Introduction

At Carterhatch, we have found a way to ensure that every one of the 90 children in Year One has access to an education that is uniquely suited to them as individual learners, where they are also becoming co-operative and responsible members of the school society. They are equipped with the literacy and maths skills that they need in order to ‘play’ and learn about the things that interest them. Through this they have thrived – their achievements have been remarkable, while they have remained the enthusiastic, independent, happy and unique individuals that they were when they came into Year One. Children aged five or six want to learn. Moreover, they want to be active, autonomous and unique learners – exploring, discovering, creating and taking risks. In other words they want to play. They each have different life histories, leading to unique personalities, interests, needs and skills. But they all want to play in order to satisfy their desire to learn. However, in many schools Year One feels like secondary school, with formal, subject-specific lessons and an approach that implies ‘one size fits all’. For many children the size is wrong, the children are bored and stressed and their desire to learn has been extinguished. The curriculum in many such schools has been narrowed down to virtually nothing but literacy and maths – as if these subjects are an end in themselves, rather than tools that can lead to exciting learning in infinite areas. This is a tragedy for the five and six year old children in England.