Learning Journeys / Observations

[Guest]

I have found a blank learning journey sheet on the eyfs disk, could someone tell me if this is to be used as an observation sheet, or do will still need another sheet for observations.

 

Hopefully I have attached the sheet below

 

Sorry I am getting really confused

Cassie

learning_journey.doc

[starsky]

I have found a blank learning journey sheet on the eyfs disk, could someone tell me if this is to be used as an observation sheet, or do will still need another sheet for observations.

 

Hopefully I have attached the sheet below

 

Sorry I am getting really confused

Cassie

 

Hiya Cassie

 

This is what we have adapted and are now using in our day nursery throughout. We then put them into an individual scrapbook. We do also evaluate planned and unplanned learning that we may obseve thoughout the day on our daily planning.

 

Can see my planning sheets and evaluation sheets on another thread - planning

 

Claire

[Guest]

How many observations do you do on each child? What is expected in the new eyfs?. It seems like I will be complete obs all the time with no time to be with the children.

I thought I would have 2 focus children each week, 1 for me, 1 for other member of staff, how many obs per child should I carry out in the week. We have up to 16 children per session, but not the same children every day. Maybe I need more focus children each week?

 

Any ideas??

 

Cassie

[starsky]

How many observations do you do on each child? What is expected in the new eyfs?. It seems like I will be complete obs all the time with no time to be with the children.

I thought I would have 2 focus children each week, 1 for me, 1 for other member of staff, how many obs per child should I carry out in the week. We have up to 16 children per session, but not the same children every day. Maybe I need more focus children each week?

 

Any ideas??

 

Cassie

 

I have approx 16 children in my class session - two sessions a day, some children are in full day care, some just do the NEG funded hours, some only come in each week. The way are tackling it is we choose approx 5 am children and 5 pm children per week split between myself and another staff member and focus on these children for learning journey obs. We still do incidental obs(post it size) on the rest of the children if we see oe hear anything of importance. The children chosen for obs are subject to change - for example if a child is seen doing something of interst or something they do not usually do we will observe them. It is supprising how quick you begin to biuld up the observations.

 

You do not have to stop being with the children, an observtion takes approx 5 minutes to complete and can often be done from a distance while you are still interacting with the children.

 

Me and my collegue take it in turns to complete our observations, we do them on our key childen, this way one of you is still with the childen.

 

All incidental observations are done duringthe session, we always carry post its with us - these are done on all children no matter if they are your key group or not.

 

Hope this helps - it works well for us

 

Claire

[Guest]

Hi

I am an early years advisory teacher and the advice that my team are giving is that the observation, assessment and planning sheets on the EYFS CD Rom can be used, adapted or not used at all. You need to find something that works in your setting. You need to remember that eny system that you use needs to be manageable so that you can keep it going. I would suggest that you observe children while you are working alongside them and when you outside what the children are doing. Don't forget you can have an observation going on a group of children, as well as focussing on one. Keep these observations to inform you of children's next steps and the following week's plannning. At some point you will need a more detailed narrative observation on the children that will tell you where those children are at that point. Children can have these kind of observation every term - don't tie yourself up in knots trying to do these more detailed observations all the time.

 

My best advice is not to panic - these things will evolve over time and will become embedded in your everyday practice.

 

Hope this helps - sorry it's such a long reply!!

[sharonash]

Hi

I am an early years advisory teacher and the advice that my team are giving is that the observation, assessment and planning sheets on the EYFS CD Rom can be used, adapted or not used at all. You need to find something that works in your setting. You need to remember that eny system that you use needs to be manageable so that you can keep it going. I would suggest that you observe children while you are working alongside them and when you outside what the children are doing. Don't forget you can have an observation going on a group of children, as well as focussing on one. Keep these observations to inform you of children's next steps and the following week's plannning. At some point you will need a more detailed narrative observation on the children that will tell you where those children are at that point. Children can have these kind of observation every term - don't tie yourself up in knots trying to do these more detailed observations all the time.

 

My best advice is not to panic - these things will evolve over time and will become embedded in your everyday practice.

 

Hope this helps - sorry it's such a long reply!!

 

 

We have tied ourselves up in knots over these observations . We are really struggling to fit everything in. We observe spontaneous obs its the target ones we cant seem to get right. Also how these feed into planning seems very wishy washy.

We have 2 rooms plus the garden with 4 staff.

One based in each room and garden leaves one floating doing snack, nappes, general floating to cover ratios, we dont seem to get time to do anything We have stopped for group time where we do a focus activity, letters and sounds and some singing so that we get something done- not sure if this is appropriate as we are stopping the children from playing?

 

We are finding we have lots of obs to go through to inform the following weeks planning, but have been told lots of different ways on how these obs feed into planning. One way was just plan from your obs to get resources/toys out for the children, another was from obs plan focus activities, then we found we might have 20 odd activities going on - of course we didnt get tho them which got staff all a mess!

Out staffs heads are right down. EYFS courses are over subscribed, we are due an Ofsted in October and of course that is playing on our minds too!.

 

Can you or anyone pls give me an idiots guide on how obs feed into planning are activities then planned from obs with a learning intention linked to them?

How do you choose which focus children to observe each week, it was again 1st suggested that we have 5 a day as well as adhoc obs, then someone else said 2 a week, with the focus children we are persuming this are long observations, again what do you plan from these obs-are you then looking at their developmental records and then planning further?

 

You can tell we are totally confused cant you!!!

 

Any help or support would be very much appreciated!

 

thanks