Early Years Foundation Stage: Observation, Assessment and Planning

1. Early Years Foundation Stage: Observation, Assessment and Planning

2. Timetable • Observation- 50 minutes • Record keeping- 30 minutes • Break – 15 minutes • Demonstrating progress- 20 minutes • Planning- 45 minutes • Summary &issues to take forward -10 minutes

3. An overview of observational assessment in the context of the EYFS • A Unique Child Babies and young children are individuals first, with unique profiles of abilities. Schedules and routines flow with the child’s needs. All planning starts with observing children in order to understand and consider their current interests, development and learning. • Positive Relationships Adults bring their own perspectives to an observation. Family circumstances and cultural contexts need to be considered in making assessments, particularly in Personal, Social and Emotional Development.

4. An overview of observational assessment in the context of the EYFS • Enabling Environments When you are planning, remember that children learn from even things not planned for – such as a fall of snow. • Learning and Development This covers all themes of EYFS: If children do not communicate freely with adults you may need to ‘think outside the box’ rather than make assumptions.

5. A description of the eight principles for early childhood observational assessment: • Assessment must have a purpose. • Ongoing observation of children participating in everyday activities is the most reliable way of building up an accurate picture of what children know, understand, feel, are interested in and can do. • Practitioners should both plan observations and be ready to capture the spontaneous but important moments. • Judgements of children’s development and learning must be based on skills, knowledge, understanding and behaviour that are demonstrated consistently and independently.

6. A description of the eight principles for early childhood observational assessment: • Effective assessment takes equal account of all aspects of the child’s development and learning. • Accurate assessments are reliant upon taking account of contributions from a range of perspectives. • Assessments must actively engage parents in developing an accurate picture of the child’s development. • Children must be fully involved in their own assessment.

7. Assessment must have a purpose… to intervene, support and extend learning to inform planning for next steps to evaluate the effect of provision

8. Ongoing observation of children participating in everyday activities is the most reliable way of building up an accurate picture of what children know, understand, feel, are interested in and can do.

9. What it looks like… • Systematic observations • Reflective interactions,which help us to understand each child’ achievement, interests and learning styles • A broad picture of children’s development and learning rather than narrow aspects • Observations made in a variety of contexts

10. Good observations are made when practitioners have… • A sound knowledge of child development and how of children learn • A sound knowledge of the curriculum and what the next steps in learning might be for individual children.

11. Practitioners should both plan observations and be ready to capture the spontaneous but important moments. Observations are made when children are involved in… Child initiated Adult initiated Adult led activities

12. Observations • Incidental /anecdotal When the practitioner notices something significant he or she is not involved in. • Participant When the practitioner is involved in play with children and in adult led activities. • Focused/narrative When the practitioner stands back to observe children in independent, child initiated, play based activities.

13. Observation opportunities are more likely to occur when… • Practitioners organise resources and their time so they can capture the planned and spontaneous • Staff especially the key person are deployed to carry out good quality observations • Staff realise every interaction with children is an opportunity to learn more about them

17. Assumptions and Inferences

18. Objective anecdotes/incidental observations • Focus on what the child did and said • Be factual • Be specific • Be brief

19. Format for anecdotal/incidental • Date each anecdote • Identify when, where and who • Describe what he child did and said, use quotes to document the child’s language • When applicable state the outcome

20. Guidelines for Narrative/Focused Observations

21. Before the observation begins • Decide what you want to find out • Identify the child/ area • Identify the focus

22. During the observation… • Find a spot close enough to the child so that you can hear, but far enough away so that you are not intruding on the child’s actions • Write down an objective description of what the child actually does and say

23. During the observation… • Include the context • Include time markers • Develop your own shorthand

24. After the observation… • Link what you saw and heard to the focus • If you can, share the observation with your team • Identify the significant learning taking place and cross reference to other areas • Decide on support strategies and next steps

25. Judgements of children’s development and learning must be based on skills, knowledge , understanding and behaviour that are demonstrated consistently and independently

26. Consider a range of evidence displayed in different contexts and across areas of learning • Observe children in adult directed and child initiated activities • The assessment made is the best description of the child’s achievement

27. Effective assessment takes equal account of all aspects of the child’s development and learning Tuning in to different skills children are developing e.g linguistic, physical creative etc. Reflecting on all the dimensions revealed by the normal activities in the setting.

28. Accurate assessments are reliant upon taking account of contributions from a range of perspectives. All adults who interact with the child,in the setting will contribute to the process

29. Assessments must actively engage parents in developing an accurate picture of the child’s development Engage in a two way flow of information between family and setting, in order to meet the child’s needs and plan next steps together.

30. Parent’s Involvement • Support parents in describing their child’s attainment • Talk with parents and involve them in reviews of their children's achievements, including those demonstrated at home.

31. Children must be fully involved in their own assessment Children are able to take ownership of their learning, when; they are encouraged to ask questions, make comments and share their own judgements about their development. This is demonstrated when……….

32. Adults and children are involved in conversations about learning, when they are involved in an activity. . .

33. ...and when they review outcomes together

34. Children ask their own questions, talk about their thoughts and how they want to tackle a problem. • Adults ask probing, yet open- ended questions that encourage children to consider quality and processes of work and what to do next.

36. Record Keeping

37. Record Keeping It involves noting the most important elements of practitioners’, children’s and parents’ growing knowledge of what children know, understand, are interested in, feel and can do. This is a continuous process, the record keeping documentation needs to be regularly updated. Developmental progress tracking sheet, nursery profile and eProfile

38. Record-keeping must be meaningful and have a purpose. • The task of keeping records must be manageable and sustainable. • Records must capture the range of children’s attainment, achievement and progress.

39. Using ICT My Journey through the Early Years Foundation Stage Name: AR

40. Records will reflect the individuality of every child and the diversity of their backgrounds. • All significant participants in children’s development and learning should contribute to the information-gathering. • Records should be shared with the child.

41. Children and practitioners recording together Link outcomes with the areas of learning

42. All information from observations process will feed into the record keeping documentation. Learning Journey using ICT

43. Parents contributing to the record keeping process Sharing their child’s experiences from home. Sheets available to parents. Examples of completed sheets could be displayed. What I would like to share. You may consider developing a record of milestones that the children have achieved while they are in the setting to give to parents.

44. Demonstrating Progress

45. Four principles for demonstrating progress: • Effective practitioners will be able to identify how individuals and groups of children in their setting have developed and progressed in their learning. • Effective approaches to assessment will generate information or data that can be used for a range of purposes.

46. Four principles for demonstrating progress: • Children’s progress must be identified and analysed through a range of appropriate evidence, the majority of this will be drawn from observation of child-initiated activity. • The complexity of young children’s development requires practitioners and managers to be able to understand a range of information in order to draw conclusions about children’s progress and the effectiveness of their provision.

47. This is demonstrated when practitioners adopt these strategies: • Identify and record a child’s starting points in the areas of Learning and Development, provided by observations and information shared by parents and other settings at times of transfer, or settings that also currently support the child. • Continue to build up individual pictures of each child’s learning and development primarily through observational assessment.

48. Review records regularly with the interested parties, including parents, to examine whether each child and group of children has made desirable progress. • Summarise records at times of transfer to describe attainment and to support appropriate planning for a child’s needs in the next setting. • Use the developmental progress tracking sheet,nursery profile summative sheet and eProfile to identify progress made during the year and to compare the rates of progress made in each area of learning and development.

49. Assessment, record-keeping and demonstrating progress in EYFS are not about assessing, recording and creating data sets designed to depress or enhance outcomes for ends such as improving added value.’ Creating the Picture pg.25

50. Information and data can be used to: • Reflect on assessments in order to support individual learning journeys. • Analyse their assessments to identify the needs of specific groups of learners.