Son not meeting EYFS Learning Goals

[Pinewood123]

Help my son was 5 in February and a late speaker. He has settled well into school but he has not progressed like the other children and I have been told he will not meet the eyfs goals for reading, maths or writing. He can’t count beyond 29 without mixing up the numbers he can recognise upto 100. He is only just starting to independently write and he is reading well stage 2 books and with help stage 3. Should I be worried or do all kids develop at different rates and he will shine one day? His short term memory is abysmal please please give me some reassurance or pointers as it is so worrying and no one seems to talk about it.

All kids do develop at different rates and I think all this assessment at such a young age is crazy. Having said that, it sounds like your child is having a number of difficulties. I'd personal be most concerned about poor memory.
I haven't got direct experience of this, but a close friend had her child assessed at age 9, because he didn't manage to catch up. He has a mild learnings disability. He's doing well in state school, but is getting some extra help.
In your shoes, I would try not to worry about some rather random set of goals set by the government, but take a holistic view. How can you help your child work on his memory? How can you make learning fun and relevant? Speak to the school. Is extra help available? Would they recommend he gets assessed?
On a more optimistic note, my son was 'failing' in reading and writing right up until year 2. It then 'clicked'. In his year 6 days he got top grade for reading and a very high grade for writing.

Bizarre he sounds totally average (in a good way!) to me. I’m not a teacher though, just had experience of three different reception classes at three different schools as a parent.

If he is in reception and reading ORT level 2 and 3 he is doing well, writing comes later. Can he form letters? Does he know the sounds letters make? Can he blend sounds together to make words, like cat would be c a t.
Speech development is also linked to writing so if that is delayed writing will be too. But don't worry, he will get there. Have you spoken to his teacher?

My DS is in reception so can relate to where you are at the moment. At this stage of the year, our reception teacher is working hard to make sure kids are building up to meeting expectations by year end. Yours should be too. We're on school holidays still, and extra resources have been given to children who need help with a particular area eg sounds/numbers etc.

From what you've said, book band 3 (yellow) is the required expected level for reception year end. Sounds like he may meet this criteria or be very close.

Re: numbers, the expectation for EYFS is to count to 20, add 1, take away 1 etc. You could purchase a Numicon set to help him with this at home. My teacher provided me with a sheet of activities to do with him at home. Happy to share if you DM me.

I'd speak to the teacher and ask what s/he is specifically doing to help your child meet the expected standard, and also what you could be doing at home, if you want to that is.

In our case, my sons writing is pretty poor, made worse by him being left handed. We sometimes doing additional handwriting sheets at home (bought a book off Amazon), but I'm being relaxed about it at this stage.

I would arrange a meeting with the school to ask how you can support him at home (probably just games that will improve fine motor skills, doing lots of reading to him etc definitely don't want to put pressure on him).

From your description of him though he definitely doesn't seem alarmingly behind at all. The problem with assessments at this early age is while they could reflect a learning problem most of the time it's just normal variation in child development (just like how some kids are walking at 9 months and some still aren't at 14 months. It's not usually indicative of a problem and by 2 years you couldn't tell the two apart). In other countries kids won't start formal learning until 6 or 7 by which point a lot of the differences have evened out.

Based on my understanding he seems pretty much on track? Eg, for EYFS learning goals they are only expected to work up to number 20 (up to 100 is KS1).

You can find info on the goals here:
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/596629/EYFS_STATUTORY_FRAMEWORK_2017.pdf

The number ELG is more about being able to work with numbers to 20 - add, subtract etc - than simply recognising numbers.

Around 50% of my class will not be achieving the ELG in reading, writing or maths. As long as he is achieving them in the prime areas (communication, language & literacy, physical development and SMSC, then he has the potential to catch up. If he's not going to achieve ELG in any areas, I would expect the teacher to be talking to you about any special needs he may have.

My son was also a late speaker. His first word came at 2 years, 2 months.
He didn’t hit the targets for EYs for any of the categories but seemed happy and was making steady if unspectacular progress.

Honestly, don’t worry unless you see something specific that seems off. Ds, now 10 can’t keep his nose out of a paperback, and was getting high 80s and 90s% for his test SATS papers last month.
He still asks me what’s for supper three times in five minutes and has forgotten by the end of the next sentence.

The ELG are designed by politicians so that not all kids can pass. It would be a pointless measure if all kids could get the pass mark iyswim.

My boys did not match the equivalent when they were in Reception (they are teens now so they were in a different assessment framework) Quite frankly they were not ready for formal learning in Reception. Ds1 became very keen to learn in y2 where he went from bottom to top groups. He's off to university this autumn depending on his A-level grades. Ds2 is a late August born and took a little longer but went from not meeting Reception goals to slightly below average in y2 SATS to easily meeting y6 goals. He had extra support from y3-6 because the school is a SATS hothouse and some of it was excellent.

I would keep an eye on things and ask about his progress at his next parents evening. In my experience progress isn't linear and he's not doomed to be below average forever. I would keep on reading and writing in the summer holidays. (Not school reading scheme stuff) Get him to do some real life writing like shopping lists, writing on calendars etc My neighbour has a whiteboard in her kitchen and gets her dd to write what meals are going to be. Remember that spellings are not important yet- "strobees" is a reasonable attempt at strawberries etc

The ELG are designed by politicians so that not all kids can pass. It would be a pointless measure if all kids could get the pass mark iyswim.

What?

???? Complete rubbish. What a ridiculous comment.

I teach Reception. For reading, children need to be able to talk about and answer questions about what they have read- so it's not just the actual reading of words. He should also be able to add, subtract, double and halve with numbers- not just recognise them. If you feel he is able to do all of those things, ask his teacher for more specific ways you can support him.

I think unless you or the school have concerns that there is something more going on, then I would just gently encourage and try not to worry.

DD is summer born and took no interest in either numbers or letters/words in Reception. She only knew a few phonics in Y1 and failed the phonics screening test. She only just passed it in Y2. Reading was a real battle ground but DD wasn't interested. We tried Alphablocks, Reading Eggs etc but it wasn't until Y4 when we were able to reason with DD and ultimately reward/bribe her effectively.

Throughout Y4, we listened to her read every evening and she improved dramatically. It involved some tears (mine and DD's). It helped that we found a series of books she really loved and we bought every single one of them!! By Y4, DD was falling behind with her work as she couldn't read the instructions well enough, she is smart but was limited. In one school year, she leaped with her reading and is now finishing Y5 reading slightly above her age (was significantly below a year and a half ago). She's unlikely to read for pleasure any time soon, but she can read well enough for it not to hold her back educationally.

However, I didn't have any concerns about her understanding, she just wasn't ready and didn't want to do it.