2023 Early Years Foundation Stage Profile (EYFSP) data, which measures social and emotional, physical and cognitive development at the end of the first year of school, found that on average 67.2% of children nationally reached a good level of development (GLD). Outcomes were worse for children from more disadvantaged backgrounds, with only 51.6% of children eligible for free school meals reaching a good level of development. Thrive at Five is working in some of the countries most disadvantaged areas where children are not thriving.
In each place we work, our collaborative ‘Discovery’ maps the gaps in support for babies, children and families and identifies the assets in the community. This involves carrying out desk research, collecting and analysing quantitative data; attending workshops and meetings to gather intelligence and qualitative insights that help us interpret the data, and spending time in the community.
Discovery is an essential first stage of Thrive at Five’s work and allows us to gain an understanding of the needs, concerns, and aspirations of local families. This insight informs the work we support in local communities.
In Redcar & Cleveland, we commissioned a local community researcher to help us hear the voice of parents and carers.
We purposefully chose a researcher who is also a local Mum, and who was well placed to connect with other parents through common experiences. This shared history helped build trust with parents and gave them the confidence to participate and share their views.
“So, you know you're in the middle of it, aren't you? And people, people kind of, you know, they know you get it.”
Our researcher connected with families in a range of ways including visiting community centres, attending church groups, speaking with women in a local refuge and interviewing over 30 individual parents and carers.
What did we hear?
The research revealed a profound sense of the difficult social and environmental challenges that parents and carers face in trying to support their families.
What did we hear?
The research revealed a profound sense of the difficult social and environmental challenges that parents and carers face in trying to support their families.
Lack of child-friendly spaces
Parents and carers are struggling to bring up children in their earliest years in environments that are not child-friendly; in neighbourhoods that have become increasingly rundown over time. Several people talked about the absence of safe and nice places to go with their children. They pointed out that the parks have all been vandalised and talked about the negative impact of increased alcohol and drug use in the community.
“Yeah things have changed, centres and things have closed and the parks are all rundown”.
Prohibitive cost of children’s activities
Another recurring theme was how expensive it is to do things with children. People talked about the unaffordable costs of soft play and swimming and explained that when the weather is poor it is hard to think of how to occupy the children. There was a recurring theme about the need for more, free activities for children and a desire for there to be more options for things to do with children that are free.
Poor public transport
We also heard frequently about the poor public transport in the area, with parents commenting on how unreliable the bus service is, meaning they can’t count on it to get where they need to go.
Lack of accessible information for parents and carers
In general parents and carers feel there is inadequate information about support and services. Some commented on the way that information – particularly leaflets – are only available once you’ve found a place to go with your child. This means that only those who know where to go have the benefit of information. Parents felt that more could be made available on social media.
"I feel like there could be more information available. And I know there is funding coming for nursery but no one has actually told me about this and it is hard to do by myself without having done it before."
Fear of being judged
Many parents and carers talked of their reluctance to engage with services due to a fear of being judged. This means that the very people who might most benefit from support are too frightened to access it.
“A lot of worry about asking for help I think, people worry that it means they can’t cope and there is a stigma around social services. “
Value placed on social connection in the community
Parents and carers fed back that they would value connecting and building networks of mutual support with the local community through parent groups, events, and social activities.
Using the research
Over the past few months, the findings from Discovery have been shared with partners across Redcar & Cleveland. The aim of feeding back the research findings is informing a next stage of conversations about how to plug gaps in support for children and families, building on the assets and strengths of the community.
Partners from across Redcar & Cleveland have valued Thrive at Five’s deep dive Discovery, the insight it has provided and the opportunity to reflect on what it means for the future. One practitioner commented that:
"The fact that is being discussed will hopefully bring services closer together” .
While the findings from D iscovery reveal the scale of the challenges that need to be to be addressed there was a sense that, with Thrive at Five’s support, there is a positive opportunity to capitalise upon. The same practitioner spoke of:
“Optimism - that we can work together as a system, not be precious about our different services & priorities, but working with our families we can improve our children's outcomes, by doing things differently, with the resources which we have”.
We are now building the Thrive at Five team in Redcar to provide the much-needed capacity to help some of these services work together to strengthen early years support. In the coming months, we will be using what we have learned from our community research and the rest of the Discover stage, to design the best approaches to help more children thrive in the early years.