Learning And Development

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

When doing work in a childcare setting once you observe the children you follow the seven aspects of learning. The three main areas are physical development, personal, social and emotional development and communication and language. The four other areas of development are literacy, mathematics, Expressive art and design and understanding of the world. Although these are seven separate aspects of learning they are interdependent because for anyone who is observing a child you would may be observing one area of learning but you will see different areas linking into that activity; for example a practioners is observing a child doing physical activity but another child comes over and joins in this means they are likely to now show personal, social and emotional development and communication and language skills too as well as doing the physical activity. This means a good quality activity is more likely to use more aspects of learning.

Physical development

Moving and handling; Children show good self-control and co-ordination in big and small movements such as crawling or grasping. They move confidently in a range of ways, safely negotiating space. They handle equipment and tools effectively, including pen and pencils from 6 months plus to mark make and then eventually to writing.

Health and self-care; Children know the importance for good health of physical exercise, and a healthy diet, and talk about ways to keep healthy and safe.

They will have their own basic hygiene and personal needs as they get older and do them successfully, including dressing and going to the toilet independently.

Personal, social and emotional development

Self-confidence and self-awareness: Children are confident and like to try new activities, they will say why they like some activities more than others. They are confident to speak with people they recognise and see regularly, they will talk about their ideas, and what they would like to use for their chosen activities. They will ask if they need help or will say when they do not want help.

Managing feelings and behaviour: Children speak about how they and the like show their feelings, talk about their own and others’ behaviours and the consequences, and realize that some behaviour is unwanted and can have bad consequences. They work together in a class or setting and follow the guidelines to acceptable behaviour and the rules of their setting or school. They adapt their behaviours to the different situations, and consider changes regarding routine of their stride.

Making relationships: Children and young people play together nicely and share turns in activities. They take into account someone else’s suggestions about how to be able to plan his or her next activity. They will show sensitivity to other people’s needs and feelings and form good relationships with grownups as well as other children and young people

Communication and language

Listening and attention: Children and Young people listen closely attentively in numerous situations. Many listen to stories, precisely anticipating important events and respond to what they will hear along with questions, comments or actions. They give their attention to what others say and respond correctly, while engaged within a different activity.

Understanding: Children and Young people follow ideas and actions that involve them. Many children's answer to ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions regarding the experiences and within response to the stories or events.

Speaking: Young children express themselves effectively, showing understanding of listeners’ needs. They will use the past, present and future forms precisely while talking about events that have transpired or that are going to take place in the foreseeable future. They develop their own narratives and explanations by joining thoughts, ideas or events.

Literacy

Reading: Children and young people understand simple sentences. They also phonic information to decode regular words and phrases and can read them out loud to others. Additionally, they understand several frequent unusual words and phrases. The children demonstrate that they understand when they are being spoken to about what they have read.

Writing: Children and young people use their phonics’ to write words and phrases with techniques which match their spoken sounds. Additionally, they create several irregular words. Children create simple sentences which can be understood and read by themselves and others. Several words are usually are spelt correctly while others usually are phonetically plausible.

Mathematics

Numbers: Children can count well with numbers from one to twenty, place them in order and say which number is one more or one less than a given number. Using lots of something and objects, they can add and subtract two single-digit numbers and count forwards or backwards to find the answer. They solve problems, including doubling, halving and sharing.

Shape, space and measures: Children use everyday language to talk about size, weight, capacity, position, distance, time and money to compare quantities and objects and to solve problems. They recognise, create patterns and describe them. They can explore everyday objects and shapes and use numbers to describe them

Expressive Art & Design

Exploring and using media and materials: Children sing songs, make music and dance rhythmically, and like to change them. They safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, such as experimenting with colours, designs, textures.

Being imaginative: Children think about the purpose and uses of the media and materials they have learnt about. They express their own ideas, thoughts and feelings through design and technology, art, music, dance, role-play’s and stories.

Understanding of the Word

People and communities: Children discuss past and present events in their own life's and in the lives of members of the family. They are aware that other children don’t always take advantage of the same things, and are generally sensitive to this. They are familiar with similarities and differences concerning themselves and others, and among their families, communities and cultures.

The world: Children know about similarities and differences when it comes to places, objects, materials and living things. They will discuss the features of their own environment as well as how environments might change from one another. Children make observations regarding animals and plants and explain the reason why some things arise, and talk about changes.

Technology: Children realise that a range of technology is used in places such as homes and schools. They will use technology for particular purposes.

1.2 A description of the documented outcomes for children that form part of the relevant early year’s framework

 The Early Years Foundation Stage was designed to ensure that all children and young people regardless of where they may live, their culture, their family background or their circumstances they will still have an outstanding early year’s education. To be able to asses this and ensure that practitioners have a clear focus for their work and a good series of positive outcomes are given for each area of learning. These are called Early Learning Goals. The aim is that young children can reach these by the end of the reception year. These goals are highly important as they form the steps to the children’s later education. It is important that practitioners realise that many of the Early Learning Goals are associated with young children’s development and that it is although it is reasonable to expect children to meet the criteria by the end of their reception year, they are not meant to be used as outcomes in nurseries or pre-schools. It is also worth noting that not all children will be at the same level and will have different varieties of reasons not to meet all the Early Learning Goals as they may have specific learning difficulties, health issues or because they are younger than their peers. Children that are born in August will only just be four when going into reception year while others in their class will be turning five years old.

Some of the Early Learning Goals need to be interpreted carefully as they are not closely focused. For example one of the Early Learning Goals for physical development is "recognise the importance of keeping healthy and those things which contribute to this". As this is a lifetime research for some doctors, it is important to interpretive these in terms of what might be reasonable knowledge for a young child.  (Tassoni et al 2010: 233)

The Early Years Foundation Stage was designed to ensure all children are treated the same no matter where they have come from that they would have access to the same education to measure this and to ensure practitioners have a clear focus for their work a series of outcomes id given for each learning area these are called early years goals this is done by the end of the reception year.

1.3 An explanation of how the documented outcomes are assessed and recorded

The documented outcomes of the Early Learning Goals are assessed and recorded during evaluation phase which is at the end of reception year. This is a statutory requirement and teachers will fill in a record stating how each child in the class is doing. This is called Early Years Profile. Children are assessed in thirteen different scales which all have nine different points. The Early Learning Goals are sometimes split up or combined. Teachers are supposed to identify what the children can do which is based on the observations that are done in reception year. There is a requirement that 80% of the observations are taken place during a child led activity where they children are engaged in the activity. The early year’s profiles are moderated to ensure some degree of accuracy. Following the assessment for social development which form part of the Personal, Social and Emotional development area. Point’s four to eight are from the Early Learning Goals, one to three describes the children that are working towards a goal and point nine is when they are working beyond the level of the Early Learning Goals for that particular area.