Incoming policy

In response to growing pressure on the early education and care system, the new Labour government is forging ahead with plans to create thousands of nursery places inside existing primary schools in England. A 2024 report from authoritative voices in the field concluded: ‘weighing up all the evidence, the most important single action for narrowing the gap is the provision of high-quality, teacher-led early education’ (Sylva & Eisenstadt, 2024). At face value this new policy direction, which appears to be being implemented at pace, seems to be an evidence-based solution to a significant problem.

In this blog post we highlight a significant challenge to these endeavours: there is a gap in the evidence base on how to best support school leaders in the UK to ensure that early years provision within their schools is the highest quality. Findings from the international evidence base suggest that leadership plays a central role in influencing quality (Douglass, 2019).

Nothing new

‘A further expansion of school-based early years provision creates enormous possibilities for integrating early years and primary school systems.’

School-based early years provision is not new in the UK: in 2023, almost one million children followed the early years foundation stage in a school-based setting, either in nursery or in reception classes (DfE, 2023). A further expansion of school-based provision creates enormous possibilities for integrating early years and primary school systems, and there is compelling evidence of the importance of strong coordination at this point (Bennet & Kaga, 2010).

Specific challenges for schools

While schools may be more resilient to some of the challenges facing the wider early years sector, they are also not exclusively focused on working with this age of children. Recent policy and practice developments have led some experts to raise awareness of an ideological struggle between the research on age-appropriate practices and the climate of child performativity in the English school system (Palaiologou & Male, 2019). In a society that generally does not understand or value the unique importance of the first five years (Ipsos MORI, 2020), it is arguably not surprising to find limited support systems for leadership to be able to deliver high-quality, evidence-informed, age-appropriate provision for the youngest children at the same time as focusing on quality (and associated accountability) for older children. Factors influencing this include, but are not limited to:

• the lack of any mandatory training for school leaders on early childhood development – this means those with ultimate responsibility for the care and education of under-5s may have significantly different interpretations of what ‘high quality’ looks like
• governance across organisations that affect levels of autonomy available to provide responsive, context specific provision
• changes at system level such as: to the statutory framework; the introduction of the reception baseline assessment; or the early years specific knowledge of an Ofsted inspector, may affect what school leaders need, or perceive they need, to do to comply with regulations and accountability measures.

What should the Labour government do?

There are many examples of schools already offering excellent provision for younger children developed thoughtfully by those involved (Weinstein, 2023). However, as policy changes could lead to more schools expanding on their provision for younger children, it seems there is a significant gap in the evidence base on factors that influence the leadership of high-quality school-based early education and systems integration. To address this gap, we propose that we urgently need to:

• systematically review school leaders’ competencies and experiences in early education and child development
• investigate what school- and system-level elements impact leaders’ decision-making in relation to the provision of early years education and care
• identify the types of support and reform that could help mitigate the barriers to age-appropriate early years provision in schools.

The current policy direction seems to be based on some significant assumptions about school leadership. We argue that rapid investment in investigating how best to support school leaders with evidence-informed policy is where the Labour government needs to direct its focus.

References

Bennet, J., & Kaga, Y. (2010). The integration of early childhood systems within education. International Journal of Child Care and Education Policy, 4(1), 35–43. https://doi.org/10.1007/2288-6729-4-1-35

Department for Education [DfE]. (2023). Childcare and early years provider survey. https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/childcare-and-early-years-provider-survey

Douglass, A. (2019). Leadership for quality early childhood education and care. OECD Education Working Papers, No. 211. https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/education/leadership-for-quality-early-childhood-education-and-care_6e563bae-en

Ipsos MORI. (2020). State of the nation: Understanding public attitudes to the early years. The Royal Foundation. https://royalfoundation.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Ipsos-MORI-SON_report_FINAL_V2.4.pdf

Palaiologou, I., & Male, T. (2019). Leadership in early childhood education: The case for pedagogical praxis. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 20(1), 23–34. https://doi.org/10.1177/1463949118819100

Sylva, K., & Eisenstadt, N. (2024). Transforming early childhood: Narrowing the gap between children from lower and higher income families. Nesta. https://www.nesta.org.uk/report/transforming-early-childhood-narrowing-the-gap-between-children-from-lower-and-higher-income-families/

Weinstein, N. (2023, September 26). EYFS best practice in schools: Provision for two-year-olds. Nursery World. https://www.nurseryworld.co.uk/content/features/eyfs-best-practice-in-schools-provision-for-two-year-olds/