C4EO Brief No 1 (October 2008)

Early days on early years, but growing fast!

Sue Owen, Director of Well-being at the National Children's Bureau, is the Early Years Theme Lead for C4EO. She explains how the work the Centre is doing on early years will empower and support professionals to deliver services which will improve outcomes for those who use them.
 
The best way to bring about change is from within localities, being responsive to local conditions and taking account of local contexts. C4EO wants to empower that approach by giving people the knowledge and tools to bring about improvements in the context of their local conditions.

Early Years is the first theme that C4EO is looking at. We know that outcomes for many children in their early years are variable and affected by a variety of factors such as poverty or parenting. Evidence suggests that the way in which services are delivered to younger children and their families can have an impact on these outcomes.

The Early Years priorities are:

• improving development outcomes for children through effective practice in integrating early years services
• improving children's attainment through a better quality of family-based support for early learning
• narrowing the gap in outcomes for children from the most excluded families through inclusive practice in early years settings.

These priorities arose from research, which indicated they are important factors affecting children's achievement and well-being. The process being put in place in C4EO will give us access to the best research and practice on these issues and help local authorities to decide which strategies will be most effective in their particular circumstances.

Professionals have long sought to learn what works by looking at what other people have done. This is hardly new, but often what works for someone in one place may not work for others in different areas because of differences in geography, demography or local circumstances.

So what makes the work of C4EO different from what people have done in the past?

The first difference is that C4EO is conducting comprehensive reviews of evidence on ‘what works' for each priority. This evidence will include everything from academic articles to tools, strategies and plans that professionals have used to improve outcomes in a local area.

The second key difference is that the knowledge will be accessible to everyone from a single point – with the C4EO website acting as a one-stop shop. This information will be put into accessible formats and products targeted at different audiences, available for anyone to access whenever they want. We aim to make the progress mapping tool, which searches for the information we have collected, as responsive as possible to people's requests.

A third difference is that this knowledge will be updated on a regular basis throughout the next three years and will take advantage of new information as it is published.

The final difference is that C4EO will actively use the information collected to offer support, to local authorities and their Children's Trust partners, to apply it to their services. A programme of regional workshops, Sector Specialists and tailored support will aim to bring a human dimension to the transfer of knowledge, enabling people to learn from others about what has worked for them rather than just reading it from the web or a book.

For the early years professional, they will benefit from our ability to provide the best information they can use to assess local early years work and to inform change where necessary so as to improve outcomes, quickly and conveniently. C4EO will not produce 'magic bullets' but it will give people the tools to make change in their local context and at their own pace.

So how far have we got with the early years theme?

The Centre has only existed since early July but since then much has been achieved. A theme advisory group is meeting. This group gives advice and guidance to the Centre to develop the work programme. It includes recognised experts from the University of London, Peterborough City Council, Ofsted and the Children's Workforce Development Council.

In October we will publish the three scoping reviews, one for each of the three Early Years Theme priorities, which will look at the availability of evidence. Over the next two months we will be recruiting, accrediting and training Early Years Sector Specialists to work with local authorities and their partners. Finally, we will publish reviews of the evidence for each priority in January 2008 and make them available to the public on our website.

We will publish the three scoping reviews for each of the three Early Years priorities which will look at the availability of evidence on 31 October. Over the next two months we will be recruiting, training and accrediting early years sector specialists to work with local authorities and their partners. Finally we will publish the results of the review of all the evidence on 30 January 2008 and make it available to the public on our website.

Sue Owen is currently Director of the Well-being Department at the National Children's Bureau and was previously Director of the Early Childhood Unit there. In the past she has held a number of posts in the early childhood field including Early Years Lead Officer for Humberside County Council, Information Officer for the National Childminding Association, Playgroup Adviser for Manchester City Council, and Deputy Director of the Early Years National Training Organisation.

Sue's latest book is Authentic Relationships in Group Care for Infants and Toddlers: RIE principles into practice (co-edited with Stephanie Petrie). Her doctoral dissertation was on the development of professionalism in childminding.

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