Examination of Witnesses (Questions 280
- 286)
WEDNESDAY 24 MAY 2000
MS EVA
LLOYD, MS
CLAIRE POWER
AND MS
MARY DICKINS
Mr St Aubyn
280. I want to be clear about the implications
of the statement in your submission to us when you say the adult
as perpetual expert stance is contrasted with what you prefer,
child-focused learning. That is a summary of what you are saying.
Are you concerned that a child-focused learning approach makes
higher demands in terms of the skill and training of the teacher,
and that level of skill and training may not be available out
there in the marketplace, so to speak?
(Ms Lloyd) I acknowledge it. I am not necessarily
concerned, because at the same time we are saying that yes, the
work force is looking for additional training, mostly as part
of continuing professional development, because if we only concentrate
on first entry into the profession, we will lose the work force,
and there will not be people to deliver this early education.
What you are saying also links in with the point we made about
boys. It is reflecting the ways we deal with children. It is something
all the workers need to do. When I quoted the adult as perpetual
expert stance, it was really referring to the view of my mentor,
Professor Barbara Tizard, the former Director of the Thomas Coram
Research Unit and an eminent educational psychologist, who based
this on her observations of children—and it was four-year
olds, and it was four-year old girls, to create some homogeneity
in the study sample. She was observing girls talking at home and
at school, girls from different social classes. She could see
that some of these girls were definitely clamming up at school
in response to the adult as perpetual expert stance taken by the
teachers in this case. Their language at home, which was mostly
with their mothers in this case, but also with Dads, was rich
and complex, and there might have been style differences. The
range of issues might have been different. This might have been
in homes where there were not a lot of books for reasons of poverty
or whatever, but there were definitely already, at the point where
these children were entering nursery education, problems in the
interaction, the communication between the work force and the
children with the skills and potential that they brought to the
setting. The new strategy, the whole new era that we are entering
in the Early Years service gives us a chance to address those
as well.
281. What I am getting at is partly reflected
in the visit three of us made to Switzerland a couple of years
ago, and I think it would be fair to say the Swiss approach is
much more a child-focused one. The formal learning happens much
later, and yet by the age of 11 their literacy and numeracy standards
are higher than ours. What struck us was the quality of the teachers
that we saw, and of course, the remuneration they receive there
is on a different level. There may be a practical point here,
which I would like you to consider, that while the more formalised
approach, the Literacy and Numeracy Strategy, at this early age
are not your preferred option, they may guarantee a basic minimum
result, whereas the child-focused approach, without sufficient
training and support and development of the teaching profession
for the Early Years, might actually on average, given those drawbacks,
produce a less satisfactory result.
(Ms Lloyd) I would like to make a quick comment. I
do not share your optimism that the strategies will deliver the
looked for results. Again, I refer to history. If we look at the
history of nursery education in this country, we do not find the
research evidence that says that greater formality in mostly disadvantaged
areas led to greater educational achievement later on. Think of
Islington, think of the education statistics. Where is the evidence?
That should give us the confidence to say let us look at the other
evidence, not just the evidence for informal approaches in a fairly
restricted setting where there was a short-term package of education,
two and a half hour sessions, but let us look at the evidence
as it is coming out from research by Tony Bertram and Chris Pascal,
of course, she is one of your advisers, from the Early Excellence
Centres, where a much more holistic approach to children's and
families' needs has been taken. It is difficult to do that. I
know. I had a meeting with OFSTED the other week. Of course, OFSTED
has just finished the Hillfields evaluation, the first OFSTED
combined inspection of an Early Excellence Centre. There is a
report available on the Web. The people I was talking to were
concerned about the difficulties thrown up by inspecting such
a complex set-up, and if we are really serious about the outcomes
for children, we cannot just withdraw into a professional stance
and say, "Oh dear, I can't stick this in boxes." We
have to face it.
282. The box-ticking culture, where we like
to say someone has reached this standard and that standard, may
give an artificial view, you are saying, of what you are actually
achieving?
(Ms Lloyd) And how, the process by which, yes.
Helen Jones
283. Can I try and tease out what appears to
me to be a contradiction in some of the evidence which has been
given to this Committee, not simply by yourselves but by other
people as well. We would all agree that Early Years education
is very complex and requires very special, highly gifted practitioners,
whether they are trained teachers or nursery nurses, and we all
agree about wanting to raise the status of those involved in it.
That is what I was getting at earlier. My firm belief is that
men do not do it very much because it is badly paid. If that is
the case, how at the same time can people argue before this Committee,
as they have done, that we can also let gifted amateurs do nursery
education and Early Years education? Can you try and resolve that
contradiction for us?
(Ms Dickins) I find the term "gifted amateurs"
a little disturbing because what I have in mind is, for example,
an Early Years worker who has 23 years experience, who is multi-skilled,
and I presume that is who you mean.
Chairman: It is not a Committee term.
Helen Jones: We are talking about volunteers.
Chairman
284. It is because we all consider ourselves
gifted amateurs in this business.
(Ms Dickins) I would just flag up the role of professional
development yet again, because I think that what is important
in Early Years education is that workers actually caring for children
are abreast of the issues, they are abreast of developments, and
are able to take on board some of the bigger picture. I am continually
surprised when I go out in the field training how few Early Years
workers actually know there is a Childcare Strategy. I think it
is very important that professional development is up to date
and actually flags up those issues so that childcare workers,
so long as they are informed, so long as they have continuing
professional input, I feel can be just as effective as Early Years
teachers. I think the key issue is in-service training.
Helen Jones
285. Perhaps I can try and press you a little
more on that, because a lot of Early Years education is delivered
by people who, at least at the beginning, are not trained. It
is a question this Committee is trying to get to grips with. We
all want to see the involvement of parents, we are aware of what
the voluntary movement has done, but why do you believe that is
appropriate for very young children, to have their Early Years
education left to people who are not trained to deliver it, when
we would not countenance it anywhere else in the system? We would
not allow it for post-five-year olds, we would not allow it in
secondary education, so why is that appropriate for very young
children?
(Ms Lloyd) Certainly as far as the National Early
Years Network is concerned, that is not our position. We are asking
for everybody to be trained, but different routes towards training,
and I have already said to you that there is this great demand
for training. We do recognise though that we cannot take a cavalier
attitude to the incredible input from volunteers, and the history
of this field, but we recognise completely what you are saying
about the need for training and, as I said, it cannot just be
at first entry to the profession. It should be, and we are trying
very hard to help that process along, through different routes,
through updating skills and experience, as Mary has already said.
Chairman
286. You said you have just met OFSTED. What
is your group's attitude to the kind of inspection that applies
in your area?
(Ms Lloyd) The OFSTED meeting was in the context of
an action research project that the Network is undertaking together
with Professor Penn at the University of East London, which is
looking at the relationship between the voluntary early years
sector and nursery schools. I mention nursery schools in particular
because it cannot have escaped your notice as you have been visiting
the field that there is currently a great loss going on amongst
nursery schools, who are losing the competition against nursery
classes in primary schools in terms of attracting three- and four-year
olds. The action research is about trying to preserve the potential
that nursery schools have, having focused traditionally on young
children, often having purpose-built buildings, having a big philosophy
behind them of early education and early years work, and how we
might contribute to preserving the 500 that are still around so
that we maintain more integrated settings, because, of course,
we know that if primary schools with nursery classes are going
to move towards delivering a more holistic service to young children
and families, in many cases they have a very long way to go.
Chairman: Thank you very much for that. Can
I thank all of you for your excellent evidence. As far as I am
concerned, it could have gone on for two or three more hours and
I would still be enjoying it. Normally the best contributions
are the ones that you think of when you are on the Tube going
home. This is a very open Committee. If there is something vital
we have missed today or something you meant to say, do tell us.
We want to make this an extremely good report, and we will only
do that with your continued help and support. Thank you very much.
|
