Hi, Weavers

We hope you managed to have a restful half term this very cold February! And, if you got any snow, perhaps you managed to throw a few snowballs or make a few snow angels. We have a number of developments and reminders for this month so do read on for more details. 

We Are Dropping Support for Some Operating Systems

Later this year we will be dropping support for some older operating systems. Namely Android 4 and iOS 9, 10, 11 and below. This means that if you’re using a device that runs one of these operating system versions, you will no longer be able to download updates to the Tapestry app. Please note, you will still be able to download the app, but at some point it will become outdated and you will not be able to update it any further without first upgrading to a more recent Android or iOS version. This won’t be happening until later on in the year and we will send another reminder closer to the time.

The New Development Matters on Tapestry

Just as a reminder, because I’m sure some of you are starting to think about making the change to the new EYFS which becomes statutory this September, the new Development Matters has been available on Tapestry for a few months now. You can enable it at any point - for no extra charge - if you’d like to start having a look.

Our education team and our developers had a lot of discussions about the new guidance and how to add it for our customers without it becoming a tick list. You can read our thinking behind these choices here.

Once you have enabled the new framework, you may notice it looks slightly different. Rather than selecting an area, then age band and then statements within that age band, there is just the option to select the ‘flag’ that relates to that area of learning. You will also notice a section for ‘reference material’. This updates depending on the areas that you have selected, and if you have already selected a child, the age of the child will also determine which reference material you see first.

To enable the new Development Matters on your account, please follow these steps:

Enabling the new Development Matters

Once enabled, you will be able to access them by going to an observation and scrolling to the "Flags" area, which appears under the assessment section.

This tutorial will help you understand how to use the new framework:

Using the Development Matters 2020 Guidance

EYFSP for Early Adopters

We have released a new screen for the EYFSP – this is for those early adopters who are assessing with the new ELGs this year. You can find this (and the other accompanying screens) by going to Tracking > ELG 2020.

As usual, the data will be pre-filled in using your most recent ELG 2020 assessments on your observations. If you need to change any of them, you can do so directly on that screen. We have a couple of new tutorials for this screen, which you can find here and here

If you aren’t an early adopter, you needn’t worry! The EYFSP screen you have used up to now is still there for those who would like to use it this year.

Cherry Garden Changes

If you are using the Cherry Garden framework, children will now be able to access their own “Orchard” via Child Login. Managers can make the Orchard visible to children by going to Control Panel > User Permissions > children.

Additionally, Baseline assessments are now also included in the Orchard. This means that the leaves on the tree, or petals on the flower, will change to reflect baseline assessments. Flower petals will change if statements have been selected at all, and tree leaves will change if statements have been assessed as “refinement 3”.

Bulk Marking Relatives Having Parental Responsibility

In order for relatives to receive notifications about a recorded accident for their child, they need to have been assigned ‘parental responsibility’. To make that process quicker, we have added functionality to allow you to set that status in bulk.

Managers can find it in the ‘Manage Relatives’ section of their Control Panel. They just need to use the tick boxes next to the relatives’ names and choose ‘Add parental responsibility’ from the pop-up options box in the bottom right-hand corner.

By doing this, the relatives you select will have the ‘parental responsibility’ status instantly applied to them for all the children they themselves are linked to.

As it applies to every child a relative is connected to, you should only use this bulk setting feature with relatives who are only attached to children they take parental responsibility for (so not people who have their nieces, nephews, grandchildren etc. linked to them, even if they are also linked to their own child/the child they are the primary carer for).

You can see which children are linked to a relative and set parental responsibility for individual children by editing a relative (again from the ‘Manage Relatives’ page in the Control Panel) and scrolling to the bottom of the page.

Parental Engagement

If you are looking to improve parental engagement on your Tapestry account, we have put together this handy infographic about Parental Engagement which highlights our main features and the benefits of each:

We Have Removed the “Downloads” Section on the Forum

And finally, as part of an on-going redesign of the Foundation Stage Forum (FSF) website, we recently made the decision to remove the resource library section. We have taken a few resources which were popular with some Tapestry users and put them on our info site here. But any other resources previously in the library are no longer accessible. If you haven’t visited the FSF before, do stop by! We have many wonderful articles there, as well as opportunities to join in with discussions with other educators. Logging in is easy using your Tapestry details.

Save the date – Tapestry Education Conference

We are delighted to be holding a free online Tapestry Education Conference (TEC), Reflecting on Antiracism in the Early Years. Keep an eye out on social media for more information to follow.

Twitter: @Tapestry_FSF

Facebook: @TapestryLearningJournal

Instagram: tapestry_fsf

LinkedIn: The Foundation Stage Forum & Tapestry

As always, you can reach us on customer.service@eyfs.info if you have any questions.

Keep safe.