Planning in the Moment with Young Children: A Practical Guide for Early Years Practitioners and Parents

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Focus on Children and Activities: This approach emphasizes the importance of focusing on key children and their spontaneous activities. It aligns with Montessori education, which promotes child-centered learning. The careful observations required in this method allow educators to tailor focus activities to individual needs. We began putting Planning in the Moment into action in September 2017 after some considerable time getting our environment right. At the end of our first year I can see how it has benefitted both staff and the children in our care. The staff are now much less stressed and relaxed and are free to spend quality time with the children, ensuring that no teachable moment is missed.　They have all commented on how much better they feel they know their key children. The children’s personal, emotional and social development has surpassed that of previous cohorts. They are much more resilient, independent and show an excitement for learning, safe in the knowledge that the adults will follow their lead." Anyone who visits our nursery (or Reception classes) comments on how calm and purposeful the children are. They are actually assessing the levels of involvement, the amount of brain activity and the amount of progress that is happening. They can see that the children are not stressed and nor are the staff. (Stress causes areas of the brain to shut down and therefore development is hindered). The children are displaying high levels of involvement and so are the staff. I will endeavour, through this book, to explain how this can be achieved.

The EYFS explicitly states that “Practitioners must consider the individual needs, interests, and stage of development of each child in their care.” Child-led learning is widely regarded as one of the most effective ways of doing that, while in the moment planning is one of the most effective ways to introduce child-led learning.Anna Ephgrave’s The Nursery Year in Action – The leading book on the subject. A must read if you’re thinking about implementing in the moment planning in your setting. ‍ The scale has five levels (see appendix A). Level 5 is high level involvement and is characterised by the child showing continuous and intense activity with concentration, creativity, energy and persistence. Deep level learning , with many parts of the brain “lit up”, is known to occur when children operate at this level of involvement. Remember, you are turning the whole concept of paperwork upside down. You’re now working on a child’s basis. They are not learning based on your planning. It is important to remember that in the moment planning can have a profound effect on the way interactions play out between child and teacher. To ensure organic implementation, both adults and children should understand the new policy surrounding child behavior management. Furthermore, those involved in implementing in-the-moment planning should demonstrate their commitment and enthusiasm for it through active role-modeling of positive adult/child interactions. For nursery school practitioners, your schedule is always very busy and things crop up all of the time. Any method which can free up some time is a big plus. Being stressed is one of the biggest causes of a burn out when teaching early years, so this approach helps relieve some of that pressure.

Foundation Stage Learning: This planning method is particularly effective in the foundation stage, where experiential learning is key. It resonates with John Dewey's philosophy of hands-on learning, emphasizing the importance of direct experience in education. If you’re considering implementing this approach in your nursery setting, we’ve put together some useful tips to make the process easier. Trained Staff The basis for all of this is that children have a natural desire to learn and explore. So instead of holding their hand through a variety of preset activities, you can allow them to find their own interests, and use this to enhance and build upon their existing knowledge.

Why Should I Use In the Moment Planning?

Building a broad understanding of this process is not difficult, but asking practitioners to follow it, performing the correct documentation and starting endless paperwork may be a little daunting. Many early years environments have adopted learning journals that make this process easier. We will argue that it's not just early years environment that can benefit from this approach. Using photography and videos, schools can document in digital learning journals what the child is achieving. Our learning skills framework can be used to monitor the progress of pupils.

This means, rather than taking the most common long-term observation, reflection and planning cycle, skilled practitioners must do all of these spontaneously. A skilled practitioner would work more closely with individual children, observe their interests and extend the teachable moments accordingly.

What Are the Benefits of In the Moment Planning?

Child Development Knowledge – Sustained shared thinking, schemas and a broad understanding of how children develop will help practitioners to find a child’s interests more precisely. The nursery school practitioners must always go to the children. If the practitioner would ask children to come to him, he may disrupt the flow of children playing with the provided nursery resources. The Documentation – At a later date, you can document the observation. Include the spark, the teachable moment and what you did next. This will help you to map out each child’s interests, and plan an environment that works for them. Habits of Mind: The focus on fostering critical thinking and problem-solving skills aligns with the Habits of Mind framework, emphasizing the importance of cultivating adaptable, thoughtful learners. Children are born with a natural desire to explore and learn and practitioners can support them in this. We do this by creating an enabling environment (both physical and emotional) and through the relationships and interactions that the children experience. We do not plan ahead, rather we remain “in the moment” with the children as they explore and learn. We observe carefully, and enhance the learning whenever we spot a “teachable moment”. Our observations, interactions and the outcomes are recorded afterwards.

Entries on the learning journeys are often accompanied by a photo. The sheets are gradually filled up over the course of the week and become a wonderful individual record. Staff meet with the parents of the focus children in the week following their focus week. The discussion revolves around the completed learning journey – a truly individual picture of the child’s experience. To work in this way involves complex arrangements and yet the reasoning is simple. After more than 25 years teaching I am confident that this child-led approach to teaching in the early years (including Reception) is best for the children. As a nursery practitioner, a lot of your time is taken up observing children, making notes, completing assessments, and planning learning for the week ahead. Teaching …. includes … communicating and modelling language, showing, explaining, demonstrating, exploring ideas, encouraging, questioning, recalling, providing a narrative for what they are doing, facilitating and setting challenges.” Ofsted September 2015The environment should be engaging and stimulating to facilitate child led learning. Providing a variety of resources and materials is also important to decipher what things the child enjoys and is drawn towards. In addition, for children aged over 3, staff complete another sheet which is really a group learning journey to record any significant events that occur in the class and that involve a group of children. Again this sheet has been re-designed by many settings – essentially it contains the same observation cycle – observation, teaching , outcome. An example might read:- Ask open-ended questions to get to know the child's interest. These are usually ‘How’ or ‘Why’ questions, and they should never have a yes or no answer. The Documentation – At a future date, you can document the observation and include details of the spark, the teachable moment and the steps you took next. This helps monitor each child’s interests so you can tailor the environment to suit. As expert Dr. Maria Montessori stated, "The greatest sign of success for a teacher... is to be able to say, 'The children are now working as if I did not exist.'" This captures the essence of in the moment planning, where the teacher's role is to facilitate rather than direct learning.