Nursery World - True joined-up thinking

By Professor Peter Moss of the Thomas Coram Research Unit at the University of London's Institute of Education There is a case for saying we want to seek a new relationship between early childhood and compulsory schooling based on equality, on recognition that early childhood is an important life stage in its own right, and on a mutual exchange of ideas and practices.

There is a case for saying we want to seek a new relationship between early childhood and compulsory schooling based on equality, on recognition that early childhood is an important life stage in its own right, and on a mutual exchange of ideas and practices.

Like many others, I have advocated redefining the boundaries by moving compulsory schooling to the age of six. One reason is that it would contribute to this new relationship by supporting a strong and self-confident early childhood sector with its own identity, purposes and practices, rather than a truncated and weakened system which increasingly serves an all-powerful compulsory schooling.

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