EYFS update 2021: What you need to know

EYFS update 2021: What you need to know

The EYFS sets the standards that all early years providers must meet to ensure that children learn and develop well. Department for Education (DfE) has introduced minor modifications to the EYFS update 2021 to improve clarity for everyone. The updates will impact early years environments around England, including childminders and nursery leaders. The new guidance has been mandatory since 1^st September 2021.

Why have there been changes to the EYFS?

It is important to note that no significant changes are needed over the coming terms. The Government has implemented these changes to:

• Support children more effectively
• Reduce teacher workload freeing up time to spend with children
• Improve the language and literacy outcomes for disadvantaged children
• Ensure the language is clear, specific, and accessible

We want to highlight the main changes that have been made to the Government statutory guidance for EYFS early years framework to help anyone concerned about future learning. Here is a breakdown of the major updates:

Development Matters

Development Matters is not compulsory, but it has been revised to reflect feedback from early adopter schools. The age bands have been simplified, and the document is shorter to allow for more flexibility and freedom. It is not compulsory, but it is recommended and works alongside the new guidance.

Reducing Unnecessary Paperwork

Less paperwork is always a good thing for busy early years practitioners. Reducing the amount of time spent on paperwork means teachers can spend more time engaging and observing children, but how do you ensure you effectively record development without EYFS statements? Observation is still vital, but it is now more about quality rather than quantity. The updated guidance highlights the importance of observational evidence rather than cold data. Planning, review, and record-keeping should work in harmony in a continuously improving setting.

The Early Learning Goals

The seven areas of learning and development remain unchanged, but the wording of the ELG’s have been reviewed to make them more explicit and more specific. This will help with a child’s learning and development by allowing teachers to make more accurate observations. Additionally, the “exceeding” judgment criteria have been removed from the EYFSP which gives teachers more free time.

Birth to 5 Matters

There is new Birth to 5 Matters guidance after a consultation period which provided information on best practices for play, characteristics of effective learning, and self-regulation. The guidance is flexible and allows practitioners to adapt what works for their children.

Safeguarding and Welfare

“Promoting the good health of children” will now need to include oral health and added support for choking prevention.

You can download a quick guide to all of the changes here.

How We Responded

We wanted to ensure The PE Hub falls in line with the guidelines to provide the best for children. We thoroughly checked that all our content met the updated framework criteria. We established where we needed to make changes in line with the new outcomes and made necessary amendments to our assessment to clearly show the links between our curriculum and the updated EYFS Development Matters outcomes. Although the changes are minor, we understand how important it is to teachers, parents and carers that we are up to date and compliant.

We hope the information and links provided have answered any questions you make have about the EYFS 2021 update. If you’d like to find out more about how we’re moving PE forward, please get in touch with the PE Hub team.