Local partnership develops early learning toolkit

• Early Learning Communities Toolkit created by Dartington Service Design Lab launched in August 2019
• Co-designed with communities in Feltham, Margate, Newport and Sheffield, where Save the Children works

ACTION

In mid 2018, workers from early years charity Dartington Service Design Lab embarked on an intensive development run to create a new toolkit for change on behalf of Save the Children.

The children’s charity wanted to develop an approach local communities could work through together, in order to improve early learning outcomes for children growing up in poverty.

Following many local workshops, meetings and iterations of the toolkit, the result – the organisations hope – is an accessible step-by-step guide that will help communities, schools, local authorities, local organisations, children and families evaluate and use the best evidence alongside local experience to develop and refine their interventions.

• Read more from CYP Now's Evidence and Impact Special Report

Tim Hobbs, Dartington’s chief executive, says in a blog on the subject that three balancing considerations were used when putting it together.

First, that an evidence-led view benefits from systematic analysis but risks not being relatable to families in a local context.

Second, that a professionally led view makes the most of the experience of local practitioners, but interventions can be alienating and cause disengagement.

Third, that taking very local community-led view may miss out on learning happening elsewhere.

While frameworks are nothing new, the toolkit’s designers have worked hard to balance the research and systematic analysis with adaptability and relatability.

“Some toolkits are not very structured or they are too prescriptive,” says Maria Portugal, design and communications specialist at Dartington, adding: “There are all sorts of things that science says you should do, but if you actually try it in the community it doesn’t really work.

“So we have to combine the science-based research but also what the community tells us that we should do.

“What we learn from working with communities is that it’s very hard to do it in a way where you are controlling the narrative, because you never do.”

Users work through each of the six sections in turn, with time periods suggested, starting with “what matters and what works”, moving through “local system and partnership”, “determining local priorities”, “building capacity and infrastructure”, “crafting a strategy”, and “implementing, testing and learning”.

Each section draws on evidence and encourages engagement with it in a different way, set out via an “evidence matrix” of the relevant factors.

“It helps people navigate to the science of good work and good help in the community,” says Portugal.

For example, there is evidence on what works for engaging parents in their children’s learning process. A partnership, made up of local organisations and families, may decide to implement a service via schools or a different context, depending on local factors and the way in which they engage with the evidence.

IMPACT

It is too soon for local early learning communities to be measuring impact of practice, with strategies still being developed. However, Hobbs believes that “some of the conditions for success are being met already”.

With the support of Save the Children, local areas are organising to create the conditions to “practically drive spending, delivery and monitoring decisions”, says Hobbs.

Following the steps, the Margate Early Learning Community has prioritised improving access to play for young children.

At first, priorities seemed to be somewhat at odds between the evidence, professional views and that of families.

“How do these competing perspectives come together?”, asks Hobbs.

“The research is super-strong on the value and importance of play,” adds Hobbs, explaining how it stimulates children as well as being connected to attachment and parental engagement in learning. Play also resonated with parents and communities. This is something they could work with others to address.

Professionals also saw opportunities to tackle barriers that limit parents’ ability to interact with their children – including stress and financial hardship.

“Redesigning some of the services around them and these needs could reduce some pressure, so parents could just ‘be’ and play with their kids,” adds Hobbs.