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