Just about every good development in education is the result of a team effort.
As we tell our students, collaboration is one of the top skills they need in response to the fluidity of modern life, along with the ability to think critically, creatively, and nimbly.
This philosophy applies just as much to curriculum development as it does to classroom learning. So, when the International Education group at Cambridge University Press and Assessment (Cambridge) launched their new Early Years curriculum in late 2023, we were in the first group of international schools to be an ‘Early Adopter’. Since then, we have had the opportunity to work with the development team at Cambridge to explore how we can embrace the programme and contribute to its evolution.
We are the first accredited High-Performance Learning (HPL) school in Saudi Arabia, which has allowed us to explore how best to align Cambridge Early Years and HPL in the Saudi context, making the most of the natural connections that arise as a result of both frameworks’ focus on active, student-led learning.
In addition, with our mandate to develop the Kingdom’s future leaders, our adoption of Cambridge Early Years alongside HPL is helping us to support Saudi Vision 2030’s educational goals, which include improving Early Years provision and raising the rate of kindergarten enrolment to 90% by 2030.
What is Cambridge Early Years?
The programme is for learners ranging from three to six years old, forming the new, first stage of the Cambridge Pathway.
It is play-based and has been designed to recognise the importance of developing attitudes and life skills alongside academic milestones. It comprises:
- the Cambridge Early Years curriculum and learning statements
- guidance to help manage learners’ transition into the programme and then to the next stage of their education
- documents that outline the similarities and differences between the Cambridge Early Years curriculum and the EYFS (UK) programme, as well as other approaches such as Reggio Emilia and Montessori.
The curriculum is structured as six broad areas of learning, all of which are interconnected and of equal importance. This encourages a holistic approach to teaching and learning, helping to ensure children make connections between the curriculum areas.
The six areas are: Personal, Social and Emotional Development; Physical Development; Communication, Language and Literacy; Mathematics; Understanding the World, and Creative Expression.
First Reactions
We have been using Cambridge Early Years with KG2 children (aged four to five years) during this academic year 2023/24, and have found that it provides a developmentally appropriate and flexible framework that enables us to work within a local, national and global context.
For our school it is a natural precursor to the Cambridge Primary programme. We have found it to be well structured with a comprehensive set of learning statements and planning tools. In addition, it provides teachers with a range of resources: curriculum maps, home school communication tools, songs, stories and activity guidance etc.
There are exemplar materials to support planning processes and we can access resources using Cambridge Go, the Cambridge School Support Hub, and are now connecting with Cambridge to use their assessment tool – Check Together.
Successes
We have enjoyed using the child-centred learning statements provided by Cambridge, as well as the guidance and resources in the planning blocks which have been published throughout the year.
A good example was in Learning Block 3, Learning and Playing Together, which opened with A Gift for Amma – a story exploring colour. Children were encouraged to make links between the story and their own experiences, such as visiting a market or a souk, buying gifts and appreciating their mothers.
The learning progressed to explore the language of colour and encourage retellings. Classroom role play areas were transformed into markets coming alive with sensory exploration of peacock feathers and spices. The children made gifts for their own mothers and wrapped them as well as making colourful canvases using a range of materials in their art lessons.
The other early success has been with our National Identity and English teachers using the same framework for planning.
The Saudi Ministry of Education, National Identity Subjects of Arabic, Social Studies and National Studies are all taught in Arabic, whereas the rest of our curriculum is delivered in English. Our National Identity teachers have been able to interpret and translate versions of the Cambridge Early Years learning statements, resulting in teachers using the same curriculum for the first time.
Training
Training and assistance from Cambridge through their online resources, online/face-to-face training and webinars has supported our use and development of the programme. The teachers who have completed the introductory training have embraced the pedagogical similarities with the EYFS and other Early Years programmes, based around developmentally appropriate learning objectives.
The Early Years Good Practice PDQ involves reflecting on and understanding early childhood development, including holistic learning, metacognition and self-regulation. It emphasises play-based learning, creating a safe and effective environment, the role and methods of Early Years assessments, effective communication and feedback, and the facilitation of active learning.
The curriculum has not changed Early Years pedagogy for our experienced team, but it has given us a solid framework to confidently support our learners.
Cambridge Early Years and High-Performance Learning
Late in 2022, Misk Schools began its High Performance Learning journey and is the first Saudi school to do so. In the Early Years, children have been learning about and using HPL’s Values, Attitudes and Attributes (VAAs) ie behavioural skills, and Advanced Cognitive Performance characteristics (ACPs) ie thinking skills, which work well with Cambridge Early Years to support a growth mindset.
To bring HPL alive for our youngest students, we have introduced animals to represent the strands embracing the Cambridge Early Years focus on play-based learning. Every classroom has HPL mascots of an elephant, a honey bee and an ant, to characterise and represent the VAAs of empathy, hard working and agile.
Some teachers also created actions and short straplines to make the HPL vocabulary more accessible to young children, and some students rephrased some of the HPL terms. An example was a child rephrasing ‘metathinking’ as ‘super thinking’ and adding a gesture adopted by the whole class!
Our teachers have found Cambridge Early Years and HPL to be complementary. They are both research-based and pedagogy-led philosophies, and have encouraged teachers to create new ways of thinking about and delivering their teaching.
Opportunities and Next Steps
One of the key areas we will continue to focus on next academic year is leveraging Cambridge Early Years and HPL resources for higher-level and critical thinking – a key development focus for us at Misk Schools. We will also be continuing to strengthen collaboration between our National Identity and English teams to enhance biliteracy, metacognition, and cross-curricular connections.
Alongside HPL, we believe Cambridge Early Years provides a very solid foundation for progression to the Primary Years, and we look forward to continuing to evolve and extend our use of it, using data to measure success from the next academic year onwards.
Written by:
Victoria Ogilvie, Assistant Principal, Misk Schools Kindergarten
Alaa Showail, Assistant Principal, National Identity Subjects, Misk Junior Schools
