School Readiness Report - June 2023
We would like to say a massive thank you to everyone who participated in our school readiness survey, we could not have written and published our first ever official report from Growing Together Developing Early Years. As a company we feel that it is important that we give back to the early year’s community, but also that we ground what we do in research, developmental theory and lessons from high-quality practice.
Our school readiness report had 3 aims:
· What are early years practitioner’s perspectives of what school readiness is?
· How many children in early years settings are perceived to be school ready?
· What challenges do children face in the area of school readiness?
Over the coming days and weeks, we will be sharing snippets of our findings from the school readiness report via blog posts and our social media channels. Also, raising interesting comments and thoughts about where to go next with the recommendations and what does the early years sector need. You can access and download the full report for free.
Abstract
This is a piece of explorative research of early years practitioner’s perspectives on school readiness with England. The research found that nearly half of all practitioners felt that 50-74% of their cohort starting school in 2023 are ready to start school. Practitioners discuss that children’s school readiness is impacted by a factor of developmental issues such as delayed speech and language, increase in screen time and the covid-19 pandemic. There are increasing concerns that children’s communication and language development and personal, social, and emotional skills are below the expected level to be school ready; and this has had a detrimental effect on the children who are starting reception class in September 2023.