Up, up and away!

Building Foundations to Literacy in the Early Years

Practitioners’ and Carers’ Ideas in Practice

C Child I Inclusion R Research into C Curriculum L Learning E Education

3.3

Aims of Session

• To give you an overview of the resource

• To familiarise you with the resource

• To give you experience of using some of the tools

• To give you confidence to go away and use the resource in your own setting

Overview of Session• Introduction to the Up, up and away! resources• The CIRCLE Early Years Framework• Identifying Need/Children at Risk• Use of: – Literacy Rich Environment Tool – Understanding Behaviour Tool

• Introduction to Stages Tool• Planning to Meet the Need - strategies• Use of:– Parent Postcard

• Next Steps• Questions

The Resources!Identifying Need

Planning to Meet the Need

Aims

Identifying Need 1. Support staff and carers to identify children who need literacy support as early as possible in order to prevent difficulties arising.

2. Provide tools to optimise literacy opportunity through the environment and adults around the child.

3. Provide tools to optimise opportunity for the child through observations made in relation to challenges to literacy and learning.

4. Provide a comprehensive framework (The CIRCLE Early Years Framework) for profiling the child’s stage of development , in relation to their environment, routines, motivation and skills.

Aims

Planning to Meet the Need1. Provide practical stage-appropriate

strategies to meet literacy needs once they are identified.

2. Help staff and carers to engage with parents and share ideas for building the foundations to literacy.

3. Highlight and promote diversity in the children with whom you work.

The resources both consider children with English as an additional language.

The CIRCLE Early Years Framework

• The Circle Early Years Framework is the basis for these resources to build the foundation for literacy in the early years

• Understanding the framework is central to using the Up, up and away! resources successfully

• The framework takes a holistic view of children and how to identify need and support learning and development

• The framework has two complementary components:

The CIRCLE Early Years Framework• Stages of Development

• The Literacy Caterpillar

Tools to identify risk and needBlue Book (and a bit of white)

• Risk and resilience Tool-page 21• Literacy Rich Environment Tool-pages 30-37• Home Literacy Tool-pages 86-89-WHITE BOOK• Identifying Stages Tool-pages 51-55• Understanding Behaviour Tool-pages 56-64• Guidance on observation & Tool-page 23-26• Also developmental mile stones and warning

signs-68-71

English as an Additional Language: Identifying need

Consider:• how to establish effective 2-way communication with

parents/carers to inform assessment• how to enable bilingual children to show what they

can do (rather than what they can’t)

EAL Service can advise on/support this and also strategies for planning to meet the need

Risk and Resilience Tool

Identifying Children at Risk of Failure with Literacy

• Why wait? • We can identify the children who are at risk by

considering the risk and resilience factors.

• Activity 1 – Think of a child you work with and complete the Risk and Resilience Table (p21)...

Is the child at risk?

CIRCLE Literacy Rich Environment Tool

• Page 30• Consider strategies that are

already in place and possible areas for development.

• Use symbols to represent your judgement about how well you fulfil each item in the tool:

Literacy Rich Environment Tool considers of the following area:

- Selection of books and stories

- Environmental print

- Arrangement: display, location, book

area

- Encouraging writing

- Planning and reflection

- Adult support to participate in literacy

- Frequency of literacy experience

- Listening and talking

- Phonological Awareness

Literacy Rich Environment Tool

Home Literacy Tool

Understanding Behaviour Tool

• Page 58

• Children may need support to learn positive ways of expressing themselves and responding.

• Staff and carers need to be confident about observing, analysing and understanding behaviour, so that they can promote positive behaviour and interactions with others.

CIRCLE Observation Tool Type of Observation: Context:

Child’s name: Date:

Observer: Reason for observation:

Write in the boxes below what you plan to observe

Observation: what did you see and hear?

C Child I Inclusion R Research into C Curriculum L Learning E Education

Making a plan

Identify Stages Tool

Group ActivityUsing the Identify stages tool (page 52-54)

• In your group pick a child to focus on (could be the same as for previous activity) who you think is at risk

• Start with the environment section• Discuss if the child fits each statement and tick the box if

they do or if they are past this• When you have completed all the boxes in this section

transfer the information to the stages profile (p54)• Complete the same process the for routine and motivation

sections• The skills section is broken down further into M, C, T, R, this

makes filling the stages profile in slightly different.

Stages Profile and Strategy Map

Action Plan

Area Strengths Areas to develop

Strategies

Environment

Routine

Motivation

Skills

Planning to Meet NeedWhite Book (and a bit of blue)

• Strategies for Future Relationships 41-43 BLUE

• Strategies for Building Vocabulary 44-46 BLUE

• Section 2: Literacy at Each stage 20-23

• Section 3: Strategies within stages of development 28-76

• Section 4: Engaging parents as partners77-89

Strategies

Literacy at Each Stage

Strategies within Stage using the Literacy Caterpillar

Engage Parents (and carers) as partners

When staff/carers engage well with parents, they can positively influence the child’s experience in the early years setting and in the family’s home life.

To effectively engage parents, it is important to affirm what they already do and build on this. You can empower parents to support their child’s learning and development by considering the following:

o Developing parent skill and awareness

o Using good communication and sharing information

o Engaging parents as partners

 

Parent Postcards

Parent Postcards

Group ActivityMake a parent postcard

• Consider the information that you’ve now collected using the stages profile

• Refer to the action plan you began to create earlier

• Which areas of the child’s development are relative strengths?

• Which areas would you prioritise for support? • In the priority areas use the stages profile and page numbers

to look at possible strategies in the white book• Choose one of these and further develop the idea into a

parent postcard

You’re ready to try it out

• Share this training and resource with staff in your setting• Start trying it out with a selected child, children or area• If you want further advice and support you could:– Get in touch with your trainers from today– Discuss it with partner agencies working in your

setting e.g. Educational Psychologist, Neighbourhood Support Co-ordinator, VTSS worker, EAL worker or Speech and Language Therapist

Instructions for accessing Circle Resources on GLOW

Log on to GLOW which you will find on the egfl Edinburgh website(You will need your password) • Click - GLOW Portal• Click - National Website• Click - City of Edinburgh Council and Noticeboard• Click - GLOW group map• Click - City Wide Group (orange box)• Click - Early Years• Click - Early Years Prinicipal Teachers• Click - Documents• Click – LiteracyUnder Literacy heading you will find Circle Resources

Any Questions?

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