Four-year-old Leo* is the type of child many Reception teachers worry about missing. Quiet, shy and reluctant to engage, he keeps himself to himself, avoiding adults and most other children wherever possible. He started Reception at Byerley Park Primary School in Durham with knowledge and skills below those typically expected for his age.

‘He’s the type of child who could easily have fallen through the cracks,’ explains his Reception teacher, Connor Teesdale, who is also the school’s early years lead. ‘He may even have gone on to display more challenging behaviour later in the year.’

Like many schools, Byerley Park has children who could easily be overlooked – those sometimes described as the ‘invisible’ or the ‘middle line’ children. But since taking part in the Moving the Box programme, staff say they have begun to look at these children through a different lens, becoming more confident in deciding where adult time, attention and interactions have the greatest impact.

The school is one of 41 primary schools across Durham – and 160 settings across six local authorities in England – that have been involved in Moving the Box since its launch in March 2025.

Rather than introducing another intervention, Moving the Box encourages practitioners to refocus on what matters most: understanding children’s barriers to learning, strengthening everyday interactions and relationships and using professional judgement to respond to individual needs. For Leo, this has translated into a whole school approach centred on relationships and consistent positive interactions.

Teachers shared his interests with colleagues across the wider school and agreed that every adult would make a point of acknowledging him positively throughout the day, whether through conversation, a smile, a nod or a few encouraging words. These small steps helped Leo feel that he belonged and that he mattered.

‘Gradually, over the course of the year, his confidence grew and he became increasingly willing to engage with adults and learning. His academic strengths, that had previously gone unnoticed, began to emerge and by the end of Reception, he had achieved a Good Level of Development (GLD),’ Teesdale says.

EQUALITY VS EQUITY

Leo’s experience is not unique. He is one of a growing number of Reception children benefiting from Moving the Box, an evidence-informed programme that supports practitioners working with children at risk of not achieving a GLD.

Led by early education expert Jan Dubiel and delivered by hey! (Hempsall’s early years), the initiative responds directly to findings in Ofsted’s Strong foundations report, which identifies a ‘vulnerable minority’ of children who are more likely to fall behind because opportunities to learn are not equitable. The report notes that children with the greatest barriers to learning often need the highest levels of teaching, practice and adult interaction, yet are the least likely to receive them, widening the gap with their peers.

Moving the Box aims to reverse that pattern by helping early years teachers and practitioners identify barriers to learning early, understand what lies behind them and respond through high-quality interactions, strong relationships and responsive pedagogy.

Underlying the approach is the principle of equity rather than equality. Rather than giving every child the same level of adult time, practitioners are encouraged to use their professional judgement to direct support where it will have the most impact.

‘At its heart, it’s about understanding the EYFS principles of the unique child and drilling down into the barriers and obstacles that effective teaching can help reduce,’ says Dubiel. Using the iceberg analogy, he argues that the visible outcomes educators often measure are supported by less visible foundations such as language, relationships, belonging and emotional wellbeing. Identifying and strengthening these underlying factors is central to the Moving the Box approach.

THE MODEL

The programme combines professional development, peer reflection and ongoing support across the academic year. Reception practitioners attend two training days and a celebration event, with the first session focusing on the principles underpinning children’s success and the second applying this thinking to identify children with barriers to learning.

School leaders receive separate briefings, while practitioners are encouraged to discuss challenges openly in what Anne Brass, specialist advisor for early years and school intervention at Durham County Council, describes as a ‘safe space’.

Schools are supported through local authority networks, half-termly data reviews and a growing library of webinars exploring topics such as self-regulation, belonging, motor development and attendance, creating a bank of resources that practitioners can revisit as needs emerge.

Brass says one of the programme’s key strengths is giving Reception teachers permission to trust their professional judgement at a time when many feel under increasing pressure to follow prescribed approaches. ‘It gives them the autonomy to make decisions based on the needs of the children in front of them,’ she says.

KEY BARRIERS

At St. Margaret’s C of E Primary School in Durham, the main barriers identified in Reception relate to self-regulation, communication and language. It supports many children with English as an additional language due to its proximity to the university and internationally diverse community.

Assistant head teacher and Reception teacher Carley McNicolas says Moving the Box gave staff confidence to direct adult time more intentionally. ‘It gave us the confidence to know it’s OK to spend more time with the children who need it,’ she says. ‘It’s OK to focus more on those who need you most.’

One child was identified through the Nuffield Early Language Intervention (NELI) screening as requiring significant language support. With his parents also speaking very little English, staff focused on increasing high-quality interactions while working closely with the family to support his communication.

Alongside this targeted support, staff also made small but deliberate changes to whole-school practice. At snack time, children wait until everyone has been served before eating, supporting turn taking, patience and self-regulation. Children who interrupt adults are encouraged to hold an adult’s hand briefly while they wait, gradually building up the time until they can manage independently.

Staff also introduced a board games area to strengthen listening, attention and social skills, with children first learning games alongside an adult before becoming ‘experts’ who teach the rules to their peers.

‘We choose one or two children to become the experts,’ says McNicolas. ‘They explain the rules to everyone else, and we swap the experts until everyone has had a turn.’

The programme has also encouraged staff to step back and consider the wider factors affecting children’s learning. ‘It took us back to the basics,’ she says. ‘Sometimes it might just be that a child is hungry or tired.’

Across Durham, schools adapted their practice according to the needs of their cohort. One school chose to delay the start of its systematic phonics programme until after the October half-term after identifying that most children lacked the attention, focus and phonological awareness needed. The first half-term instead focused on strengthening these foundations, with the school reporting sustained improvements in early reading outcomes. Others redesigned their learning environments, spent the first weeks of Reception almost entirely in play, or focused on improving adult-child interactions.

At St. Margaret’s, the approach also proved valuable during a recent Ofsted inspection. McNicolas says the project gave leaders a ‘shared language’ to explain not only what they were doing for children with additional needs, but why. ‘It gave us a holistic, shared vision and the confidence to talk about what we do for children and why we do it,’ she says.

LASTING IMPACT

Brass believes the programme’s simplicity is one of its greatest strengths, allowing its principles to become embedded in everyday practice. While the project is ongoing, early data from Durham is encouraging. Across 39 participating schools, 388 children were identified as being unlikely to achieve a GLD by the end of Reception because of barriers to learning. By the end of the project, 51 per cent of these children had achieved a GLD, while a further 35 per cent had made accelerated progress but narrowly missed the benchmark.

Brass believes the results reflect the programme’s central philosophy: that when practitioners are given the confidence, permission and time to identify children’s individual needs and respond through high-quality interactions and responsive pedagogy, stronger outcomes – including a higher Good Level of Development –naturally follow.

Staff now focus on those who need them the most.

Credit: Nursery World

For more information contact hey@coramhempsalls.org.uk