SCOTLAND has been sending children to school the year they turn five since 1872. But this isn’t “normal” behaviour.
Only 12% of countries worldwide expect children to crack on with the three Rs at such an early age and all bar one are ex-members of the British Empire. In 66% of countries school starts at six, and in 22% it’s seven. So why was the Empire different?
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In the late 1860s, the Westminster parliament wanted children in school as early as possible so working class mothers could return to the factories and mines.
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What’s more, the sooner poor children started school, the sooner they’d finish and be off to the factories themselves.
There is no educational justification for expecting such young children to sit at a desk, learning to read, write and do sums. But, thanks to those Victorian values, that’s what Scotland has expected ever since. So when our First Minister decided to introduce national testing of children’s literacy and numeracy skills as part of the drive to close the poverty-related attainment gap, she saw P1 as the natural starting point.
The Scottish National Standardised Assessments (SNSAs) in P1 are promoted as helping identify potential problems in literacy and numeracy.
But they’re also linked to demanding attainment-based targets (known in Scotland as “benchmarks”). Local authorities want as many children as possible to reach those targets.
That puts great pressure on teachers to ‘teach to the test’. But focusing on the three Rs before children are developmentally ready to cope with them can cause emotional problems which then inhibits learning in the long run. Early childhood is defined by the United Nations as birth to eight – “a time of remarkable growth, with brain development at its peak”.
Neuroscientific studies now back up the advice of great pioneers in early education such as Froebel and Montessori, and the developmental psychologists Piaget and Vygotsky.
They all recommended that formal education shouldn’t start till around seven years of age. While some children are ready to read, write and reckon before this (and should, of course, be supported to do so), others need more time to acquire the developmental foundations upon which literacy and numeracy skills are based.
High-quality early years education is therefore about supporting all aspects of children’s development – physical, emotional, social and cognitive. This is done through play-based ‘kindergarten-style’ activities, including plenty of stories, songs, rhymes, music, art, drama, exploration, experimentation and lots of active outdoor play.
In international surveys of educational achievement, countries with well-established kindergarten stages for three- to seven-year-olds (such as Finland and Switzerland) have always out-performed early-start countries like Scotland.
Nowadays, opportunities for children to be outdoors and active (especially in natural surroundings) are particularly important.
In twenty-first century traffic-clogged streets with dwindling community ties, children’s lifestyles are increasingly indoors, sedentary and screen-based.
The decline of outdoor play – now described by scientists as a biological necessity – has been linked to physical health problems such as obesity and the swelling tide of mental health problems among children and young people. More outdoor playtime for the under-sevens is urgently needed.
This is why, in 2016, Upstart Scotland launched its campaign for a kindergarten stage for Scottish children. It’s also why Upstart has joined with other national bodies, including the EIS, Children in Scotland, Play Scotland, ACE-Aware Nation and the parent-teacher organisation Connect, to campaign against the P1 SNSAs.
And it’s why we’re urging the Scottish government to put aside out-dated Victorian values and turn the educational focus towards play, not tests, in P1.
Sue Palmer is chair of education charity Upstart Scotland
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