Readers are supported by copious discussion activities, questions to consider and practical tasks to carry
out...it is enormously helpful.

This course book has been written to support trainee and new teachers working with young children (aged from 3 to 5 years). Its focus is on the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage and the new Professional Standards for the award of Qualified Teacher Status, helping trainee and new teachers to recognise the importance of early years education and to develop their role in encouraging children to build their skills, knowledge, understanding and attitudes. Each chapter includes: practical tasks to highlight important concepts; links to relevant research; suggestions for further reading to extend trainees' understanding of key issues.

This course book has been written to support trainee and new teachers working with young children (aged from 3 to 5 years). Its focus is on the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage and the new Professional Standards for the award of Qualified Teacher Status, helping trainee and new teachers to recognise the importance of early years education and to develop their role in encouraging children to build their skills, knowledge, understanding and attitudes. Each chapter includes: practical tasks to highlight important concepts; links to relevant research; suggestions for further reading to extend trainees' understanding of key issues.

This book forms part of a series called 'Achieving QTS', which is aimed exclusively at trainee teachers. The series has been developed as course material and written according to the framework of the Professional Standards for Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). It includes over 20 titles, encompassing 'Audit and Test', 'Knowledge and Understanding', 'Teaching Theory and Practice' and 'Skills Tests' titles. As well as covering the core primary subject areas, the series addresses issues of teaching and learning across both primary and secondary phases.

Key features:

* Clearly linked to the Professional Standards for QTS.

* Specifically written for trainee primary and secondary teachers.

* Combines underpinning theory with practical classroom examples.

* Includes research summaries, short tasks and further reading.

In writing this book we have been aware of the very special challenge for those of who are planning to work with young children and by this we mean children ages from 3 to 5 years. The Early Years are an area of great interest and concern. The foundations that are laid at the beginning of children?s early education stay with them for the rest of their lives. One of the major characteristics of the early years is the variety of locations where children can be engaged in learning. There are the informal situations, with parents, carers and childminders and there are the more formal venues, playgroups, day nurseries, nursery schools and units and reception classes. The focus for this book is on the formal locations and in particular, children in reception classes. Here is the interface between the Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 and in some ways this can result in competing demands on staff time and children?s experiences. A particular example of this is the importance of play in the different settings. We believe that play is central to the Foundation stage, underpinning the activities and experiences contained within it. We would argue that play should continue to have a part in the lives of older children too but as children grow older there are further pressures placed on them and in order to meet these demands play can sometimes be squeezed out of the children?s school experiences. However in the reception class we maintain that play must continue to have a pivotal role.

The Foundation Stage was introduced to meet the needs of 3 to 5 year old children in a range of settings. It is discussed in detail in Chapter 1 and should not be confused with Foundation subjects, which are the National Curriculum subjects, geography, history, art, PE, and RE. Its introduction was very significant in the education of young children since for the first time a distinct stage was identified with a specific philosophy, expectations and underlying principles. These principles are at the heart of this book and in the chapters that follow these are developed in a range of areas. One of the central principles, and one which this book is built around and upon, is that the Foundation Stage is concerned with more than the just the content of what children learn, but also includes the process of learning and with this the four key elements of learning: concepts, knowledge and understanding, skills and attitudes.

The Foundation Curriculum is organised into six distinct areas of learning which are:
* Personal, social and emotional development;
* Communication, language and literacy;
* Mathematical development;
* Knowledge and understanding of the world;
* Physical development;
* Creative development.
By the end of the Foundation Stage most children will be expected to have reached a number of goals in each of these areas of learning, some will have exceed these goals, others will be working towards them. These are the Early Learning Goals. Because children develop at different rates and in different ways, a number of developmental Stepping Stones have been identified which relates to the relevant knowledge, understanding, skills and attitudes needed to achieve each Early Learning Goal. This information is all contained in the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage (DfEE/QCA, 2000) and described and explained in detail in the book.

The book is structured to take the reader through the central features of the Foundation Stage. In order to do this there are a number of tasks in each chapter that will encourage the placing of theory, into the experience of practice. This is further aided by the inclusion of classroom stories and case studies. We have also provided details of further reading, which we hope will encourage the reader to learn more about this important and fascinating stage of children?s learning.

Iris Keating is a member of the Early Years team at Manchester Metropolitan University, working in Continuing Professional Development and on the Best Practice Research Scholarship scheme for the Department for Education and Skills. Before joining MMU, Iris was a nursery teacher for 12 years.