Ms. Abigail Barnett

A Short Bio / زانیاری کەسیی / سيرة ذاتية قصيرة :

Abigail is Director of Cambridge 3-19 Curriculum and has overall responsibility for the intended learning embedded in the Cambridge Pathway, ensuring that learners are prepared for the future. She has recently led on the development of Cambridge’s Early Years programme, which offers a holistic curriculum, resources, professional development and assessment for 3-6 year-olds. Her role also encompasses education system analysis and curriculum review for Ministries of Education and she has carried out this work in diverse contexts including India, Ethiopia, Kuwait, Bermuda and Thailand. She started her career as a secondary teacher of English language and literature, moving on to strategic school improvement working for a local education authority before joining Cambridge in 2010.

Category / پۆلێن / الفئة :

Early Years Education

Seminar Title / ناونیشانی بابەت / عنوان الندوة :

From intention to implementation of play-based learning in Cambridge Early Years settings: early lessons from monitoring and evaluation

Abstract / پوختە / الملخص :

The Cambridge Early Years programme is underpinned by synthesised research and evidence on high quality Early Years education. This synthesis is articulated at a high level as the Cambridge Early Years Key Principles, covering position statements on areas including curriculum, pedagogy, assessment. In terms of pedagogy, the programme promotes learners being actively engaged and involved, experiencing balanced provision according to developmental areas, experiencing child-initiated and adult-guided play and developing awareness and control of their own thinking and emotions. During the first full year of global implementation of Cambridge Early Years, we carried out a detailed monitoring and evaluation process to assess how successfully we were supporting newly-registered centres to implement the programme. This workshop will explore some of the findings in relation to play-based teaching and learning, reflecting on conditions which facilitate best practice and exploring how centres can work flexibly with the programme to adapt it to their unique context and their learners’ needs.

Keywords / وشە سەرەکیەکان / الكلمات المفتاحية :

Play-based pedagogy, child-centred, implementation, active learning, holistic