EYFSP Moderation Myth Busting and Top Tips!

As those of us working in Reception classes find ourselves being moderated as part of the EYFSP national moderation process- I wanted to bust a few myths...many of which I have heard on my travels, many of which I am contacted and asked about and many of which I see being discussed on social media.

All of what I am going to say comes from little old me....an experienced nursery nurse, EYFS teacher, an accredited moderator and then LA moderation manager. 

In my role as LA Moderation manager, despite only being in post one day a week, we had an external visit from STA who highly praised the moderation plan put in place. 

So here goes my top tips and EYFSP moderation myth busting blog:

1. Have the moderation handbook and exemplifications printed and KNOW the handbook well. You may even know it better than the moderators. You need to be ready to ask "can you show me where it says that in the statutory guidance please?" There is helpful guidance around evidence, practice and making judgments. 

2. Moderating teams have to have a clear appeals/complaints procedure which they are expected share with you. This is where you go if you are not happy with your moderation. Ask about it if they do not share it with you!

3. Children are judged as either: "emerging", "expected" or "exceeding". There is no "emerging expected", "within expected" or "secure expected". The discussions with your year one colleagues will be where you discuss the children's individual development and achievement of the goal.

3. No where in any of the literacy goals does it say which specific level of phonics or bands of reading books needs to be achieved to be expected..this is because there is no prescribed level! TO BE AN EXCEEDING WRITER DOES NOT REQUIRE A FOUR OR FIVE YEAR OLD TO WRITE WAR AND PEACE ON NARROW LINES WITH PERFECT PUNCTUATION AND SPELLING IN CURSIVE WITH PERFECT FORMATION...

4. Children can achieve exceeding! Of course not all of them...these are your "above and beyond" learners. Those children that you know are clearly beyond the ELG. They do not need to be performing like an A level student or ks2 child. They are 4 or 5 years old!!!EXCEEDING SIMPLY MEANS THEY ARE BEYOND THE EARLY LEARNING GOAL!!!!

5. The exceeding descriptors are guidance. Perhaps Johnny doesn't skip to music but he can ride a 2 wheeler bike and dribble a ball like Ronaldo!!! This along with other evidence could make him exceeding! 

6. Evidence....no requirement for piles of evidence. Yes of course you need evidence but a prime source of evidence is your knowledge!!! The handbook clearly tells us this!  

7. It's all about best fit! Do not break down and tick off ELGs. Look at them. Look at the evidence. Think of the child...where do they fit best??? E.g in shape, space and measure  they may talk more confidently about some aspects than others...that's fine... IT'S BEST FIT!!! Children do not need to have equal mastery of all aspects to achieve the ELG.  

8. Make sure you keep the maths ELG developmentally appropriate for 4 and 5 year olds! To achieve the ELG for number children do not need to be recording number sentences or be adding/subtracting by marking jumps on a number line.  To achieve the shape and space ELG they do not need to be telling the time to o clock or using a ruler  to measure in centimetres.  Any children doing things like this may well be exceeding...

9. There is no expectation for children in reception to have maths and literacy books.  Evidence towards ELGs must come predominantly from child led activity! 

10. Finally remember...these are YOUR children,so you know them better than whoever visits to ask you about them....(except their families obviously 😜) You will be expected to talk about their Characteristics of Effective Learning- so use this dialogue to demonstrate how well you don't just know WHAT your children know, but HOW they know it too!

Please feel free to add myths or questions below in the comment...lets do some myth busting and empower ourselves!

Hope these documents might be of use to you all.

Download the EYFSP handbook 2017 here
Download the ELG exemplification materials here
Download the EYFSP 2017 Assessment and Reporting Arrangements here...
A useful document by Oxford LA exploring exceeding and expected