Planning Problems

This week, the ladies of the Early Years Staff Meeting discuss planning. They talk about their experiences of some of the difficulties of planning in the Early Years and some of the ways they are overcoming these. 

They also explore the purpose of planning and ways to keep workload to a minimum.

Transcript

00:12

Kealey: Hello and welcome to the Early Years Staff Meeting podcast with Sarah, Keely and Steph. The place where you can listen, learn and laugh with us about all things early years. Today we'll be discussing effective planning for early years education. Okay, hi ladies, how you doing? 

Sarah: Hi. 

Steph: Good, hi. Just a little bit tired this week. First week back. 

Sarah: Even though it's been a four day week, which has been very nice. But...

00:40

You do feel really tired, like more tired than a five day week, I think, sometimes. 

Steph: Why is that? 

Sarah: I don't know. I do. Literally. I think it's because you're cramming. I just was like, I just couldn't keep my eyes open. I was just talking gibberish as well. I didn't know what on earth was going on.

01:02

The bad thing is the children didn't even notice. 

Steph:. Because they were falling asleep. 

Kealey: They were tired too.

Sarah: Probably. 

Steph: Yeah. I think it's just anything where we're out of our routine in the slightest always makes us feel more tired. 

Kealey: And you're trying to cram, aren't you, as well? You feel, oh, I haven't got five days to kind of get back. Yeah. And you're trying to cram all the stuff you've got in your head and on your list into those four days.

01:30

and you still don't get hold of it done, but... 

Sarah: No, it's all about routine in early years. I think we always think it's the children, but I think it's the adults too. I don’t know what that says about us. A few red flags. Yeah. But we'll save routine for another day. 

Kealey: But today we're going to be talking about planning and how to make planning work for you and your setting. 

Sarah: We're going to start off talking about what our

01:58

what our challenges, what our problems have been over the years with planning and how we sort of overcame them. And you, the listeners may have had these problems as well, because I'm sure we're not the only ones. I'd like to think we're not anyway. 

Steph: No. And then hopefully we'll be able to give some ideas and inspiration to the listeners as well about things they might like to try in their own practice to do with planning.

02:27

Sarah: We all know about the different types of planning. And I think over the years, planning has definitely evolved from just long, medium and short-term planning. Haven't they ladies? I think we, um, we've definitely, I've definitely started my career doing long, medium and short-term planning. 

Kealey: Oh yeah. Mine as well. When I was training, I think my plan was about seven pages long. And for yeah, if one of these things, she and my observer came in

02:56

She went, should you really be doing seven pages on? I went, well, I think so. And literally it was like typed out word by word of what I was going to say. And she went, this is a little bit. Yeah, it was, it was just like a script, just like a play, do you know what I mean? No, it was seven pages long. She went, I think we could probably cut this down to five. 

Steph: Just the five.

Kealey: Just the five. So it was still like expected

03:26

that I still had a plan. I mean, it was a long time ago. But yeah, it has definitely changed now. 

Steph: When you start out and you're doing your first few plans, it's your first time in the job, you probably do make your plans out a little bit longer, like you say, like a script, because you're maybe a little bit unsure. But I know there's a lot now about making planning more succinct, isn't there? However, then that is also...

03:53

sometimes contradictory in that there'll be other influences that are on your planning and what you're expected to produce. So it's a little bit contradictory. 

Kealey: Yeah. 

Sarah: Yes, definitely. There's been lots of trends and also expectations from the people beginning with O who I don't like to say their name. I don't like to give them... 

Steph: Those who will not be named. 

Sarah: Exactly.

04:23

Steph: Oh dear, don't tempt it Sarah. 

Sarah: You know what I mean, I don't like to give them any airtime. They do create trends for expectations, don't they? I’ve definitely seen

04:51

on social media and just searching on the internet, goals and settings planning all comes up and it's all linked to Ofsted expectations. And actually, is that what's best for our children? And that is the big question, isn't it? They want to see planning, do they? 

Steph: That's it, that's the irony is that those that may not be named, there's no requirements for planning. It's meant to be.

05:19

for the teachers, for the staff, it isn't meant to be for outside agencies to have a look at, because what is the purpose of it? It's to say that we know as practitioners what we're teaching and the order in which we're teaching it and what we need to include to make our lessons and our provision high quality. 

Steph: And at the centre of that planning has to be the children and it has to meet their needs. It has to meet their interests.

05:49

And it also has to meet the gaps in their learning and what we are going to do as a setting, what we're going to do to plug those gaps basically. 

Kealey: And it does change with your cohorts as well, their likes and stuff, doesn't it, as you go? 

Sarah: And I think that has been our biggest challenge over the years is not just rolling out the same planning year over year because, oh, it worked last year for those children or it worked for us as a team.

06:19

we've got those resources to hand, so we might as well just roll it out again. I think that has been a real challenge for us. And it can work, you can either be too rigid in that, or you can go the other way, where you tinker with the planning too much and it goes off in like a weird tangent that doesn't really meet anyone's needs. 

Kealey: We've done that. That's happened a few times. And then we've gone, what happened there?

06:48

You have to bring it back, don't you?

Steph: Yeah. I've also worked in settings in the past that were very topic-based in early years. It would be, oh, we're doing space this half term for no reason other than we've got space books, we've got the space. We've got a topic box in the cupboard in the big hall. The planning would then become 

07:17

focused around these topics that were adult-imposed. They weren't following the interests of the children. Yeah, it's just about using those child-centred approaches.

Sarah: As we've said before, it's about knowing your children and making those bonds and those relationships with children, and so you can know what their needs and what their gaps are and what their interests are. So again, it's at the centre of all planning should be the child. 

Kealey: We had a couple of years back.

07:46

We hadn't really done it before because we hadn't had so many children really into it. But we had a year where they loved dinosaurs, didn't we? They were all obsessed. They all came in. It was odd to find so many children out of three classes that loved dinosaurs. So we did a whole thing on that and they absolutely loved it. 

Sarah: It is a balancing act. It's a juggling act, isn't it? Because the more...

08:14

the more you have a different cohort of children with different interests, the more, you know, you have to change the planning, which does, you know, impact workload. That is very topical at the moment. Practitioner teacher workload is quite astronomical and it is about finding a balance.

08:36

Steph: So what would you say our biggest problems have been recently and what have we tried to do to address that? 

Sarah: So I would say our biggest problem is when we looked over the planning and we looked over our, you want to say our long term plan, others might call it a coherence document, your overview of the year, I don't know, whatever you like to call it, whatever you know what you normally would do.

09:04

It didn't quite meet, I would say, some of the new expectations from the new curriculum that was in place. And I think that is because we had used what we'd done in the past and perhaps it didn't quite match our children. And perhaps it didn't quite meet the new curriculum. And I think that's probably the biggest challenge we've had.

09:32

Steph: Do you think as well, at that time, the time of the new curriculum coming in was coincided with the pandemic. So again, it was, you never really got off to this, the usual start and you weren't able to do actually all the things you normally do anyway. So there were these gaps.

Sarah: Yeah. And I think the community, the early years community, which I have to say, like everybody does band together and you know, there are lots of people on social media and on the internet.

10:01

They all come up with ideas and examples of work as well. I think that's what was missing. They didn't introduce that until quite late, did they? And I think that was what was missing because of COVID. Things were not functioning as early as settings normally would. 

Steph: Yeah, so sort of like meetings you'd go to.

10:28

to introduce the materials probably weren't on or if they were, they were virtual. 

Sarah: Yeah. And I mean, there was a lot of like hoo-ha from what I remember about having Play-Doh out in the setting. 

Steph: Oh my goodness, the discussions. Yeah. About Play-Doh. I mean, for me, it was the reading books. We used to have to quarantine our books. But then the children would come in and lick you.

10:57

So it was so contradictory.

Kealey: And not wash their hands when they go into the toilet. 

Sarah: And not wash their hands, exactly. 

Steph: But you know, but don't bring a soft furnishing into the settee, whatever you do. Oh yeah. Riddled with COVID. 

Sarah: And the bunting. 

Kealey: Yeah, bunting. There were no pillows at one point. 

Steph: Hashtag pan the bunting. No, it was all very drab, wasn't it? 

Sarah: It was, it was. And I think because of that, it didn't... I've been...

11:24

An earliest practitioner for a long time, I've seen a few curriculums changes and it just didn't feel like it normally did. It just there wasn't as much support out there. And I think it's just because the community was just battling with COVID and all the other things that were being pushed on them. So I think because of that, it just I didn't feel as though we were up to date with the curriculum changes really and what that meant.

11:53

in terms of provision and the expectations for our children.

Steph: Because some of the goalposts have moved, haven't they? With the change of curriculum. And that means you can't be churning out the same planning because actually the coverage has got to be different. Yeah. We've looked at this, that this year, haven't we, to make sure that we, you know, we really are covering everything.

12:21

in a way that's relevant to our cohort at the moment. 

Steph: Yeah, and I think that has been a little bit labour intensive. But I think once you get that over, once you get your head around the expectations by end of year, and then once you know your children, it does start to fall into place. And I think at the beginning, it was a bit tricky.

12:49

to get going, but I think now we're on the way. And, you know, there's lots of lessons to learn from this year and I'm sure we will hopefully fingers crossed learn from those next year when we do our planning. So yeah, it's all a learning curve, isn't it? Always in early years. 

Steph: Always in everything. Life, life's an education.

13:19

Yeah, and it probably is worth mentioning as well that planning being part of that assessment cycle and knowing the children so well, but we're not going to go into that too much today. But that will be on a future podcast. It's a cycle.

Sarah: And I think most practitioners do understand the cycle. It does inform your planning and finding the right assessment tool or way is what will really help you.

13:49

Steph, because obviously you are, you're not, I wouldn't say you're new to our, um, our staffing team, but you definitely, um, joined us later, didn't you? So in your experience, if there's, has there been any other planning issues you've come across? 

Steph: I feel that it's the same problems. No matter.

14:11

what your system is. For me personally, something I always find really hard is just workload with planning. Maybe I'm a bit of an over planner, as you girls have found out, where I've been planning some of the content. 

Kealey: Steph loves a plan. 

Steph: Yeah, I do love a plan. It does take up a lot of time to do planning. If I'm going to do something, I like to do it thoroughly, let's say.

14:41

So I'm forever desperate to find ways to improve my practice. And I know that lots of times I've been told, work smarter, not harder. But then no one's been able to actually give me any concrete tips on what it is to be smart.

15:05

But I have listened to some advice on different other teachers, different podcasts and things about workload. And one concept that I've come across is batch planning. So a little bit like you would batch cook your meals and it's, you know, it saves you time because you're obviously having to only get the equipment out once. You're only having to get the ingredients out once and you can cook.

15:34

a few meals at a time. That's something I've been sort of trying out is a little bit of batch planning. So trying to get down to doing a number of weeks planning in one go rather than doing daily. Yeah. Because I think as well, it's like getting into that headspace. It's like, you know, you get your laptop out, you get your notes out and that will all take 10 minutes of your time.

16:02

So if you're doing that continuously, it's almost better to block out a few hours and say, I'm going to nail this, you know, phonics planning or whatever it is and get it done. So I've tried that with varying success. 

Kealey: That works well for phonics, doesn't it? Because you know where you're going with the phonics. You know what's going to be coming next. Yes, you will make sure things are in there to help, you know, a variety of children.

16:32

and to make it interesting for them. But Phonics is, you know, what steps you need to do, what comes next. And because we keep it very- 

Steph: It's repetitive, isn't it?

Kealey: The same repetitive. Yeah. It's gonna be very similar anyway. You're just tweaking those few bits, but it makes it a lot easier, doesn't it, if you've already batch planned something like Phonics that's very repetitive. Yeah. 

Steph: You're not having to really-

16:58

you know, think too much about the delivery because the delivery is always very similar. The questioning, the assessment is, yeah, it's all part of routine and, and, you know, which will be another, another podcast that we're going to cover. But yeah, if you can get these routines into your plan, into your sessions, it would make the planning process more smooth because you don't really need it.

17:24

But then it comes back to the debate, well, then if it's only for me and I don't need it, why am I producing this piece of paper? Yeah. 

Kealey: Well, we can't lie. 

Steph: Because I did find a quote which I thought was great. And it's, the plan is nothing. The planning is everything.  Do you like that?

Sarah: Yeah, I love that. 

Steph: Yeah, because actually, what is this piece of paper? It's just a piece of paper, isn't it? But it's the process and the...

17:54

You know, the understanding of what you're doing is the main thing. 

Kealey: But when you've done that for that, it then gives you the time to do you like your headspace and things for doing more of like the planning in the moment. The planning in the moment part of listening and seeing and watching your children, what they'd like to do and just adding that on as you go. 

Sarah: So planning in the moment for our listeners that who don't know is Anna Ephgrave.

18:24

She teaches the in the moment planning where we have spoken about this, haven't we?

Steph: I think we have, yeah.

Sarah: And it does what it says on the tin, in the moment planning, it's about responding to what children are doing and moving them on in their learning all in one play cycle in the moment. That's the best way to describe it.

StephAnd that's something that you can't

18:54

write down or put on a piece of paper because you don't know what's happening until that very moment. 

Sarah: I think I have seen some settings they do record those moments but again that can become very labour intensive and you know what is the purpose exactly? 

Steph: What is the purpose exactly? Recording it in retrospect.

19:22

Sarah: because who are you recording it for?

Yeah. It's difficult, isn't it? And I like it too. I think if it informs your planning for next time, you might think, well, actually that child, I noticed that they're still not responding to, I don't know, holding a pencil effectively, then that is something I need to change my provision. And perhaps you will do that, but I don't feel.

19:52

a whole observation perhaps needs to be created because of that. Yeah. And I actually, I don't know what Anne Ephgrave actually suggests. I don't know. 

Steph:  I think, let me just refer to my notes here, on my very detailed plan. See, this is why you plan. 

Sarah: Oh yeah, that is the documentation. 

Steph:  Yeah. She does say to document it as sort of the third step. So you sort of have the child's spark where the child was shown interest in something.

20:22

then the teacher will teach, there's a teachable moment, and then you document it at a later date. And she suggests this will help you to map out each child's interests and plan an environment that works for them. However, I would argue that that would be very, very labour intensive to do that every single time that you.

20:49

you taught in the moment because we're teaching in the moment, every moment of the day, aren't we? So there's got to be a little bit of practitioner trust that actually we know, we know that about the child because we've seen it and we know what's next for them.

21:12

Okay. So unfortunately we're down to two, aren't we Kealey? 

Kealey: Yep. Just me and you. 

Steph:  We've lost Sarah. She's been called away to her poorly little boy. So we hope he feels better. But these are the realities of being busy working mums that record their podcasts at the weekends. So yeah, so it's just me and you Kealls, but we'll plod on.

21:41

So we seem to have spent a lot of time talking about things that haven't gone well in this podcast. It's taken a sort of... 

Kealey: Lot the yeah buts. 

Steph:  Yeah, buts. So what have we done in our practice that has worked well that we can hopefully give our listeners something to think about and to try? 

Kealey: So we introduced skill planning a little while back and this thing of sparks.

22:11

So basically on your plan you'll have a little spark that will spark your children's learning and spark them to go off. And it's so interesting they want to go off and find what's in your environment. It's not restricted. We've also found doing the skills where we are teaching the skill of how something in the environment of what you have, how to use that, how to extend that.

22:40

and then how to use that in other areas as well. You're taking those children on a skill journey for things that they are going to need when they grow up. 

Steph: For example, just this week, we taught a spark on how to make a book and the children went off and had a go at doing this but they did it in their own way. So the child that loves Sonic made a Sonic book and he's like done some fantastic writing.

23:09

and that's all come from one spark. You know, it's different, it's given the skill to go out into the provision and use what you've got in your provision. 

Kealey: That's the sparks for us also as teachers with the planning, they are just sparks. They're small little pockets of information. And then we do come back to it later as well in the year that we've learnt that skill.

23:37

And obviously it's not all skills. We do do other things in there as well. We have those good old festivals, don't we? So we do all those, but it all just kind of flows in quite nicely. And then if we can see a gap there, we can add something in to, to make sure those gaps. 

Steph: Yeah. And then like you say, we revisit that area of the provision. So if we've taught a particular skill, we would then revisit and say, sort of, you, you're coming back around those skills to build upon what the children already know.

24:06

Yeah, that's worked very well for us. We looked at the skills that needed to be taught in the EYFS curriculum and we also looked at the content that we needed to cover. We organized the planning to look at the progression of skills. Sarah had found something which we used as an assessment tool to make sure we were covering everything on the curriculum.

24:35

It's by somebody called Shonette Bason Wood inspired us. She produced some I CAN statements and she based them upon the early years framework. And yeah, we use that as a basis. So when we did our long term, when we do our long-term planning, we're making sure that all of these I CAN statements are covered throughout the year. So we know that by the end of the year, we've covered all the skills the children need in order to meet.

25:05

these I CAN statements. That was our starting point. Then our next step is to then develop our provision planning. We looked at all the areas of provision and we produced a plan showing what is our base provision. Then we looked at how we need to level up the provision in order to move children's learning on. So once they've mastered this skill, 

25:32

We're going to add this. Probably worth mentioning as well that in our planning, we look at how we enhance the provision to meet the needs of the children. When we talk about enhancing, we mean what are we adding to the provision in order to allow the children to access something? So that's what we also looked at as well. And that's where we're kind of at. So it's still a bit of a work in progress, but that's kind of what we're doing now.

26:01

Something else which I think has worked well for us is we're very flexible and I think you've got to have that flexibility, I think, in the early years, haven't you? Because, as we said, the children are going to take it their own way and you may plan something, but all it is is a plan. It's not the outcome. So you might plan.

26:25

this is how the children will use this resource or this area and they may completely use it in a completely different way, which means you have to change what you were going to, how you thought you were going to support them in that in a different way. So yeah, being flexible is definitely something that is important.

26:53

Kealey: It might be that at that time, they're not maybe ready for a certain skill. So you can move that to another point. It is thinking out of the box sometimes, isn't it? We're five year olds. Out of the box. 

Steph: Yes, you're very good at doing that, aren't you, Kealey?

Kealey: Yes. I do love an out of the box. 

Steph: In the box. On the box.

 Out of the box. Cut the box out. Yeah, we do love a box. 

Steph: I feel like we kind of need to maybe sum up some

27:23

good tips for our listeners? What do you think? Because I don't know how many tips we've actually given people. 

Kealey: No. Well, I think the spark planning to make it sparky and to make your planning short enough for you just to type what you need to do at that time. You can always write on your plan after. So even if most of your stuff comes from you just scribbling on your plan, scribble on your plan. If you've got a couple of sentences, it's there.

27:52

But also we found obviously like sharing, playing as a team, we're very lucky. We do have a big team. We have close team that we've worked with for a while or we've all got very much the same thinking. And we just share the load and it is just sharing out. I'll do this with this week, you do that this week and just sharing it out. That is, I know it's harder when you're in a smaller group. Or a small school. 

Steph Yeah, 

28:22

or if you're a child minder or somebody on their own. But I guess then you've just got to ask yourself what is the purpose of this planning? Who is it for? If it's just for me, make it work for you. And there are lots of different planning formats that you can access online. Now you choose the one that maybe works for you or just create something that works for you. And we are hoping to in the future produce some materials.

28:51

planning materials, aren't we, to support people. So watch this space. I think I've already said about the batch planning, about trying to plan more than one lesson of a similar nature or activity of a similar nature all at once.

Kealey: Because children do like routine. They love the consistency. They know what's going to happen next.

29:19

Steph: Absolutely. And then that makes an effective use of your time as well, because if your routine is always the same, the children know exactly what to expect and there's no time wasted. Something that I've been dipping my toe into, and I know Sarah has been dipping her toe into it too, I don't know how much you've explored this yet, Kealey. 

Kealey: Well, no. I've sat back a little bit.

29:46

Steph: It’s the use of AI. Yeah, ladies try it out first. It's a new thing. I've only been introduced to using things like ChatGTP for a couple of months and it really did blow my mind to begin with because I think I asked it to produce me a policy on something and it just produced one and I was like, what? This policy has been on my to-do list for seven months and then the

30:15

computer's just done it for me. And I have started to dip into using AI, particularly where I'm doing sort of individual plans for individual children. If you've got children or intervention groups running that you've got to plan for, it just comes up with like 10 suggestions and you're like, great, copy and paste, copy and paste, copy and paste. So maybe this is the future. 

Kealey: Yeah, using that, that does sound really good because it's basically what I do.

30:43

pretty much every day and kind of make up my own ideas. But having that there would probably save quite a lot of time. So you need to get onto it. 

Kealey: I do, don't I? 

Steph: Kealey, I mean, you've just gotten to Instagram, haven't you? 

Kealey: I have, yeah, I'm very proud of myself. My username is-

Steph: No, don't give out your username. 

Kealey: No, I'm not going to, but I'm just saying, my username is something to be desired. It was quite tricky.

31:11

And yeah, I have now been informed, probably not the best one to have done, but there we go. I'm learning. 

Steph: So yeah, try a bit of AI if you haven't. I just think overall planning, it needs to work for you. So if you have a system that you're using at the moment that you don't think works for you, it's worth putting in that extra time to tweak it.

31:38

to get your processes right, to get your actual planning process correct. Like look at the children, look what you know about the children, look at the curriculum, look at where you need to get those children and work it from there. Do you think that wraps up planning?

Kealey: I'm just thinking, is it mindful moment time, Steph? 

Steph: It is. Previous listeners to our podcast will know that we like to finish with a little mindful moment, something to support

32:08

your wellbeing even just a tiny bit going forward. So today we want to think about gratitude. So just maybe now, at the end of this podcast or maybe later on in the day when you've got a moment yourself, just have a think about something that you're grateful for. It can be anything at all. There's always something to be grateful for. Even when you've had the worst day, there is always something to be thankful for.

32:37

It's not always easy to find. But practicing gratitude is something that is good for your, for your wellbeing. So Kealey, what have you been grateful for today? Let's kick it off.

Kealey: Grateful for well, lots of people who know me. I do obviously I'm absolutely grateful to have my family to come home and have a nice cuddle that just is everything to have a nice cuddle woth my children.

33:06

But to top it all off, gratitude towards chocolate, you know, you can't not give a chocolate a bit of gratitude.

Steph: So yeah, have an attitude for gratitude is another little... 

Kealey: Attitude for gratitude.

Steph: You may have noticed that I do like to collect little sayings. 

Kealey: I think we should have a little Steph saying book that like attitude, gratitude.

33:32

Steph: I did used to do this little thing at my, in a previous school, or I was not where I work now, but I used to stick little quotes, positive affirmations and quotes in the toilets. 

Kealey: Oh Steph, you've got to bring them back. Bring them back. 

Steph: Sometimes that's all you need for the, you just need a little... Little pick me up. Positive quote. So... 

Kealey:We're coming to the end.

33:59

Steph: We are. And this is the bit where we're meant to say all the things we're meant to say, but this is normally what Sarah's good at. 

Kealey: Yes, this is Sarah's bit because she's really good at this stuff. So I'm just going to say, share, like, review. Yeah. 

Steph: Yes, please. If you've got this far, we'd love it if you could review.

34:28

review the episode or maybe leave us a comment on our Instagram or our Twitter or even our Facebook group. The Facebook group is a little bit quiet at the moment, I think, but we will add to that. If you liked this episode, you can go to our website and check out our meeting minutes and listen to some of our other episodes.

34:55

But yeah and I believe our next episode is going to be all about our routines, your routines in early years. Yes listen up.

Kealey: Yes it is. Okay so till next time we will see everybody soon. Have a great week this week, rest of the weekend and a great week. We'll see you soon hopefully.

Steph: Goodbye.