Observation, Assessment and Planning - transcript



Pre-Birth to Three: - Observation, Assessment and Planning

Narrator: Babies and young children are individuals, each with their own unique talents and abilities. Effective staff within early years settings seek to ensure that learning experiences, routines and activities build on information provided by parents, and start with the child’s needs and interests. Planning begins with skilful and purposeful observation of children, and this enables staff to draw conclusions and plan next steps.

Liz Hutcheson: Observations are vital in a nursery. Through observations we see children’s interests, we observe what they are interested in playing with, the resources they love to play with. We see how children interact with each other and with adults, and we also have the opportunity to just see how different children need different learning needs, individual learning needs. The observations we do we plan, on a weekly/monthly basis, and we have some focussed observations on specific learning outcomes. But we also have incidental observations; each day children do something that has not been planned, so these are very important too. At the end of each day the staff look at these observations, and discuss them with each other, because a member of staff may have seen something different in a child. So we discuss these and these are then taken into formal tracking sheets, and then once we have discussed these they can then see how we have to take children’s learning forward, and what aspects they need to be supported in or challenged in.

Narrator: Assessing children in terms of their progress and needs is an ongoing process, and is integral to planning, observation and implementation. By using this information effectively staff, parents and children can create and maintain plans, which can help to help to provide a focussed and individualised approach.

Narrator: Sensitive and meaningful observations enable staff to get to know individual children well, ensuring that staff are able to plan and provide for children’s individual needs and interests.

Irene Jardine: Observation for me is at the heart of everything, so there are any number of observational spaces that you can take up as an observer. You can observe the play room as a landscape, as you would with a landscape painting, and stand back from it, and see what’s happening, or the nature of the interactions that are occurring, in the room. And you can come in closer, and observe and see a bit more of what is going on. You can come in really very close and really be alongside a child but not actively intervening or doing anything, but you are observing, you are feeling, you are sensing, you are with them, and you can feel the experience of the child; you can actually feel the resonance of the internal vibrations of the child when they are working on what they are doing. So there are so many different levels to it that it is a passion, and a source of great excitement. And a tremendous skill, and one that I would say I go on developing throughout my life. And I encourage those I am working with to do so as well.

Narrator: Staff and parents require to have a shared understanding of, and commitment to, the need for ongoing observations in supporting and promoting children’s learning and development.

Bernie Hassan: Heuristic play is also an excellent way for sitting back and observing the children. It allows you to see how their fine skills are developing, it allows you to see how their problem solving is coming on, and it helps you to take forward next steps within your play room. Sometimes it’s nice to have a small heuristic play discovery area set up within your room, or displays within your walls, like we made up a small bit of material and there are discovery items in there, and you are developing their learning through their senses all the time.

Narrator: Observations take place naturally during everyday activity and interactions. Whilst other observations may be more specifically targeted for particular reasons, such as finding out more about the child in relation to their development and learning, social and emotional wellbeing likes and interests, reviewing the suitability of resources and the layout of the space children use both indoors and out. Sharing observations with colleagues, parents and other service providers is an important priority which has to be considered in a way that ensures the child is at the centre of all decision making in line with the vision, values and principles of ‘Getting it Right for Every Child.’

Amanda Watters: At Shotts we use a varied number of observation strategies, both within the room and within our planning. We use general observations to inform our planning, progress reports and to inform our children’s special books, so that we can keep track of the children’s progress. We record the observations formally, as well as verbally. We would pass on observations informally to parents on a daily basis, just about what their children have been doing etc., as well as discussing within the staff team and recording on planning sheets the observations.

If we were targeting a child for a specific reason; if we suspected perhaps developmental delay, or they weren’t reaching their milestone, then the practitioner would use a timed intervention to work out exactly where they were in their stage, so the practitioner generally would set up, if you like, a scenario then we would intervene to see how far the child would go, so that we were recording accurately exactly what stage they were at.

Maria Irvine: Yes, we observe children in all situations. So, for example, it would be maybe within the playroom, and using all the areas, in what the child’s interests would be. There would be how they use the resources, what they would do with them, what are they interested in, how can we take this forward, how can we extend their learning, what are their next steps. And also as well, for their development; ensuring that they are reaching their milestones. We work very closely, sharing the observations with other staff during observation meetings and planning meetings, because observation meetings are based on what we have observed in that particular session with a particular child or children. And what we will do is, our observations are maybe related to profile operations, which is part of our profile pro forma that we give to parents during our parent consultations, and our other observations are for children to put into our planning. So we will then discuss that as a team; what ways that we can support the children, through the observations into how we can extend their knowledge and their learning, and their interest.

Sometimes our discussions are regarding observations that we have noticed, are very informal, and we will say “Oh did you notice that? What do you think we should maybe do to take that forward?” And we would throw our ideas about just very informally.

Jacqueline Turner: For our children’s learnings, normally we would chat to mum and see what stage children are at, what activities they enjoy, and obviously through spending time with a child you get to see what they enjoy, and we can offer them activities that will challenge them, that they enjoy, and that we can see if they are learning - like a counting game.

Narrator: Assessing children in relation to their learning and development can take many different forms, for example, through observations or conversations. Working and communicating meaningfully and respectfully with parents, other key family members and key services is necessary if staff are to make valuable and accurate assessments of children. Children have a key role to play in assessment, and should be encouraged to contribute to all stages as appropriate.

Ruth Eglington: Through interacting appropriately with the children we are also able to observe what they are doing, what skills they are using, what particular small motor skills are they using, what are they having difficulty with, what kind of things are they interested in, all about their hand/eye co-ordination, there are lots of things we can observe. Also we can observe how confident they are in doing that, how much they need the adult. We can observe how they are with the other children; are they sharing well, are they able to take turns, or is everything getting pulled and grabbed in their direction. So we would use this as an opportunity to make a wide range of observations, which obviously then would be important to take back to the rest of the team at the observation meeting, and share that with the team. And then these observations may mean that we will provide other opportunities for the children within the play room, or within outdoor play, for example, if we observe that they have had an interest in filling and emptying, there are lots of things we can do there through water play, through sand play, through the sensory area within the nursery, through outdoor play in gathering natural resources again. So its all about us using the observations to further develop that skill for that child in a wide range of settings.

Narrator: Getting it Right for Every Child provides staff with guidance to help ensure that children benefit from support which is appropriate to their individual needs.

Lisa Barnes: It may be that lots of children are using the same sorts of resources in a room, but they might be doing some very different things with them. So you might be thinking about, right one child is really interested in putting things in, taking them out, so you might be thinking well rather than just they are interested in bags, or they are interested in boxes, what you are thinking is not so much the content but the concepts that the children are really wanting to explore. And so also it may be that one child is a much more lone learner – they like to experiment themselves – whereas another child might need a little bit more encouragement, or a bit of support to engage with an experience. So you are thinking about not just what you provide, but how you provide that, and the crucial role of the adult.

And as we know, young children really need to repeat experiences, but its key to observe to see when they still need to repeat, but maybe when you need to know when to move them on, and give them that little experience that’s going to help them take their learning forward. So for our youngest children sometimes we get that absolutely right, and sometimes we don’t. But when we are planning we need to be really reflective about what’s happened, has it been effective, what we need to do now. So it is a core skill that we are always improving.

Narrator: Staff may find the national practice model that joins up the wellbeing indicators, and the Getting it Right, My World triangle helpful in the process of identifying concerns and gathering relevant information about children in more complex situations.

Paula Dudgeon: I have come to know the staff particularly well, and it’s very much a team approach, I would say, in the nursery. I work very much with the staff, looking at how they support the children, and looking a lot at what they do that they do well, and building on that. Another way that I support the nursery is through doing in service training as well, and we try to wide that to other partners in the nursery, so with people form the high school they came in, and we had parents who were interested, they came in. And the nursery use me really flexibly, they use me really well; they ask me to do anything that they think that I will be able to help and contribute with. So there was a parents group being run, so I came in and did some work with the parents, which is also really good because if there are issues the parents already know me as a face, so it’s not a scary thing to then say we would like Paula to meet with you to have a chat about how to support your child.

Narrator: Like assessment, recording may be a continuous process throughout the observation, assessment, planning and implementation cycle. Records generally include observations and information from parents, as well as staff, and where appropriate, children themselves. Recording may take many forms, from simple note taking to video footage, pictures, photos, or individual profiles or plans. It is important to ensure that any system of recording is manageable, and does not take up too much time.

Paula Dudgeon: We look at strategies, we look at ways of helping the children to develop further. One of the key things we have used has been using video work. So we have had some children who have had some issues in terms of their behaviour. And what we did was, I asked staff to video ten minutes where things were going reasonably well, where they thought it was quite a good session with the young person, but also to then video ten minutes of a particular time in the day where things were more problematic, or where they found more difficulty. And then we sat down with the parent or the carer, relevant staff who were involved with the child, pre-five support for learning if they were involved, and looked at what worked with the child, when were the times that things were being managed well, when were the times that the child was responding well. And we picked out from that the kind of structure that was best for that child; how we needed to manage that.

Narrator: Planning is only effective when staff take account of children’s needs, interests and stages of development. Flexible planning that facilitates staff to be responsive ensures that opportunities for rich and meaningful learning experiences, which are not planned for, are also recognised and maximised. This could be, for example, responding to a change in the weather, a surprise celebration, or further supporting children’s learning and interests by going on a visit or researching on the internet.

Amanda Watters: Spontaneously, if it started to snow, which it frequently does in Shotts, we have been known to rush outside and collect snow and bring it in, or take all the children out. We have to plan and risk assess, but it can be done fairly quickly so that the children make the very most of what is on offer. Also if maybe a hard shower of rain came down they like to go out and splash in the puddles. We also make the very most of all our gardens that we have, with the very natural resources, the herb plants, the digging. So we respond immediately to what the children are interested in, or if they are choosing to go outdoors.

Narrator: If overall provision is to respond meaningfully to the needs of children and their families planning needs to be informed by observations, regular assessment, and it has to include information from parents, colleagues and other professionals.

Yvonne Hall: The staff are very responsive to the children’s needs. It was noticed within observations that the children had been playing with keys quite a bit, and had been going towards our entrance door to play with the key. So we took that further and we got a miniature door made for the children where they could actually unlock with keys; they had to find the appropriate key, and then we mounted that onto our main door because that is where the children had wanted to play, and it seems to be very popular.

Narrator: The key person system is extremely valuable in supporting approaches to observation, assessment and planning, as the staff who know the children and families best can ensure that discussions and decisions are on track and in the child’s best interests.

Agnes Thomson: We are a very strong motivated team. We work in room teams as well as our whole staff teams. Each member of staff is responsible for their own group of children – it’s a key worker system – if a member of staff is at training, or on holiday, or off sick, then the room team has the responsibility of looking after that child’s education.

Narrator: Staff should place observation, assessment and planning at the heart of their practice, and should see this process as a continuous cycle in supporting babies and young children.

Taking meaningful account of the four key principles of the rights of the child, relationships, responsive care and respect, will ensure staff help families to achieve the best possible start for all children.

Narrator: How do you ensure that your observations are focussed and that you record significant information?

Reflect on how you currently use this information and discuss the ways in which you could use it more extensively or effectively.

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