Foundation Skills - How these abilities support children not only when starting school, but also throughout their lives as learners
November 2024
Recognising the comprehensive manner in which children learn, and progress is essential. Facilitating children with the requisite skills for school should be enjoyable, robust, and engaging. It should encompass elements of playfulness, exuberance, creativity, challenge, and fascination. In essence, play equips children with the fundamental groundwork necessary for commencing school.
Upon entering a contemporary New Entrant classroom, one may observe children engaged in activities such as cutting, colouring, painting, and pasting.
Some may be found outdoors, swinging, hanging from monkey bars, carefully traversing a balance beam, or scaling trees. Others may be simulating baking and mixing playdough in a miniature kitchen or operating a pretend takeaway counter. Children may also be seen using tongs to pick up fluffy pom-poms, piecing together jigsaw puzzles, or constructing and toppling block towers.
In certain New Entrant classrooms, children might be seen examining an empty suitcase in a group, brainstorming ideas about planning a trip, speculating about its contents, or pondering about potential visitors. They may be gathered around a large book, discussing its features, utilizing animated animal voices, or crafting stories. It is likely to be a lively environment, filled with conversation, a degree of disorder, and a hint of chaos. What are these children engaged in? They are now in school. Shouldn't they be learning to read, write, and do math?
The straightforward answer is that these children are indeed learning. Reading, writing, and mathematics are intricate skills to acquire, and there exist various foundational skills essential to facilitate the process of learning to read and write. These foundational skills have been categorized into six learning areas, namely:
From infancy, movement must come first, and movement is what drives new learning. Physical development is so important and right from the beginning, we need to create the right conditions for learning to unfold naturally.
A great little reminder is-
Physical evidence brings language to life, language makes meaning and understanding, and understanding leads to learning and discovery.
Providing physical experiences to support cognitive wiring
Being present and active alongside children
Provide space for big gross motor development & free movement (for infants)
Time spent in the natural environment and doing real life things
Access to a variety of resources
Language that stimulates brain development
Making musical instruments
Marching
Dancing
Ball (passing)
Construction
Jumping
Simon says
Obstacle course
Hopscotch
Outdoor playgroup
Relays
Colouring
Cutting activities
Sewing
Threading beads or macaroni
Tweezers
Sorting
Nuts & Bolts
Jigsaw Puzzles
Playdough
Cut & fold activities
Lego
Matching games (pom pom to the right colour)
I spy books
Story sequence card (right order)
Matching patterns
Jigsaw puzzles
Memory games
Dominos
Having a solid foundation in oral language will help children become successful readers and strong communicators.
Everyday life (this includes talking and thinking out loud yourself)
Helping with cooking, cleaning, gardening, etc
Reading, Reading, Reading!
Wordless pictures books
Being a good role model (full sentences, appropriate language, using comparison.
Mealtimes
It’s in the bag
Role playing (builds children’s understanding of language and contributes to future learning)
Puppets
Draw a story
A picture paints a 1000 words (this is a great chance to ask who, where, why, what, and how)
Children who arrive at school with the ability to hear and manipulate words down to the syllable sound will have a big head start on the reading and writing process. Hearing the rhythm in music can also help to identify rhythms in speech and that can aid in hearing words and syllables. We talk very quickly, but children need to understand that language is made up of individual words.
Another aspect is the working memory. This is the part of our memory that holds information for a short while - like being able to follow 3 instructions.
Working memory can be developed through exercises. A trap for parents and teachers to be aware of, is repeating instructions too many times as the child starts to rely on that person rather than using their working memory.
Get children thinking for themselves -
"What do we need to do next?", or "what do we need before we leave the house?"
"What’s in the box"
Listening walks (inside & outside), good listening skills; keep quiet, have eyes and ears ready. Listen and then talk about the sounds they can hear around them. Then later you can sit and make a list of all the sounds they heard - either words or pictures.
Rhyming books
Listening games
Video rhymes
Musical statues
Identifying objects “Find a big yellow button with four holes”. “I wonder if you can find one which is different?”
Beat perception
Simon says
I went to the zoo (I went to the zoo and I saw a monkey; I went to the zoo and I saw a monkey and a lion……)
Syllable songs (YouTube)
Rhyming bingo and rhyming memory game
Reading, reading, reading! As we all know, books help develop early literacy skills through rhyme, rhythm, repetition, and predictable text and children can gain a great deal of knowledge from being exposed to books at an early age. It’s more than just reading a book ‘to’ them but more about involving them in the story telling. This type of sharing involves discussions and really helps children understand what a story is. Traditionally for a lot of cultures, stories were only told using oral language which enable the stories to be retold in a way that indicated one’s own understanding of the plot/message.
It’s important for children to RECOGNISE their name before starting school. Key word - recognise!
But the main idea is that children are starting to recognise letters and that letters can make up words. Celebrate their name by having it displayed around the room, in the kitchen, on their belongings, etc.
Teaching children that books have beginning, middle, & end
They have characters, shape and structure
Noticing if children can predict the story
Things such as author and illustrators, spine and title
Role model by following the words with your finger when reading.
Pointing out matching letters to the child’s name.
Read stories with expression, ask questions during the book like, “What do you think will happen next?” etc
Using puppets to help ‘read’ a story or to bring the story to life.
Story stones are also a fun and interactive way for children to explore, retell, or create stories.
More about Story Stones and how to make them here
Managing self, relating to others, thinking, using language, participating, and contributing are competencies listed in The New Zealand Curriculum, (Pathways to School and Kura).
Of these 5, teachers are finding the greatest issue with two - can you guess which?.........................
Managing self and relating to others!
Managing self: Two types of parenting styles may be the reason why- lawnmower parents (removing challenges) and helicopter parents (constantly hovering). Create further opportunities to ensure children have time, space, and support to manage themselves (doing zips, opening lunch box, getting dressed, etc).
Relating to others: This means listening to others, sharing ideas, and thinking about what others might be going through. Empathy is the most complex skill of being able to relate to others.
Risks are another massive area that is important for children’s development. It stimulates their senses and develops healthy motor skills. Risk taking in a physical sense can be transferred over to learning and give children a sense of confidence in their ability.
Ways to encourage:
Relating to others
Encourage kind hands and gentle words, sharing, taking turns, what is empathy and what they might do to show it.
Managing self:
Can they dress themselves
Do they complete tasks/activities
Are they will to give things a go
How well do they deal with challenges
Are they resilient
Thinking:
Encourage children to be curious and have wonderings-model this yourself, “I wonder…….."
Solve problems
Make up imaginary games
Using language/symbols
Encourage children to talk about their day
Draw pictures
Share their opinions
Participating & Contributing
Observe children, do they have opportunities to take part in discussions?
Can they take part in things they haven’t tried before?
A message from some new entrance teachers:
What skills and aspirations do you believe are important for children to have when starting school?
- social skills eg: working well with others, sharing, taking turns, communication skills, handling conflict etc...
- fine motor skills eg: cutting, gluing, pincer grip
- gross motor skills eg: crossing the midline, coordination etc...
- beginning to take responsibility for themselves and their own belongings - carrying school bag, unpacking lunch box etc ....
What are the roles and responsibilities of the ECE teachers in the transition to school?
- to engage in conversation with children about starting school in a positive manner
- to talk with them about their transition visits that they may have had at school.
- to talk through any worries with a child that may be worried about the transition to school.
Do you see similarities between ECE and school curriculum?
- Play based learning; we are allowing time in the day for pure play based learning to help with the transition from ECE to school.
- the key competencies in the NZ curriculum are very linked to what gets promoted in an ECE(relationships with others, managing self, communication, creativity etc).
