Long before children encounter formal subjects, they are busy making sense of the world around them. This article explores how children build knowledge in the early years and why understanding that matters to every teacher.
Using evidence and examples from practice, we consider what knowledge progression looks like in the early years and how building a shared understanding can strengthen curriculum thinking in your school.
This article is part of a series exploring the four overarching principles of the early years foundation stage: the unique child, positive relationships, enabling environments, and learning and development.
Knowledge builds through connection
Young children don’t learn isolated facts. They build knowledge by connecting new experiences to what they already know.
Every conversation, story, investigation and shared experience adds to their understanding of the world. Over time, children begin to connect these experiences. They notice patterns, use increasingly precise vocabulary, solve problems in new ways and apply what they have learned in unfamiliar contexts.
This is what knowledge progression looks like in the early years. As you observe children, you can see this in the connections they make, the vocabulary they use, the questions they ask and the confidence with which they apply previous learning in new situations.
Progression in the early years isn’t about moving rapidly through content. It’s about helping children develop increasingly secure understanding by revisiting important ideas in meaningful contexts. The early years foundation stage reflects this by recognising that learning across the seven areas is interconnected, with each area contributing to children's overall development (Department for Education, 2024).
Understanding progression in this way shifts the focus from how quickly children move through content to how securely they build knowledge over time.
A curriculum that builds knowledge
If knowledge grows by connecting new learning to what children already know, then the curriculum has an important role to play.
Daniel Willingham's work on the science of learning highlights that children understand new ideas by connecting them to what they already know. He argues that knowledge and thinking are inseparable. The richer a child's knowledge base, the better equipped they are to understand new concepts and solve problems (Willingham, 2009). This is why young children benefit from opportunities to revisit important ideas, make connections across experiences and develop increasingly secure understanding over time.
This principle is reflected in the Education Endowment Foundation's guidance, which highlights the importance of building on children's existing knowledge and experiences through carefully sequenced learning. The guidance emphasises that secure foundations in language, mathematics and early literacy are developed through planned opportunities to revisit, practise and deepen understanding over time (Education Endowment Foundation, 2020; 2021).
For you as an early years educator, curriculum progression is about more than deciding what children will learn next. It requires careful thought about the knowledge, vocabulary, concepts and experiences children need to encounter repeatedly so that learning becomes increasingly secure over time.
A shared understanding across the school
Knowledge progression isn’t created by one teacher or one year group. It's built collectively across a child's journey through school.
For that reason, understanding the early years curriculum shouldn’t sit solely with early years educators. Subject leaders, Key Stage 1 and 2 teachers and senior leaders all play a role in understanding the foundations that are established in the early years and how these support later learning.
When schools develop this shared understanding, conversations about curriculum become richer. Teachers can build more effectively on what children already know, make purposeful connections between year groups and create a more coherent learning journey for every child.
Case study: Six principles for creating a coherent curriculum from the early years to Year 6
Find out what this looks like in practice at Ashby Hill Top Primary School. Expert early years practitioners, Dixie-Louise Dexter and Nicola Middleton, explain how they placed the early years at the heart of curriculum development, creating a shared understanding of knowledge progression from children's first day in school through to Year 6.
You can read about their approach in this case study: Six principles for creating a coherent curriculum from the early years to Year 6.
What does this mean for school leaders?
Creating a coherent curriculum requires a shared understanding of how knowledge develops from the early years onwards. As you reflect on your school, consider the following.
1. How well is the early years foundation stage curriculum understood across your school?
How familiar are your subject leaders, Key Stage 1 and 2 teachers and senior leaders with the knowledge, vocabulary and concepts introduced in the early years? Creating opportunities for colleagues to understand where learning begins helps ensure later learning builds on secure foundations.
2. How are curriculum connections made explicit?
Consider how your curriculum helps children build on what they already know. How do you support teachers to identify and strengthen connections between learning in the early years and what comes next, both within and across subjects?
3. How visible is progression across the learning journey?
As you observe practice, look beyond the activities children are taking part in. How is children's knowledge and understanding developing? What connections are they making? What can they explain, remember and apply that they couldn't before? Looking for these signs of progression can help you build a richer understanding of children's learning across the curriculum.
Questions for staff reflection
Take a moment to reflect with colleagues:
- How do children in your setting demonstrate that their knowledge and understanding are growing over time?
- Which knowledge, concepts and vocabulary do children need repeated opportunities to revisit and deepen?
- How might greater collaboration across phases strengthen children's learning journey from the early years onwards?
Summary
Children begin building knowledge from their earliest experiences. Through carefully planned experiences, meaningful connections and a progressive curriculum, knowledge develops into increasingly secure understanding over time.
When every teacher in your school shares an understanding of where learning begins and how it develops, curriculum progression becomes a shared endeavour rather than the responsibility of one phase alone. Whether you are a teacher, subject leader or headteacher, understanding where knowledge begins helps you make better decisions about where learning should go next.
References
- Department for Education (2024). Statutory Framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage.
- Education Endowment Foundation (2021). Preparing for Literacy: Improving Communication, Language and Literacy in the Early Years. London: Education Endowment Foundation.
- Education Endowment Foundation. (2020). Preparing for Early Maths: Improving Mathematics in the Early Years and Key Stage 1. London: Education Endowment Foundation.
- Ofsted (2024). Best start in life part 1: setting the scene.
- Willingham, D. T. (2009). Why Don't Students Like School? A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions About How the Mind Works and What It Means for the Classroom.
