3 to 5s LEARNING

Comments on key concerns raised during the recent consultation exercise

1. Young four year olds are not ready to start school in the September after their fourth birthday. Nursery schools and other dedicated early years settings can meet their needs much more effectively.

The Foundation Stage curriculum has been carefully designed to meet the learning, social and developmental needs of young children aged of 3 to 5. All primary schools in England are now recognised providers of the FS curriculum, and particularly in the final year of the Foundation Stage (FS). In the majority of English LEAs, children start primary school in the September after their fourth birthday.

Primary schools in Oxfordshire are fully involved, alongside Nursery Schools and PV providers, in initiatives to improve the quality of provision in the Foundation Stage and to ensure that all practitioners who work with the FS age group undertake specialist early years training.

Many primary schools in Oxfordshire are now appointing Foundation Stage Co-ordinators. The job descriptions of these co-ordinators often require them to develop effective partnership arrangements with other early years providers in their local communities.

2. The staffing ratios in primary reception classes are too high. They do not allow young children to receive the amount and quality of individual attention they need.

In order to be eligible for OFSTED registration, PV providers have to have a ratio of 1 adult to every 8 children over the age of 3. The leader of the setting has to be qualified to NVQ level 3 standard (‘A’ Level equivalent). At least 50% of the remaining staff in the setting have to be qualified to NVQ level 2 standard (equivalent to GCSE, grades A* to C). These ratios apply specifically to childcare provision.

LEA nursery schools and classes do not have to meet these Ofsted registration requirements. They are expected to meet a nationally recommended staffing ratio of 1 adult to every 13 children. The first adult in the setting must be a qualified teacher (NVQ level 4 equivalent) with an early years specialism. The second adult must be an early years support worker with a level 3 qualification (Nursery Nurse equivalent). These ratios are specifically intended for Early Education.

As for reception classes in primary school, the nationally laid down staffing ratio is 1 teacher to every 30 children. This ratio applies to all classes in Key Stage One.

As part of its ‘3 to 5s Learning’ proposals, the County Council intends to introduce a recommended staffing ratio of 1:15 for children in the final year of the Foundation Stage and 1:10 in the first two years of the Foundation Stage. However, these improved ratios are dependent upon the County Council voting additional funding for reception-year five year olds in primary schools’ budgets.

3. In small schools, young children will suffer through being taught in the same classes as older children.

• through imaginative organisation of space and activities within the school so as to enable FS children to be taught as a separate group for at least part of each week
• through flexible partnership arrangements with local private or voluntary sector providers, which in turn might enable older FS children to be taught as one combined group for at least part of each week
• through a long-term investment programme in primary school buildings, which will create separate FS accommodation in many of those schools which currently do not have it

4. Parents will come under ‘peer group pressure’ and under pressure from headteachers to send their four year olds to primary schools.

This is one of the main issues raised in the consultation responses. However, it is a notoriously difficult issue to pin down. Parents are liable to interpret the conversations they have with primary school staff about their child’s transfer to school in varying ways. And there are certainly circumstances – particularly where summer-born children are concerned – where popular schools have no option to spell out honestly for parents what the admissions consequences could be for their child if they do not take up a rising five place in the summer term.

It is also true that many parents positively want their child to start school as soon as possible in the reception year. It is natural for them to want their child to ‘settle in‘ early into the surroundings in which they will be spending the next six years or more. This is clearly the message coming from the County Council’s survey of parents earlier this year and on a more limited basis, from the County’s Parental Involvement Co-ordinator in response to the 3 to 5s Learning consultations.

If the current proposals are approved, the County Council should publish and distribute a special leaflet for parents and providers, which sets out the issues involved in a young child’s transfer to primary school. The leaflet could spell out the options that parents have and the questions that they should ask before deciding on when to take up a primary school place.

5. Without the oldest four year olds, Nursery Schools and Pre-School providers will be forced to cater for a narrower age band of children. As a result, a significant number of Pre-School providers will be forced to close.

It is true that the age profile of many existing early years providers will change as a result of the County Council’s proposals. However it will continue to be parents who decide which early years provider their child goes to. For example, many working parents currently make arrangements that combine funded early education with wraparound daycare. It is assumed that many of these parents will probably want to remain with their existing arrangements, rather than accept a half-time place in a primary school.

As far as nursery schools are concerned, they will certainly have a key role to play in the new arrangements. They will be beacons of good practice not only for children’s early learning but also for integrated family support services generally. The possibility of freestanding Nursery Schools extending their age range slightly so as to provide for children in the whole of the Foundation Stage age range could be explored. In addition, in those geographical areas where nursery schools are located (Botley, Chipping Norton, Didcot, East Oxford, Grandpont, Headington and Wood Farm) the County Council could ensure that binding protocols are agreed with the local primary schools on how primary admissions are handled in their area and on how parents are advised about the options available to their children at the time of primary transfer.

With regard to PV providers, past experience in Oxfordshire shows that when the primary admissions date was lowered in 1994 and again in 1997, there were relatively few closures. In addition, a large number of individual primary schools now have either nursery classes or early years units (more than 100 primary schools now have them out of a total of 227) without any obvious adverse impact on local PV providers. Currently the PV Sector is more buoyant in Oxfordshire than it has ever been, with 333 providers registered as part of the County’s Early Years Development and Childcare Plan and a recorded increase of nearly 10% in the numbers of 3 and 4 year olds enrolled between January 2001 and 2002. The numbers of 3 and 4 year olds in the LEA sector remained static during this period. Funding for the sector is increasing rapidly as the entitlement for all three year olds to have access to publicly funded early education is extended across the County.

One possible way forward could be for the County Council to establish a sustainability fund to meet the short term costs of supporting any PV providers which may be in serious danger of closure and where there is no alternative early years provider available to families within a reasonable travelling distance.

6. It does not make sense to change arrangements which are working well already.