Physical development frameworks

UK Chief Medical Officers’ physical activity guidelines 

The UK’s Chief Medical Officer’s activity guidelines (Department of Health and Social Care, 2019) could help to support young children’s physical development, however, they are rarely mentioned. If they were included in the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework then Ofsted could assess implementation in any inspection process. For example, how are settings supporting the recommended 180 minutes of daily physical activity? In Australia their physical activity guidelines are taken very seriously; sleep, screentime and physical activity work hand in hand. If the physical activity guidelines are implemented, monitored and evaluated effectively they can make a significant difference to children’s overall quality of life. 

Education inspection framework 

The Education Inspection Framework is actually very positive for physical development and includes two essentials – ‘from birth onwards’ children should be offered opportunities to move throughout the day, and these opportunities should align with their ‘stage of development’ – not their age. What we still don’t know enough about is what responses are provided by educators around physical development during their ‘learning walks’ conducted during Ofsted inspections – and why this is often barely mentioned in follow-up documentation and reports. 

Early years foundation stage Statutory framework  

The Early years foundation stage (EYFS) statutory framework causes the biggest issues in terms of young children’s physical development, in my view. Since the EYFS update in 2021, physical development has been reduced simply to the two categories: gross motor and fine motor skills. So literally half of the field now lies elsewhere, and whatever the rationale was for doing this, we never discovered. 

Health and self-care that previously sat very nicely as the second part of physical development now sits in personal, social, emotional development (PSED), under ‘managing self’ – ’manage their own basic hygiene and personal needs – dressing – toileting and understanding the importance of healthy food choices’ – this comes just after ‘explain the reasons for rules – know right from wrong and try to behave accordingly’ (DfE, 2021, pg. 12)– is this really a good fit?  

So we cannot view physical development within the framework as part of a 360 wellbeing approach now. There is little evidence of the mind-body connection, or understanding how physical skills entirely underpin self-care routines and habits, such as brushing teeth and hair, dressing, eating, on time continence…these are all competencies that teachers cite as being useful when children start Reception and school.  

Early learning goals 

Now we come to the early learning goals (ELG’s) for physical development.  

However much we would wish otherwise, the ELG’s do matter. The limited vision they present of children’s physical development and extraordinarily narrow focus has a significant impact on observation, assessment, planning, policy and practice in the field. They impact even more widely on how educators are trained and the content of available physical development continuous professional development (CPD) opportunities.  

Their meaning is vague and historically they have simply been a tick-box exercise – can they really be called ‘goals’ when you think a percentage of the children they apply to will be rising 6 – and surely we should be aiming for more than just ‘negotiate’ – ‘demonstrate’ and ‘move energetically,’? 

And why are gross and fine motor skills divided into two separate units when developmentally, in real life, they work in synthesis; continually evolving and being refined through movement experience? 

Next article coming soon