence the profession’s societal value (Katz, 1995 in Osgood, 2006, p. 8). When considering the professionalisation and the role of the early years professional, a number of academics present these attributes as vital to continuing development (Taggart, 2016). Other perspectives are prominent, namely those from government policymakers and those from early year’s educators, and for this reason the interests of all three parties will be considered within the context of early years professionalisation, and the role of professionals within this field.

Underlying professionalisation (or professionalism) are two general concepts: that it specialised and requires knowledge, skill and talent; and that it cannot be “standardised” (Friedson, 2007, p. 17) or “commodified” (Abbott, 1991, p. 22 in Friedson, 2007, p. 17). Sociologists generalise these concepts as professional bodies take many guises, for example, doctors are within a self-regulated profession, while engineers are semi-autonomous. With this in mind, it is worth reviewing the Department of Education’s (England) aim to drive the professionalisation of early years by improving educators’ basic skills and creating uniformity of provision (DoE, 2013, p. 6) through sector standardisation. This is to safeguard the nation’s neoliberal agenda to “…compete in the global race.” (DoE, 2013, p. 6).

It is a narrative where political design, through credentialism, controls the status of early years educators by creating occupational closure. It negates experience, talent and expertise from divergent roles, backgrounds and skillsets, in preference of educational inflation to promote ‘quality’ early years education, where practitioners become “preoccupied with assessment, accreditation, targets, accountability and performativity in attempts to demonstrate professional competence.” (Osgood, 2006, p. 9).

The policies outlined within “More Great Childcare” (DoE, 2013) and the “Early Years Workforce Strategy” (DoE, 2017) to ensure “the service offered is the best it can be” (DoE, 2017, p. 4) run contra to aforementioned concepts defining professions and lead practitioners to be “…increasingly re-envisioned as technicians.” (Moss, 2006,.p. 7). This could be seen as a form of de-professionalisation favouring a workforce of technical operators rather than:

workers with specialised knowledge and the ability to provide society with especially important services…[workers who] organise and control their own work, without directives from management or the influence of free markets. (Eliot Freidson, 2007, p. 1).

These “important services” include the qualitative attributes some academic sources seek to preserve to ensure appropriate professionalisation of the sector (Woodrow, 2007, p. 241). These attributes include a “culture of care characterised by affectivity, altruism, self-sacrifice and conscientiousness” (Osgood, 2006, p. 8), as well as the “attitudes and values, ideology and beliefs…code of ethics, autonomy…commitment, enjoyment and passion” (Brock, 2006, p. 2) of practitioners.

Being qualitative these explicit traits are resistant to standardisation and if policy-led professionalisation prevailed their desirability would depreciate. In defence of these attributes academics speak of rallying “the voices of those working in the field.” (Brock, 2013, p. 33); using academic research “to give early years educators a voice” (Brock, 2013, p. 51), concluding that there is “…a clear need for a research agenda exploring issues of professional roles and identity.” (Woodrow, 2007, p. 241) on behalf of early years practitioners. With this, academic researchers appear to take on the role of protector and liberator of the professionalisation of early years practice, leaving the role of the early years professional to that of subject matter.

Although this is dissimilar to the status of occupational technician by government-led policy constraint, influential involvement of academic researchers also creates a regime of control. This  type of control reduces the role of professional practitioners to that of “technicians of behaviour” (Foucault, 1978, p. 294 in Osgood, 2006, p. 7), creating distrust in the value of practitioners’ own research as well as their capability for self determination. It creates scenarios where practitioners resign themselves to the role of disenfranchised test subjects, surrendering their work for external analysis and determination, a status lamented by Carla Rinaldi, “But can you find a university teacher who can learn from a practitioner? Very rarely!”(Rinaldi, 2006, p 151). Further, autonomy in research and experimentation is considered a key trait for professionalisation by both Friedson (2007, p. 108), and as a “technician of evaluation” (Shapiro, 2002, p. 4) within the Foucauldian concept of the professional.

Further, there is evidence to demonstrate autonomous professionalisation is desired within early years practice, for example, the Reggio Emilia project’s refusal “to surrender research and experimentation to academics.” (Moss, 2018, p. 75), because “we want our research, as teachers, to be recognised.” (Rinaldi, 2006, p. 150-151). In considering autonomous research and decision-making on par to that of academic counterparts gives practitioners the voice of authority within early years education. This in turn allows for a democratic, sector-driven professionalisation of substance, because educators:

…would be promoted from being simply practitioners to being authors of pedagogical paths and processes. They would be able to contribute to overcoming…the arrogant idea of the continuing separation between theory and practice, culture and technique. Teachers would be able to stop seeing themselves, and being seen by others, as those who simply apply theories and decisions developed somewhere else. (Rinaldi, 2006, p. 77).

This narrative enables practitioners to develop their professionalisation from within; fostering purposeful relationships based on mutual values within an environment of shared governance.

With an autonomous entity early years professionalisation would slowly evolve from the qualities, intricacies and ideals indigenous to the profession. It is a brave non-linear approach to maturation focused on ‘becoming’ professional rather than ‘achieving’ professional status:

personal and professional development, like education, should not be seen as static or unchangeable qualities, achieved once and for all, but rather a process, an ongoing path. (Rinaldi, 2006, p. 108).

It is this understanding, after considering the interests of policymakers and academic researchers, that the best professionals to administer an appropriate professionalisation of early years practice are those working within: the experienced; the novice; the graduate; the skills specialist; the non-graduate; the active practical participants of the profession who together cross a spectrum of skills, expertise and passion. It is with this, and only with this, will the genuine role of the professional in early years be fully realised – for the benefit of the children they teach, for society as a whole and for themselves.

——-

Brock, A. (2006). Dimensions of early years professionalism – attitudes versus competences Reflection paper on Training Advancement and Co-operation in the Teaching of Young Children (TACTYC). Retrieved 4th December, 2019, from http:// www.tactyc.org.uk

Brock, A. (2013). How do Early Years Educators sustain and define their professionalism? A methodological approach to eliciting early years educators’ thinking. Forum Oświatowe, 1(48), 31-56. Retrieved from: http://forumoswiatowe.pl/index.php/czasopismo/article/view/83

Department of Education. (2013). More Great Childcare. Retrieved 30 November 2019 from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/219660/More_20Great_20Childcare_20v2.pdf

Department of Education. (2017). Early Years Workforce Strategy. Retrieved 30 November 2019 from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/596884/Workforce_strategy_02-03-2017.pdf

Freidson, E. (2007). Professionalism. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.

Moss, P. (2006). Structures, Understandings and Discourses: Possibilities for Re-Envisioning the Early Childhood Worker. Contemporary Issues In Early Childhood, 7(1), 30-41. doi: 10.2304/ciec.2006.7.1.30

Moss, P. (2019). Alternative narratives in early childhood. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.

Osgood, J. (2006). Deconstructing Professionalism in Early Childhood Education: Resisting the Regulatory Gaze. Contemporary Issues In Early Childhood, 7(1), 5-14. doi: 10.2304/ciec.2006.7.1.5

Rinaldi, C. (2006). In dialogue with Reggio Emilia. London: Routledge.

Shapiro, S. (2002). Michel Foucault’s Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison. Reader/Workbook. Retrieved 30 November 2019 from http://eprints.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/110/1/83-244-1-PB.pdf.

Taggart, G. (2016). Compassionate pedagogy: the ethics of care in early childhood professionalism. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 24(2), 173-185. doi: 10.1080/1350293x.2014.970847

Traunter, J. (2019). Reconceptualising early years teacher training: policy, professionalism and integrity. Education 3-13, 47(7), 831-841. doi: 10.1080/03004279.2019.1622498

Woodrow, C. (2007). W(H)Ither the Early Childhood Teacher: Tensions for Early Childhood Professional Identity between the Policy Landscape and the Politics of Teacher Regulation. Contemporary Issues In Early Childhood, 8(3), 233-243. doi: 10.2304/ciec.2007.8.3.233

Does the EYFS provide a comprehensive curriculum for children from birth to five?

If the EYFS provides a comprehensive curriculum for children from birth to five it gifts each child “the best possible start in life” (DoE, 2017, p. 5) with “support that enables them to fulfil their potential.” (DoE, 2017, p. 5). It appears to understand what each child’s potential is, comprehending the purpose of children, and details all that is required for this purpose to be realised. With this clear an intention the EYFS is an instruction manual, a predictable, linear, gradational guide to the realisation of potential in the fives and under. However, what is this potential that the EYFS is hinged upon? Is it possible for this framework to fully grasp childhood capability in totality without taking a restrictive approach? And, as a government driven initiative, is each child’s development a means to a political end, with the EYFS curriculum comprehensive only with this end in mind?

At first glance the framework appears comprehensive, reaching far into the superfluity of childhood potential. Separated into two categories it considers seven main areas of childhood learning and development: the prime areas of communication and language, physical development, and personal, social and emotional development; and the specific areas of literacy, mathematics, understanding the world, and expressive arts and design.

Each area contains specific objectives, for example those for the prime area concerning managing feelings and behaviour:

children talk about how they and others show feelings, talk about their own and others’ behaviour, and its consequences, and know that some behaviour is unacceptable. They work as part of a group or class, and understand and follow the rules. They adjust their behaviour to different situations, and take changes of routine in their stride. (DoE, 2017, p. 11).

As a framework with specific outcomes, the EYFS curriculum needs to measure children against its objectives in order to rank “progress against expected levels, and their readiness for Year 1.” (DoE, 2017, p. 14). In an editorial piece for the European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, Maelis Lohmander voiced concern that within:

a neoliberal, outcomes-driven discourse there is a risk that being ‘ready for primary education’ can be associated with a curriculum which decontextualised knowledge and offers scripted instructional frameworks with narrow measurable outcomes often offered…this comes at the expense of a holistic perspective. (Hayes and Filipovic, 2017, in Lohmander, 2017, p. 808).

In determining a child’s potential in terms of school readiness, the EYFS is systematic to a neoliberal (1) approach to early years education, categorising young children in terms of their potential economic value. Peter Moss goes further when he states that frameworks like the EYFS are “…contributing to squeezing every last drop of human capital…to ensure survival in an environment of cut-throat competition.” (Moss, 2018, p. 22).

However two factors require consideration before concluding whether the EYFS curriculum is limited. Firstly, is the EYFS fit for purpose, i.e. comprehensive within its own remit to produce economically viable humans. Secondly, are there alternatives: those in comparable practise, for example by other governments, and those which Erik Wright (Wright, 2007, p. 27) considers as “envisaged real utopias”, those alternatives that hold three key elements of desirability, viability and achievability (Wright, 2007, p. 27).

To assess the scope of the EYFS curriculum within its own limitations, is to assess whether its approach is currently conducive. That its knowledge-based principles provide the under-fives with the tools required to economically succeed. To do so let’s consider a two year old toddler who started nursery in England in 2019. Say this child followed their education through to university, to eventually graduate at the age of 22 in 2039. Has the economy focused pathway, that the child first began 20 years ago within the EYFS curriculum, unlocked their ability to economically succeed?

An analysis of 46 countries and 800 professions by the McKinsey Global Institute (2017) sheds much light on this. They report by 2030, a full nine years before this child completes their education, 800 million jobs across the globe will have been replaced by robot automation, affecting 20% of jobs within the UK and requiring one-third of our workforce to retrain for other work.

The McKinsey report is backed by businessman Jack Ma who believes neoliberal, knowledge based curriculum like the EYFS are decreasing in validity:

If we do not change the way we teach 30 years later we’ll be in trouble, because the way we teach our kids is knowledge based and we cannot teach our kids to be smarter than machines we have to teach something unique so that machines can never catch up with us, so that 30 years later our kids have the chance…values, believing, independent thinking, teamwork, care for others these are the soft parts that knowledge will not teach you…making sure that humans are different from machine. (Ma, 2019).

Jack Ma says only by changing education can your children compete with machines

"Everything we teach should be different from machines". Read more: http://wef.ch/2E6fH2p Alibaba Group Alibaba.com

Posted by World Economic Forum on Wednesday, January 24, 2018

 

His concerns are shared by educationalist Sir Ken Robinson who, speaking in The Guardian, stated our approach to education is:

stifling some of the most important capacities that young people now need to make their way in the increasingly demanding world of the 21st century – the powers of creative thinking…Most students never get to explore the full range of their abilities and interests … Education is the system that’s supposed to develop our natural abilities and enable us to make our way in the world. Instead, it is stifling the individual talents and abilities of too many students and killing their motivation to learn. (Robinson, 2009).

Economically, what appears increasingly desirable is a broad-brush approach, one including a child’s interests, interrelations and inquisitiveness, those holistic attributes currently lacking in the EYFS curriculum. Its knowledge-based framework devised to develop a young child’s potential for economic gain falls short of being fully comprehensive: by the time our example child is thirteen, the linear, neoliberal education stream they have followed since the age of two, is made redundant by artificial intelligence. It is fair to say the EYFS curriculum is failing the regime it was created to support.

The second consideration is the availability and viability of alternatives, options that “rather than specifying any pre-defined knowledge, skills or attitudes…empower children as active citizens, so that they can act to change their own lives.” (Siraj-Blatchford, 2008, p. 9). Within early years practice in the city of Reggio Emilia this empowerment comes from recognising each child as the “rich child born with a hundred languages: the child as a protagonist and citizen; the child of unknowable potentiality.” (Moss, 2018, p. 70). Within this approach, early years learning is a process of construction rather than transmission or reproduction, a process where adults are co-constructors who rather than request a child to complete activities to fit them within a system of understanding, focus on listening and the creation of relationships without bias of what is appropriate, accurate or aim. This remit enables wonderment, surprise and uncertainty; an open-ended divergent learning process far removed from a measurable, linear educational curriculum. In comparison to the wealth of learning this model represents the EYFS curriculum appears restricted.

Admittedly the Reggio Emilia model, a realisation of Wright’s (2007, p. 27) three key elements of desirability, viability and achievability, is worlds apart from the EYFS framework, however there are other curriculums; and some like New Zealand’s Ministry of Education’s Te Whāriki, are a waystation (Wright, 2007, p. 37), a middle ground, between two educational extremes.

Te Whāriki, New Zealand’s early years curriculum embraces many holistic attributes not seen within the EYFS. It is set out in five inclusive strands: Wellbeing, Belonging, Contribution, Communication and Exploration; very much an integrated approach different to the EYFS targeted areas. Further, New Zealand’s curriculum considers each strand as equally important and is void of the language of school readiness and developmental goals. Rather than the requirement of ‘good future progress’ (DfE, 2017, p 5) the Te Whāriki looks towards:

competent and confident learners and communicators, healthy in mind, body and spirit, secure in their sense of belonging and in the knowledge that they make a valued contribution to society. (MoE, 2017, p. 7).

With this the Te Whāriki of New Zealand embraces both knowledge and active citizenship within its framework, it is a pedagogy based on societal values rather than economic worth.

The existence of these alternatives to the EYFS demonstrates its incomprehensible approach to early years learning. That it is possible to highlight a practice vastly different in nature as seen in Emilio Reggio, and give a ‘middle ground’ example, crafted by the government of an economically developed nation further amplifies this perspective. However these examples just demonstrate the relative concept of a comprehensive curriculum, and there are a multitude of definitions of what this may look like. So, it is in demonstrating the failure of the EYFS through its curriculum to attain its overarching goal, i.e. realise the economic viability of children and support the regime it was created to promote, that gives justification to conclude that the EYFS is not a comprehensive curriculum for children from birth to five years.

1. Neoliberalism as defined by Oxford Reference as “A political label with multiple meanings, neoliberalism is primarily associated with the goal of reducing the role of the state” (Oxford Reference, 2019). The issues concerning neoliberal ideology are discussed here https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot .

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