Why early years?
The early years play a critical role in a child’s overall development. Disadvantaged children in the North of England face significant challenges in their early years, often starting school without the necessary communication and language skills.
This gap in skills between disadvantaged children and their better-off peers can start as early as two years old and can be as large as 15 months by the time they begin school.
Children acquire early communication and language skills through activities such as reading, singing, talking, and playing.
Research indicates that parental involvement in early learning boosts academic achievement, but disadvantaged children in the North often lack these opportunities, for a number of reasons:
- Many disadvantaged families do not own books or educational toys, which can stimulate early learning and development.
- Access to high-quality pre-school education and childcare is often limited for disadvantaged children.
- Parents of disadvantaged children may lack the skills, resources, or confidence to provide adequate learning support at home.
- Children from families with low educational attainment are typically exposed to fewer words than their wealthier peers, and often begin school with limited knowledge and exposure to language. They are also less likely to access high quality educational experiences outside of home.
The consequences of starting school without adequate communication and language skills are far-reaching. Children with poor language skills at age five are less likely to succeed throughout their school education.
Research shows that a child’s vocabulary at age five is a strong predictor of their GCSE results. Poor language skills also increase the risk of social issues, behavioural problems, and poor school attendance.
Scaling impact: Boromi
Boromi sets up play libraries in schools, nurseries, and community spaces, providing free play bags filled with fun activities for children and families. Schools receive new play bags each term to take home, while community spaces offer on-site play bags for families to enjoy anytime.
SHINE is supporting Boromi to partner with evaluators ImpactED to better understand their impact and ensure they can maximise early outcomes for children.
The most recent evaluation results found:
- A 19.3 percentage-point increase between children’s communication, language and oracy skills at baseline and endline.
- The fact that Boromi takes place in person rather than online particularly contributed to children’s development in oracy and language skills.
- A 10.7 percentage point increase in children’s social and emotional development. Improved communication abilities in quieter children.
- An improvement in children’s behaviour at both school and at home, with a 10.6 percentage-point increase across the two years. Improvements to children’s imagination and ability to engage in independent play.
- A 10.3 percentage-point increase in parents’ confidence, knowledge and ideas to initiate play-based activities with their child.
- A change in average scores for the quality of learning activities that parents perform with preschool children from 2023-24, which could be partly attributed to Boromi’s influence.
- The programme was well-received by families, with 50% of teachers stating that in their school 81-100% of families signed up for the programme.
This research indicates the positive effect of Boromi’s Play Library on children’s development and on parents’ engagement with play.
The evaluation also found that several parents and teachers observed an improvement in children’s resilience and their ability to share with their siblings at home. This suggests that engagement with the play bags could promote positive behaviour in their interactions with siblings and peers.
Numerous parents also benefitted from the use of the Boromi play bags. During the focus groups, individual parents reported that the play.
Scaling impact: Chatta
Chatta is an innovative teaching tool which links images with language. It helps learners build confidence in writing and speaking by using interactive storyboards to break content into manageable steps. It helps improve spoken sentence composition and vocabulary.
It is delivered through local hubs that create connected practice around the Chatta approach.
Schools in Hull and Liverpool were first to join the programme, followed by settings in North Lincolnshire, West Yorkshire and most recently Newcastle.
Currently 40 schools are involved across the North. Engagement data and teacher feedback is consistently positive. All school leaders have chosen to incorporate Chatta into their whole school development plans, showing that they recognise the value of using Chatta as a teaching and learning method.
The pilot project in Hull involved 12 of the most disadvantaged schools in the city. At the start of the project, only 44% of early years children in these settings were achieving a good level of development. By the end of the project, this had ncreased to 67% – above the national average.
“I’m not saying this is entirely due to us, but we have been involved along the way with the training resources and support,” said Chatta founder Chris Williams. It is definitely a cause for celebration that the schools we’ve worked with are now on average performing above the city average.”
Project participant Jo Clegg, EYFS Leader and SENCO at St Anne’s Catholic Primary School, Liverpool, said: “This is the most exciting thing I’ve seen in education for 20 years. The idea that the same tool can be used to support such high-quality learning from Nursery to Year 6 is almost unheard of but possible, due to the limitless possibilities of Chatta.
“The positive impact on our children’s participation, confidence and communication skills has been immediate and profound.
“From the very youngest to children in Year 6, the use of Chatta has transformed our teaching of oracy and removed so many barriers to writing.
“For children with limited vocabulary and those learning English, it has been the most incredibly empowering learning experience.”
Key insights
- Adapting evidence-based practices to fit local contexts was crucial for many projects’ success, allowing interventions to be effectively tailored to specific community needs. Attempting to roll out approaches ‘off the shelf’ sometimes ran into difficulties.
- Successful early years projects were characterised by well-defined outcomes and objectives, which provided a clear focus for planning, implementation, and assessment. The development of a Theory of Change was a strong enabler of the most successful projects.
- Clear, measurable targets facilitated focused planning, execution, and assessment, ensuring tangible results.
- Gradual scaling, combined with strong collaboration, contributed to the success of several projects. This approach allowed for manageable expansion while leveraging partnerships to enhance effectiveness.
- Some projects suggested access to mentorship from previous successful innovations would have been helpful.
- Projects that integrated robust evidence and evaluation frameworks from the outset tended to achieve better outcomes, as they could track progress, make data-informed adjustments, and demonstrate impact.
- Adaptability was a crucial factor for the success of early years projects. Projects that could adjust to the evolving needs of their settings and stakeholders tended to perform better. Flexibility allowed these projects to respond effectively to unforeseen challenges, ensuring continued relevance and impact.
- Sustainability was a recurring challenge for some projects, especially those who were heavily reliant on external funding.
- Parental involvement emerged as a critical success factor. Projects that engaged parents from the design phase through to implementation saw higher levels of engagement and better outcomes. Involving parents directly ensured that the interventions were relevant and effectively addressed their needs.
Conclusions
SHINE’s focus on early years has provided significant insights into how funding can best unlock impact in this critical educational phase.
By applying these insights, and sharing them with our partners and wider stakeholders, we hope that future projects can build on past successes to achieve even greater impact into the future.
We look forward to continuing to scale up some of the most effective innovations we have supported in the early years as part of our continuing commitment to children in this crucial life stage.