It's All About the Skills!

Mr Incredible has Syndrome

Spiderman has the Green Goblin

Batman has the Joker

and Early Years has 'Stagnation'.

We should all be on a constant quest is to ensure that quality learning is taking place for all children in our setting. This is HARD to do in an EYFS environment which, although packed with potential, is also packed with unlimited opportunities for children to stagnate in low level activities that challenge no one.

Not that there is likely to be much stagnation going on at this time of the year. Everything is shiny and new and there will be lots of assessment sheets flying about. It is once the initial assessment is over the children have settled into the regular patterns of the day, that the rot can start to set in...

Once your initial Point of Entry Assessment is done you will then be able to set up your environment based on what the assessment has told you.

With in that environment you will have areas of Continuous Provision that will provide children with lots of opportunities to think and explore BUT that also will be linked to next steps development and then 'dressed' to children's interests.

Even with all of this good stuff in place Stagnation can still comes calling on a fairly regular basis.

There are key areas of any setting where he is most likely to strike. Sand, Water, Malleable Materials, Workshop and Paint.

What can save these areas from the evil clutches of Stagnation?

Why, Captain Skills of course!

When I am planning for my areas of provision I always have a list of the 'types' of resources that I am going to offer as basic provision. I don't list each item individually but give an overview by type. I call this list my non-negotiables. 

Then, each week I choose 3 or 4 areas where I know that it is easy for children to revert to low level non challenging play and I plan for development in a specific skill.

Take for example your 'Workshop' continuous provision. When you are not in it with the children how do you get them to learn a new skill or apply something you have taught them to their work and not just stick two cardboard boxes together with some PVA and put it in the 'going home tray'?

I look at assessment as see if there are any skills that can be easily promoted in the Workshop area that the children are not demonstrating.

Then I take this skill and subdivide it into a Basic Level, Mid Level and High Level. This is a great thing to do with the whole team if you can because then everybody gets to have the discussion about how specific skills develop and what next steps look like for each level of progression.

Lets take the skill of joining for an example.

When I am planning for my workshop area this week I am going to have a focus on the skill of joining , so with my team (ideally) I would have a discussion about what joining might look like at each stage of development.

Basic Level Join

Using easily accessible glue to stick two surfaces together. This requires minimum dexterity, planning and imagination. It is very quick and simple to achieve.

to enable this skill to happen we would need to provide:

• glue - Pritt, PVA, flour and water paste (I would discuss the difference between the glues and the skills you would need to use them, Pritt being much quicker and easier to apply than PVA, flour and water paste being more complicated to mix)
• materials - A range of materials with large flat surfaces to make joining easier.

Mid Level Join

For a mid level join you are probably introducing techniques and resources that require more advanced dexterity and a wider range of apparatus.

To enable this skill to happen we would need to provide:

• Tape - masking and sellotape (differentiate between then in discussions with the team. Which would you start with and why)
• elastic bands
• folding
• Blu Tack (as if you are ever going to put that in your workshop area! It is like gold dust)
• paper clip (large and small)
• stapler

High Level Join

For a high level join you are going to need really good fine motor manipulation and also master the use of other equipment and techniques to enable to join.

To enable this skill to happen we would need to provide:

• hole punch (single and double)
• split pins
• treasury tags
• stitching  - hole punch and lace/woo/string
• stitching - large blunt ended darning needle and embroidery thread
• more complex folding and tearing
• glue gun

This is not an exhaustive list but it gives you the idea.

You would then ensure that your area was well stocked with all of the resources that you have identified.

By introducing a skill focus into the area and making sure that all staff are aware of the progression of that skill, you can use that planning an knowledge to encourage and support children to include joining in their work at an appropriate level.

WARNING - This will make your head hurt! But, the pain is worth it as not only will you be upskilling yourself and your team in the progression of basic skills you will be adding an extra layer of rigour to your planning and provision.

Try it, it will work wonders...

Alistair

Comments

[ritabannon@btinternet.com]

Great as always, it is really useful to have the skills differentiated like this. Your ideas will provide a good talking point for helping to plan our provision. Thanks

[Hettie]

Stagnation attacked my water tray half-way through last week. Hasn't reached the other areas yet! I've been looking really closely at these areas this term and had already come to the conclusion that I need to do some serious work on rearranging the resources - making some more and some less accessible. I think the hard bit for me is going to be identifying which skills are being used in which area - any tips?!

[Sarah Watkins]

Perfect... we are getting there with the planning... the learning curve is steeeeeeeeeep but good :D !!!
Sarah

[abc does]

You are dead right! It is a challenging process that makes your head hurt but it is great when it is done. I am in the process of writing a skills list starter for each area which I will share when it is done. My issue is finding the time to sit down and finish it!

Good luck

Alistair

[Amy]

I wouldn't put Blu-Tack in my area, not because it's like gold dust, but because my children keep eating it!!!