The school toolkit is based around the ‘Ready early years providers and schools’ section from the Leicestershire Children and Family Partnership, ‘School readiness: A shared understanding across Leicestershire’ practitioner leaflet. The 13 statements, organised into the four themes of the EYFS, have been expanded for you to explore. Each begins with an inspiring quote to help you start to reflect and unpick the statement, supported by a wealth of thought provoking material to consider.
Every school is unique and will be at differing points on the school readiness journey. All will have existing expertise in varying aspects of school readiness, and differing areas they wish to develop. The ethos of this toolkit is all about supporting your own professional development journey, by inspiring you to consider what you already do well, and build on that good practice, with the needs of your current children and families at the forefront of your mind.
Each statement contains a number of reflective questions to consider. The downloadable audit tool provides a framework to record your responses to these - celebrating success by recording strengths of current practice and provision, and highlighting areas for further development.
Once you have identified strengths and areas for development, you may then select the statements you wish to develop further – at this point you can look through the supporting documentation. This should support you in deciding “what needs to happen next”, writing and implementing an action plan. It is important to regularly come back to this to review how the strategies you implemented worked in practice, and what impact they had on children and families. Remember to include all stakeholders in your evaluation.