The Foundation Phase

The Foundation phase only takes place in Wales and it includes children from the ages of three to seven years old. The idea behind The Foundation Phase is for children to learn actively through play and through a ‘learning by doing’ strategy. The Foundation Phase enables children to solve real life problems in both indoor and outdoor environments through play, it also allows children to take part in practical activities that are relevant to their developmental stage.

 

 

“Through their play, children practise and consolidate their learning, play with ideas, experiment, take risks, solve problems, and make decisions individually, in small and in large groups.”

 http://wales.gov.uk/dcells/publications/policy_strategy_and_planning/early-wales/whatisfoundation/foundationphase/2274085/frameworkforchildrene.pdf;jsessionid=2484C469987366E87362399275222D07?lang=en

 

The Foundation Phase has seven main areas of learning which are:

 

 

 

  -Personal and social wellbeing and cultural diversity

This encourages children to build relationships with other people as well as build self confidence in themselves. This also allows children to identify others needs and different cultures that surround them.

 

 -Physical development

Children’s physical development is actively encouraged to ensure that they can develop skills such as spatial awareness, motor skills, control and coordination and balance.

 

-Creative development

Children should constantly be developing their creative and imagination skills, these are crucial to a child’s personal development. This part of The Foundation Phase allows children to use their imaginations and creativity through the means of art, dance, craft etc.

 

-Language, literacy and communication skills

Children are encouraged to share their experiences with both other pupils and staff as a means of communication, this enables them to use their own ideas, thoughts and interpretations in their detail. Children are also encouraged to ask questions and voice their own opinions as well as making their own choices. 

 

-Mathematical development

Children use numbers on a daily basis in the classroom for various tasks, they also progress on to mental maths when ready to do so as well as the recording of mathematical sums and information. As the child develops the introduction of shape, area, patterns and many other areas will be introduced.

 

-Knowledge and understanding of the world.

Children are given the opportunities to learn in both an indoor and outdoor environment for various lessons, this encourages them to investigate and learn about the world around them. This area also encourages children to demonstrate care, emotion, opinions and feelings about the world and their lives.

 

-Welsh language development

Welsh language skills are developed in various ways, but the language is used on a daily basis. Generally a lot of welsh schools answer the registers in welsh, talk about the weather in welsh as a class and as they get older more daily welsh spoken tasks are expected.

 

 

 

The Foundation Phase was first implemented on different dates according to the ages of pupils at the time between 2008 and 2010.

 "Not everybody agrees that The Foundation Phase is the right solution for developing young children in Wales. The link below is a BBC article from 2011 stating how ESTYN (The office of Her Majesty's Inspectorate for Education and Training in Wales) did not find all schools findings on reading and writing acceptable."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-14898083

Personally from working in The Foundation Phase for a number of years and in various schools I can am still a little wary of The Foundation Phase, I agree that it is an encouraging way to start a child’s Education, it allows the child to get to know themselves and to develop in their own person without being moulded. The school obviously leads the children in the right direction but at the same time allows the children enough space and time to develop themselves as individuals. However I rarely see children reading out of choice like we did in school. Reading in The Foundation Phase is not emphasised which I do feel is a down-fall personally. If I could change one thing about this programme it would be to include some form of reading on a daily basis.

 

 

 

References:

http://wales.gov.uk/dcells/publications/policy_strategy_and_planning/early-wales/whatisfoundation/foundationphase/2274085/frameworkforchildrene.pdf;jsessionid=2484C469987366E87362399275222D07?lang=en

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-14898083

 

Forest School

 Forest School

 

 

 

 

The original concept of Forest Schools came from Sweden, they were first implemented there in the 1950’s, but are now used worldwide.  The philosophy behind it believes that children's contact with nature and the natural world is a very important factor in their development.

 

 

 “A study done in Sweden over a 13 month period found that children located in urban environments were much less happy than those attending forest school kindergarten in a countryside environment. It appeared the main reason was due to the larger range of choices present for play in nature, children played for longer amounts of time, with less annoyance of each other compared to the children of the city kindergarten.”
http://www.forestschools.com/a-history/

 

"Before the urbanisation of the nineteenth century it was not necessary to create formal links between education and the outdoor environment. Children spent large amounts of time outdoors as part of normal life, and the skills and knowledge acquired there were life skills often related to the food economy, or for the privileged minority, leisure skills (Heywood  2001:23,158)" (Knight,2009, p2)

 

 The development of forest schools in the UK began around 1993 when teachers and students from Bridgewater, Somerset visited a Denmark on an exchange visit. They were inspired by the emphasis on outdoor activities and they brought their inspired visit back to the UK and shared their experiences. They actually went on to set up their own forest school within their college for children of students.

 Outdoor learning is now being seen very much as a great natural development of children, it addresses the holistic development of a child. It also allows children to take risks and develop self-awareness, self-confidence, empathy and social skills. Whilst in the forest children are allowed to develop their own ideas, make decisions and solve problems. In the forest children are developing at their own speed and are gaining awareness of the outdoors and the environment.

 "Being outdoors brings with it a new set of rules and guide lines for children to adhere to, although it should be stressed that too many rules will hinder the freedom and opportunities to explore that the children so benefit from.” (Constable.K, 2012, P14)
 

Forest schools are a useful, innovative and inspiring approach to learning to children of all ages and abilities. They allow children to develop and improve communication skills, self-awareness skills, empathy and independence. It also promotes a positive mental attitude, confidence and self-esteem. Forest schools allow time for social interaction and improving emotional intelligence, it also enables learning about the environment. Forest schools are beneficial to children of all ages, particularly early years, disabled children and children who may not be succeeding in school.

 ‘The Forest School ethos fundamentally acknowledges individual learning processes by supporting participants at their own pace and following their lead as they explore a safe and stimulating environment full of sensory diversity and variability.’
http://www.forestschoolwales.org.uk/ysgol-goedwigforest-school/benefits-of-forest-school/

 Forest schools actually meet all of the requirements set out by The Welsh Assembly Governments ‘Foundation Phase’, they can also actually allow children to earn an OCN Level 1 in Basic Practical Forest School Skills. This may be the only qualification some children get whilst at school.

 "In addition, Forest School meets a variety of Government Objectives for “Healthy Living”, “Every Child Matters”, and “Inclusion”. Specifically, Forest School Programmes meet the following WAG strategies and policies:

Out of Classroom Learning

WAG–Extending Entitlement

Lifelong-Learning

WAG:The Learning Country

Woodlands for Wales

Local Agenda 21”

 http://www.forestschoolwales.org.uk/ysgol-goedwigforest-school/benefits-of-forest-school/

 

Activities that can take place during Forest school can include:

Nest-building

Flower and tree challenges

Adventure books

Leaf identification tasks

Mini-beasts challenges

Language development–poems, stories etc.

Mud-tasks

Whittling

Den-making.


This video gives you an insight into how forest schools can be implemented within Early Years:

 

 

Forest schools in my eyes are a great asset for every school to include, children benefit in so many ways and still it stays within the guidelines of The Foundation Phase and National Curriculum. I feel that forest schools are very important within a child’s education and part of self-development and awareness.

 

 
References:

http://www.forestschools.com/a-history/

Knight.S, (2009) Forest schools and outdoor learning in the early years, Sage

Constable.K, (2012) The Outdoor Classroom,Ages 3 to 7, Using ideas from forest school to enrich learning,  Routledge

http://www.forestschoolwales.org.uk/ysgol-goedwigforest-school/benefits-of-forest-school/

http://www.forestschoolwales.org.uk/ysgol-goedwigforest-school/benefits-of-forest-school/