The EYFS is a year old, but many of us are still coming to grips with it. So this is a good time for a readable and accessible guide to the EYFS to appear.
Unfortunately, while the timing may be good, this handbook disappoints in many respects. In attempting to cover every aspect of the EYFS in less than 300 pages, it is can be a little too brief. For example, I would caution any practitioner against relying on the section on safeguarding. While this covers the main legal issues, there is little description of multi-agency work, family support, or approaches to promote children's welfare outside of making referrals to social services.
The sections on the six areas of learning mostly repeat what is already available in the EYFS pack, although I was surprised to see that the emphasis on nursery children having a 20 minute discrete synthetic phonics session. There are numerous references to play, but overall little insight is given into how play might promote children's development and learning, or what the role of the practitioner is. For example, much of the chapter on Play and Exploration covers how to teach children the skills of using a hammer, risk assessment and other health and safety issues.
There are some interesting and useful references to ICT, and the book takes a forthright and practical approach to equalities issues, which is to be welcomed. But overall, the handbook tends to reflect rather than develop established practice in primary school nursery and reception classes. I think most practitioners would probably benefit more from reading the EYFS and its guidance in the original form, rather than turning to this book.
