Examination of Witnesses (Questions 420
- 433)
WEDNESDAY 21 JUNE 2000
MR CHRIS
WOODHEAD. MR
MIKE TOMLINSON
AND MR
DORIAN BRADLEY
420. But it is an important point, is it not?
If I pointed you to any other period of education I am sure you
would come back to me and say what we need is well educated and
relevantly trained and up skilled over time teachers. Why is early
years different?
(Mr Woodhead) Well educated and well trained, yes.
I am saying to you that the issue is what sort of training rather
than how much training. Is it relevant to the particular needs
of the adults who are working with this particular group of children?
421. I put it to you in terms of this very early
period, three to five particularly, that we have seen a number
of settings in which there is very little evidence of training
and people are being paid the minimum wage. Is that of any concern
to you?
(Mr Woodhead) If the children are suffering in terms
of their progress because of the inadequacy of the training or
the inadequacy of the remuneration then, yes, of course it is
of as much concern to us as it apparently was to you.
(Mr Bradley) The inspection evidence that we have
collected over the last three years in the private and voluntary
sector is pointing towards a training need focused, through the
local authority partnerships, which would help the staff plan
to have a broad and balanced developmental programme for the children
but with appropriate focus on literacy and numeracy, to help the
staff make better use of resources that are available to them,
to help them to be more clear about what they intend children
to learn, how they should group children to take part in activities
and how they should deploy other adults working with them, increasing
substantially the number of staff with good knowledge of all areas
of learning, and improving the ability of staff to assess children's
progress and attainment. Those would be the five steps for improvement
in that sector of the early years and I understand that the Government
is picking that up currently with a large-scale training programme
through the Early Years Partnerships and that training, we trust,
will be informed by our inspection results.
(Mr Tomlinson) I wanted to be clear in my mind that
you were talking about those areas of early years that we currently
inspect as opposed to those areas which we may well be asked to
inspect in the future.
422. That is right.
(Mr Tomlinson) What Dorian said about what we have
inspected is right. The picture of training is clear and one that
is being tackled by the government through its partnerships in
each local authority.
423. There is a view expressed on this Committee
by one particular individual that we are in danger of frightening
off the gifted amateurs in early years. That would be a pretty
big sacrifice because they do bring something to the early years'
experience. Would that be your view?
(Mr Woodhead) I have already said that I think there
is a danger and I agree this is something that the government
has got to be alert to. On the one hand you are suggesting that
more training is a good thing for everybody, and most people would
put their hands up to that to an extent. As I said, we need to
think clearly about the nature of the training but if you put
in place a series of hoops which people feel are the wrong hoops
or hoops they are not going to be able to jump through, then you
run the risk of losing people who are currently doing a very good
job. That is right. That is why I was trying to tease out your
attitude at different levels of education because we do find people
have a totally different attitude to qualifications and skills
and pay in the early years that they would not have in any other
section of education. It really does strike us in this way.
Mr St Aubyn
424. I wanted to draw on the Chief Inspector's
views of life in Denmark which we have visited. I do not know
if you have been there or studied the system?
(Mr Woodhead) Sadly I do not have the opportunity
for foreign travel.
425. If I can summarise by saying they believe
that teaching starts at seven, before that it is pedagogy, and
they have two distinct disciplines. Do you think there is anything
to learn from that approach to early years?
(Mr Woodhead) I think it is always useful to try and
find out what is happening in other countries and to learn from
it as a principle. If the argument is that we should delay the
point at which children go to school, I am trying to avoid the
adjective "formal", then I have not yet been persuaded
by that argument. If you looked at the high standards that are
achieved in other countries I think myself it probably has more
to do with the effectiveness of teaching later on in the child's
period of schooling than it does to the delayed entry of the child
to school.
426. My other question would be concerning the
different rates of progress of different groups, girls versus
boys, less advantaged compared to those with more advantages.
Are there any particular points that you would like to make? Do
you feel this is something that sorts itself out in due course
or that a particular focused strategy should be given to those
who are developing slower in the early years?
(Mr Woodhead) I do not think any of us have any answers
to the under-achievement of boys. It remains a very serious issue
and I very much hope as we expand the inspection of early years
provision we will look at this because it would be helpful to
those who make policy on this particular issue, but as yet I think
it would be wrong for me to pretend we had anything we could say.
Chairman
427. There is a very important point in the
evidence that has been presented to this Committee that, particularly
with boys, pushing them to formal learning, formal reading and
writing too early can damage their later development and what
some people out there fear is that OFSTED inspection may push,
very often pushed by parents, too early learning to read and write
which can be very damaging to boys' later development. I wonder
if you can help dispel the fear that OFSTED is coming along and
saying the really important thing is literacy and numeracy as
early as possible, because that could be damaging to some children's
development.
(Mr Woodhead) I wish that OFSTED had the influence
that those people who have those fears seem to believe. The fact
is, of course, that OFSTED inspects against the Government's requirements.
We do not have our own agenda. We see whether the particular placement
is meeting what the government thinks it should be doing. It is
not our agenda at all. With regard to pushing boys through hoops
inappropriately, I think the same point is true of girls. It is
damaging to try to assume that any young child can do more than
they can do. Having said that, I have emphasised throughout this
morning's session that I am all for challenge and stimulus. It
is a professional judgment as to how far you push a particular
child at a particular point in that child's development.
Mr Foster
428. If I have heard you correctly with an answer
to Nick St Aubyn earlier, are you saying in a country such as
Denmark, which is the example Nick used where formal teaching
starts at seven compared to the UK at five, that by the time the
child reaches the age of 11 the Danish children are educationally
at a higher level than that in the United Kingdom and that is
because Danish teaching between the ages of seven and 11 is far
superior to that in the UK which starts at five?
(Mr Woodhead) I do not know about Denmark because
I have not been to Denmark and studied the evidence but if you
take Switzerland you have certainly got superior attainment in
mathematics compared to the UK. If that is the case, there are
two broad explanations given the context of the current discussion.
The first is that there is a different approach to early years
education and the second is that it is something to do with the
experience the children have when they get to school. I was saying
in response to Nick that I think the latter explanation is a powerful
one. Having said that, for me I quote to you the statistic from
the inspection of reception classes where 96 per cent of receptions
classes are judged to be "satisfactory" or better by
the inspectors, which seems to me to suggest that what is going
on is basically okay and we should not be too concerned about
inappropriate demands on young children.
429. You say that the inspection said it was
satisfactory or better?
(Mr Woodhead) Or better.
430. But if we were making a comparison with
Switzerland it is clearly in your opinion inferior to what is
being taught in schools in the UK?
(Mr Woodhead) No, I am saying with regard to Switzerland
and other countries across the world that achieve higher standards
with their pupils that we need to look at the nature of the pedagogy.
I am not saying that necessarily the answer to the relative under-achievement
of English pupils lies in an inappropriate early years curriculum.
I think it would be wrong to jump to that conclusion.
Mr St Aubyn
431. You did mention earlier the problem of
under-achievement by boys. Does OFSTED recognise that boys may
simply develop at a different pace to girls mentally as well as
physically?
(Mr Woodhead) That is possible. I am myself a bit
wary of generalisations. I think the best way of approaching any
child if you are a teacher is to look at the individuality of
that child whatever their gender might be and to judge what is
appropriate in terms of their development. I do not know is the
answer but my practical response is as I put it.
(Mr Tomlinson) I think it is worth reflecting that
about 15 years ago the concern was about the under-achievement
of girls and a great deal of effort was put in, notably in the
areas of science, technology and mathematics and clearly all of
those efforts have yielded, as we are seeing now, a great deal
of good results. I am not sure that the idea that one learns faster
than the other is sustainable. I just make that simple observation.
I think there is something much more detailed and complex lying
underneath that if we want to get to the bottom of it. It has
to do with cultural matters as well.
Chairman
432. We have had a whole range of very good
evidence sessions in this inquiry. It has been a most stimulating
inquiry to the Committee ut in terms of effective provision of
pre-school education a very important piece of research was funded
by the government. What is your relationship with that sort of
research? Do you have an on-going dialogue with the team that
are conducting this because half way through, roughly, they are
finding some interesting stuff about what is effective and what
is less effective in early years. Does the Inspectorate have an
on-going dialogue with a team like that funded by government and
monitored, I take it, by government?
(Mr Woodhead) We keep abreast of developments in research
generally. With regard to this particular project, Mr Bradley?
(Mr Bradley) One of the most pleasant parts of my
working life is sitting on the Steering Committee of these EPPE
projects so I keep in very close contact with Kathy Sylva.
433. So the answer is yes.
(Mr Bradley) Yes.
Chairman: Thank you very much. Mr Woodhead,
as ever, it is a great pleasure to see you and we look forward
to seeing you in November.
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