The opportunity is to provide government support for Early intervention programmes, such as that run by Transforming Lives for Good (TLG) which has been shown to positively influence young children’s lives in the early school years: https://www.tlg.org.uk/. This support will raise education outcomes of the poorest children, reduce school exclusions, benefit the family and wider community and support the Government’s ‘levelling-up’ agenda.
These programmes typically enable trained volunteers to become coaches and work on a one-to-one basis with children, with the overall aim of reducing the child’s felt anxieties and increasing their confidence and aspirations. Volunteers are trained and equipped with proven resources to help children explore their choices and the consequences of the decisions that they make. The specialist training equips each coach to become a trusted support to the child, their teacher and their family. Through regular conversations with home, the coach will be able to offer support and discuss strategies used to help the pupil in the sessions which may be helpful at home too. In many cases feedback is given on a weekly basis. Each week, the volunteer goes into school to listen to and talk with the child to help them to make sense of their experiences in school and at home. Through Early Intervention programmes, schools and families are seeing children and young people become more confident, enthusiastic and excited about school and the future.
Through giving one hour a week of my time to a child in one-to-one coaching, I have seen what a positive impact this can have both on the child’s behaviour and opportunities in school as well as in the wider family and community environments. In terms of doing things differently to address issues of social inequality leading to reduced educational opportunities, I see a great need for further investment in early intervention programmes, such as that supported by TLG, which have been shown to positively influence young children’s lives in the early school years.
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