Early Learning Goals

Michael Everett
Jul 5, 2022
11 min read

Updated: Oct 31, 2024

In Early Years, our aim is for each student to meet the Early Learning Goals by the end of Reception. In order to meet these important milestones, children in Pre Kindy and Kindy first work towards a set of objectives tailored to their individual needs.

Pre Kindy

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Communication and Language

At the end of Pre Kindy:

Listen and respond to a simple instruction.
Copy your gestures and words.
Use intonation, pitch and changing volume when ‘talking’.
Listen to other people’s talk with interest, but can easily be distracted by other things.
Generally focus on an activity of their own choice and find it difficult to be directed by an adult.
Make themselves understood, and can become frustrated when they cannot.
Start to say how they are feeling, using words as well as actions.
Start to develop conversation, often jumping from topic to topic.
Develop pretend play: ‘putting the baby to sleep’ or ‘driving the car to the shops’.
Understand frequently used words such as ‘all gone’, ‘no’ and ‘bye-bye’.
Understand simple questions about ‘who’, ‘what’ and ‘where’ (but generally not ‘why’).
Understand and act on longer sentences like ‘make teddy jump’ or ‘find your coat’.
Identify familiar objects and properties for practitioners when they are described. For example: ‘Katie’s coat’, ‘blue car’, ‘shiny apple’.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

At the end of Pre Kindy:

Find ways to calm themselves, through being calmed and comforted by their key person.
Establish their sense of self.
Express preferences and decisions. They also try new things and start establishing their autonomy.
Engage with others through gestures, gaze and talk.
Use that engagement to achieve a goal. For example, gesture towards their cup to say they want a drink.
Find ways of managing transitions, for example from their parent to their key person.
Thrive as they develop self-assurance.
Look for clues about how to respond to something interesting.
Play with increasing confidence on their own and with other children, because they know their key person is nearby and available.
Feel confident when taken out around the local neighbourhood, and enjoy exploring new places with their key person.
Feel strong enough to express a range of emotions.
Grow in independence, rejecting help (“me do it”). Sometimes this leads to feelings of frustration and tantrums.
Begin to show ‘effortful control’. For example, waiting for a turn and resisting the strong impulse to grab what they want or push their way to the front.
Be increasingly able to talk about and manage their emotions.
Notice and ask questions about differences, such as skin colour, types of hair, gender, special needs and disabilities, and so on.
Develop friendships with other children.
Safely explore emotions beyond their normal range through play and stories.
Talk about their feelings in more elaborated ways: “I’m sad because...” or “I love it when ...”.
Learn to use the toilet with help, and then independently.

Physical Development

At the end of Pre Kindy:

Enjoy moving when outdoors and inside.
Gradually gain control of their whole body through continual practice of large movements, such as waving, kicking, rolling, crawling and walking.
Clap and stamp to music.
Fit themselves into spaces, like tunnels, dens and large boxes, and move around in them.
Enjoy starting to kick, throw and catch balls.
Build independently with a range of appropriate resources.
Begin to walk independently – choosing appropriate props to support at first.
Walk, run, jump and climb – and start to use the stairs independently.
Spin, roll and independently use ropes and swings (for example, tyre swings).
Sit on a push-along wheeled toy, use a scooter or ride a tricycle.
Use large and small motor skills to do things independently, for example manage buttons and zips, and pour drinks.
Show an increasing desire to be independent, such as wanting to feed themselves and dress or undress.
Start eating independently and learning how to use a knife and fork.
Develop manipulation and control.
Explore different materials and tools.

Kindy

Prime Areas

Communication and Language

At the end of Kindy:

Enjoy listening to longer stories and can remember much of what happens.
Pay attention to more than one thing at a time, which can be difficult.
Use a wider range of vocabulary.
Understand a question or instruction that has two parts, such as “Get your coat and wait at the door”.
Understand ‘why’ questions, like: “Why do you think the caterpillar got so fat?”
Sing a large repertoire of songs.
Know many rhymes, be able to talk about familiar books, and be able to tell a long story.
Develop their communication, but may continue to have problems with irregular tenses and plurals, such as ‘runned’ for ‘ran’, ‘swimmed’ for ‘swam’.
Develop their pronunciation but may have problems saying:
- some sounds: r, j, th, ch, and sh
- multisyllabic words such as ‘pterodactyl’, ‘planetarium’ or ‘hippopotamus’
Use longer sentences of four to six words.
Be able to express a point of view and to debate when they disagree with an adult or a friend, using words as well as actions.
Start a conversation with an adult or a friend and continue it for many turns.
Use talk to organise themselves and their play: “Let’s go on a bus... you sit there... I’ll be the driver.”

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

At the end of Kindy:

Select and use activities and resources, with help when needed. This helps them to achieve a goal they have chosen, or one which is suggested to them.
Develop their sense of responsibility and membership of a community.
Become more outgoing with unfamiliar people, in the safe context of their setting.
Show more confidence in new social situations.
Play with one or more other children, extending and elaborating play ideas.
Find solutions to conflicts and rivalries. For example, accepting that not everyone can be Spider-Man in the game, and suggesting other ideas.
Increasingly follow rules, understanding why they are important.
Remember rules without needing an adult to remind them.
Develop appropriate ways of being assertive.
Talk with others to solve conflicts.
Talk about their feelings using words like ‘happy’, ‘sad’, ‘angry’ or ‘worried’.
Understand gradually how others might be feeling.
Be increasingly independent in meeting their own care needs, e.g. brushing teeth, using the toilet, washing and drying their hands thoroughly.
Make healthy choices about food, drink, activity and toothbrushing.

Physical Development

At the end of Kindy:

Continue to develop their movement, balancing, riding (scooters, trikes and bikes) and ball skills.
Go up steps and stairs, or climb up apparatus, using alternate feet.
Skip, hop, stand on one leg and hold a pose for a game like musical statues.
Use large-muscle movements to wave flags and streamers, paint and make marks.
Start taking part in some group activities which they make up for themselves, or in teams.
Increasingly be able to use and remember sequences and patterns of movements which are related to music and rhythm.
Match their developing physical skills to tasks and activities in the setting. For example, they decide whether to crawl, walk or run across a plank, depending on its length and width.
Choose the right resources to carry out their own plan. For example, choosing a spade to enlarge a small hole they dug with a trowel.
Collaborate with others to manage large items, such as moving a long plank safely, carrying large hollow blocks.
Use one-handed tools and equipment, for example, making snips in paper with scissors.
Use a comfortable grip with good control when holding pens and pencils.
Show a preference for a dominant hand.
Be increasingly independent as they get dressed and undressed, for example, putting coats on and doing up zips.

Specific Areas

Literacy

At the end of Kindy:

Understand the five key concepts about print:
- print has meaning
- print can have different purposes
- we read English text from left to right and from top to bottom
- the names of the different parts of a book
- page sequencing
Develop their phonological awareness, so that they can:
- spot and suggest rhymes
- count or clap syllables in a word
- recognise words with the same initial sound, such as money and mother
Engage in extended conversations about stories, learning new vocabulary.
Use some of their print and letter knowledge in their early writing. For example: writing a pretend shopping list that starts at the top of the page; writing ‘m’ for mummy.
Write some or all of their name.
Write some letters accurately.

Mathematics

At the end of Kindy:

Develop fast recognition of up to 3 objects, without having to count them individually (‘subitising’).
Recite numbers past 5.
Show ‘finger numbers’ up to 5.
Solve real world mathematical problems with numbers up to 5.
Compare quantities using language: ‘more than’, ‘fewer than’.
Talk about and explore 2D and 3D shapes (for example, circles, rectangles, triangles and cuboids) using informal and mathematical language: ‘sides’, ‘corners’; ‘straight’, ‘flat’, ‘round’.
Understand position through words alone – for example, “The bag is under the table,” – with no pointing.
Describe a familiar route.
Discuss routes and locations, using words like ‘in front of’ and ‘behind’.
Make comparisons between objects relating to size, length, weight and capacity.
Select shapes appropriately: flat surfaces for building, a triangular prism for a roof etc.
Combine shapes to make new ones – an arch, a bigger triangle etc.
Talk about and identifies the patterns around them. For example: stripes on clothes, designs on rugs and wallpaper. Use informal language like ‘pointy’, ‘spotty’, ‘blobs’ etc.
Extend and create ABAB patterns – stick, leaf, stick, leaf.
Notice and correct an error in a repeating pattern.
Begin to describe a sequence of events, real or fictional, using words such as ‘first’, ‘then...’

Understanding the World

At the end of Kindy:

Use all their senses in hands-on exploration of natural materials.
Explore collections of materials with similar and/or different properties.
Talk about what they see, using a wide vocabulary.
Begin to make sense of their own life-story and family’s history.
Show interest in different occupations.
Explore how things work.
Plant seeds and care for growing plants.
Understand the key features of the life cycle of a plant and an animal.
Begin to understand the need to respect and care for the natural environment and all living things.
Explore and talk about different forces they can feel.
Talk about the differences between materials and changes they notice.
Continue developing positive attitudes about the differences between people.
Know that there are different countries in the world and talk about the differences they have experienced or seen in photos.

Expressive Arts and Design

At the end of Kindy:

Take part in simple pretend play, using an object to represent something else even though they are not similar.
Begin to develop complex stories using small world equipment like animal sets, dolls and dolls houses etc
Make imaginative and complex ‘small worlds’ with blocks and construction kits, such as a city with different buildings and a park.
Explore different materials freely, to develop their ideas about how to use them and what to make.
Develop their own ideas and then decide which materials to use to express them.
Join different materials and explore different textures.
Create closed shapes with continuous lines, and begin to use these shapes to represent objects.
Draw with increasing complexity and detail, such as representing a face with a circle and including details.
Use drawing to represent ideas like movement or loud noises.
Show different emotions in their drawings and paintings, like happiness, sadness, fear etc.
Explore colour and colour-mixing.
Listen with increased attention to sounds.
Respond to what they have heard, expressing their thoughts and feelings.
Remember and sing entire songs.
Sing the pitch of a tone sung by another person (‘pitch match’)
Sing the melodic shape (moving melody, such as up and down, down and up) of familiar songs.
Create their own songs or improvise a song around one they know.
Play instruments with increasing control to express their feelings and ideas.