family – Find Joy in the Middle

Our worlds changed on 23 March 2020. We were united by a sense of uncertainty, feelings of anxiety, and of confusion around what was to come. We gathered eyes and mouths agape, in front of TV screens as we were told to stay at home. The outside world fell silent, roads and skies emptied, non-essential shops closed, workplaces ceased operations with some being asked to work at home or be ‘furloughed’ (a new word for most of us), and keyworkers kept our essential services going.

Home was a reassuring sanctuary, if you were lucky, surrounded by loving family members. A time to pause, reflect, look after our basic needs for safety and nourishment. For many it was a trap that intensified disadvantage, deepened dysfunctional relationships, and a exacerbated their lack of opportunity. For our youngest children, their worlds became so much smaller. Some benefitted, some did not. As lockdown(s) continued, we predicted families would feel the effects in terms of parent relationship pressures, domestic abuse, economic burdens, and children’s development would be compromised or delayed. It gives none of us any pleasure to say we were right.

In early years, we started to hear from keyworker parents who needed our support so they could go to work, we delivered for them. Parents not able to use our services started to appreciate in new ways the work we do, and the shared partnership we have in supporting their children’s development and learning. Providers, like all businesses, were juggling with the new realities, the economics, and the need for short- to long-term planning, and supporting their own workforce. Local authorities were contacting us for help in navigating the complexities of Government guidance, financial packages, and the processes needed for business change, so the best possible support could be offered to the whole sector. We were only too pleased to do what we could, it was something core to our mission.

Like many others, online meetings were something of a grey area for us. But we soon got to grips with the technology (after many clumsy attempts). We started to connect as a team to make sense of what was happening on a day-to-day basis. We began meeting with individual local authority early years leads, for mutual support, sense checking, and information sharing. This is a time we look back on with great fondness and friendship. We were in it together. These exchanges formed the basis of our national support programme ‘Finding Your Way Through’ a structured strategy framework, and a set of actions, approaches and resources we developed and freely gave to the sector. Then came the idea to offer a weekly/fortnightly online session for local authority leads for peer support, wellbeing, and information sharing. We called them Coffee Breaks, essentially because we were asking everyone to stop, put the kettle on, and come together with the community for an hour of mutual support, understanding, and collaboration. What a moment that was, a movement began, and Coffee Breaks became that national space for both unstructured and focused discussion, problem solving, resource sharing, and a safe space for emotional safety. Five years on, and they continue, for all the same objectives, and they are a pleasure for us to facilitate and provide for our colleagues.

The lessons learned, from lockdown to the present day are many. It has become clearer for many who have a stake in our sector that we play an essential role in supporting parents in caring for their children, building their development and joy for learning, and their economic opportunities. Early years is an essential cog in a large machine that delivers for families across multiple (not single or artificially allocated) outcomes. Without it, and the impacts are clear. We have been identifying the increases in children’s developmental delays, speech and language, and SEND and have been adapting approaches to best help their recovery. However, we know these will continue for many, and risk affecting their school-lives and beyond.

The past five years have also reminded us of the power of togetherness, our unswerving commitment to the sector, our empathy and affinity with parents and children, and not forgetting our resilience. That said, there are fragilities that continue despite the ambitions, recognition, and increased spend in the sector. The need for support, challenge, and community in the sector remains vital. This needs to include all types of setting or school, group-based or home based, and reaching all practitioners to fully deliver our impacts confidently, healthily, and joyfully for better futures.

I had a really awful time at school. I was far from ready. I was unsocialised, anxious, and sensitive. As a summer born white working-class boy I had already been dealt a difficult hand of cards. Being at home with mum had not helped me to be school ready for lots of reasons. Back then, pre-school groups were not readily available in our community, and as a stay-at-home mum, my mother mostly kept me at home, and we had a small family. I remember attending a pre-school group, once or twice. I was four years old, and I can still describe the experience in vivid detail, some fifty years later, as it was so traumatising and confusing for me. It did nothing to help me. Neither did starting one school for a year before being moved to another for the next. Making friends was hard, I was different, the culture and curriculum was ill-matched to my learning style and preferences, and that fuelled the fire of the bullying I experienced throughout primary and secondary. I left as soon as was able, with a meagre handful of qualifications, but with determination to find a world that was a better fit for me.

That’s why I am certain one of our important roles in early years and one of our key moral purposes is to prepare children for all aspects of school. We should be embracing ‘school readiness’ as a mission and goal for all the children we work with. But instead, too many of us are resisting this. We argue the nuances and distinctions of the term ‘school readiness’. We should focus on activity on outcomes and impacts instead. I have written about this topic for years. I’ve been quoted too: “If school readiness means we support children to develop their key skills in communication, speaking, listening and questioning, social and emotional well-being, and physical development, then count me in. If it is about producing learning robots trained to comply with a rigid and inflexible education system, then I am less keen on the idea.” (cited in The complete companion to teaching and leading practice in the early years. Jarvis P et al 2016). I still like what I said then, and that was 10 years ago.

Despite us still having a fragile construction of multiple offers and entitlements to juggle, often attached to single-minded policy objectives, we have a great foundation upon which to build. Children rely on us to hold it all together and reconcile its creases that I truly hope will be ironed out one day very soon. We all have to be the glue in our various roles and interactions that help children build the resilience to feel safe and to engage, and to develop and use the skills to communicate and connect with the world around them, of which school is a very big and important part indeed. Everyone needs to know that and understand ‘school readiness’ in its widest sense to avoid any misconceptions and mistakes.

This blog was first published on http://www.cypnow.co.uk

Tag: family

From lockdown to now: Five years of looking back and moving forward.

Let’s think again about school readiness.