Scottish teachers plan bold classroom revolution to 'save childhood'

If Palmer and French – two campaigning Scottish teachers – are correct, then it’s the modern world that’s done the damage.

The pair believe they have the cure: a complete revolution in early years schooling. They lead the Upstart campaign, which wants an end to formal education until the age of seven. Instead, children from three would get play-focused, state-run kindergarten.

Their campaign – Palmer is Upstart’s founder and French the chair – has widespread support among teachers, social scientists, psychologists and high-ranking police officers. Supporters believe it won’t just save childhood, but adults too.

Upstart says the modern education system creates adults poorly equipped emotionally. That can impact physical and mental health, and lead to both poor learning outcomes and job prospects, and potential criminality.

Research points heavily towards play-focused early years learning forging happier, healthier, smarter, and more socially and emotionally adjusted kids.

So, is this the cure-all for our social ills? Can it fix education and behaviour in class, address youth crime and the mental health crisis among young people and adults, and even close the attainment gap?

To find out, The Herald on Sunday sat down with Upstart’s leaders to discuss their ideas.

Primary School age campaigners Willie French and Sue Palmer at the Scottish Parliament where they hope to persuade MSPs to introduce a kindergarten style play-based education for under-7s. Picture:  Gordon Terris 

First the evidence. International studies seem very supportive. Since PISA comparisons began – that’s the Programme for International Student Assessment into child attainment – “countries with an early school starting age have not performed as well as those where formal education starts later”. Here in the UK, kids start at five.

In 2023, the best-performing nations were China, Singapore, Estonia, Japan, South Korea, Canada, Taiwan, Finland, Poland and Ireland. Four – China, Estonia, Finland and Poland – start children in primary school aged seven while the rest start at six.

In international studies of child wellbeing, the UK often ranks near the bottom. Nations where children start formal school later, or have play-centered kindergarten, perform better. Twenty-two per cent of nations start children in formal schooling aged seven, 66% at age six, and the rest – only 12%, mostly the UK and its former colonies – start at five.

Palmer and French are experienced educators. Both were head teachers in Scottish primaries. Palmer is also an acclaimed author, specialising in literacy, and helped craft education programmes for the BBC. She’s renowned for her book Toxic Childhood and was a member of the Scottish Government’s Early Years Taskforce.

Health

The kernel of their idea to overhaul education is this: education will remain mandatory for all kids aged five and up, but until the age of seven, children will attend play-focused kindergartens.

Developmentally, children aged five are just too young to prosper in formal education. That doesn’t mean they won’t learn the three Rs – they will, but they’ll do so through play, storytelling, singing, and games. There would also be a focus on the outdoors to improve physical and mental health.

Upstart just wants to bring Scotland into line with most of the rest of the world, where kids begin formal education slightly later.

Initially, there was much resistance, even hostility, from the SNP government. As Scotland tests children in Primary One, Palmer and French say they weren’t looked on favourably.

However, matters seem to be changing, with support rising across all parties, including the SNP.

Palmer began the campaign almost 10 years ago, when as an educator she became increasingly troubled by the state of modern childhood. “Childhood has changed unbelievably over the course of the 20th century,” she says.

Until the 1990s, most children played outside with friends, free from adult supervision. This kind of experience is seen by many child psychologists as vital for development. Children learn resilience, how to manage emotions and be social, and gain a sense of independence.

That chance to “learn through play” is pretty much gone, say Palmer and French, along with tight-knit communities where friends and neighbours took part in raising children.

Palmer believes the rise in mental health and development problems among kids is linked to this change in childhood, and exacerbated by how we teach in early years. Children who have learned few emotional or social skills find themselves in formal education aged five. It’s a recipe for disaster.

Senior police officers are supportive as they believe an early years model will reduce offending in adulthood. More emotionally and socially equipped kids are less likely to turn into adults who commit crimes.

Now, add in social media and that recipe for disaster becomes a runaway catastrophe. Children aren’t just being exposed to screens from before they can talk, they’re often raised by parents with phones in front of their faces.

“You can’t change this world, but you can change universal state services,” says Palmer. “We realised it was time to do things differently.”

It’s not rocket science, she points out. All Scotland has to do is imitate the systems already in place in Nordic countries and many other nations where children go to kindergarten from three to seven and only then enter formal education.

Kindergarten isn’t some holding pen for kids while parents work. The kindergarten model that Upstart campaigners want is highly sophisticated, and staffed by trained teachers and experts in child development.

Children listen to their teacher  in a primary school in Vaasa, on the second day of school in Finland. 

Evolution

THIS kindergarten system is “based on strong relationships between children and the adults who care for them, with lots of play, preferably outdoors”, says Palmer. Play, she believes, is an evolutionary gift which we’ve forgotten. “We know play is an internal drive we’re born with that makes us creative, curious and want to learn and discover – it motivates us to learn for the rest of our lives.”

Since the 1990s, Palmer says, children’s mental and physical health and motor control “has been going downhill”. Around one in five children and young people suffered mental health disorders last year. An estimated 7% of UK children attempt suicide by age 17. One in four self-harmed in the past year. One in 36 are on the autism spectrum – 80 years ago, it was one in 2,500. Levels of ADHD now stand at 3.62% of boys and 0.85% of girls. Estimates have been made that if these trends continue, by 2041, one in 10 will have autism.

“Then there’s the obesity explosion,” Palmer adds. “I realised we needed to do something fast.” So she established Upstart, with the backing of experts in child development, health, and crime. “But right from the beginning we were seen as anti-government. They shut us off.”

The SNP saw Upstart as “the enemy”, Palmer says, when they began their Play Not Tests campaign opposing assessment in Primary One.

Shifting to a kindergarten early years model for children up to seven would have minimal costs, campaigners say. Existing school buildings can be used, and many teaching staff already have the necessary skills.

“It’s a change in the ethos of education to make it relationship centred and play-based between three and seven,” adds Palmer.

In some nations where this model is followed – like Finland, one of the most successful countries when it comes to education and childhood wellbeing – it’s not mandatory for kids to get any schooling, kindergarten or otherwise, until six or seven.

However, Upstart doesn’t want to change our current mandatory system of education starting at five. It just wants mandatory education between five and seven to be appropriate for the developmental stage children are at – that means kindergarten-style play-based learning. Additionally, Scottish children from three upwards should also be able to access this state-run kindergarten-style model.

“The two great things that everybody needs to do well in life both in school and beyond,” says Palmer, “are self-regulation and emotional resilience, and almost all kids need lots of time to get that sorted.” Throwing children into formal classrooms doesn’t help those skills develop, she says.

Although the campaign has widespread support among professionals, many parents are initially sceptical, fearing any change will “hold their child back”. Quite the reverse, says Palmer, as international comparisons show. “The point about kindergarten is that you support a child’s development appropriately.

“It would be as horrid to hold children back as it would be to push them beyond what they’re competent to do.”

In Finland, where Palmer often goes on fact-finding missions, she’s watched kindergarten children walk into class and “go straight to the writing table”.

French says the Scottish Government has focused on “closing the attainment gap at the expense of everything else”

Behaviour

BOTH French and Palmer are very worried by the changes seen in children today, specifically “trouble controlling their attention, behavioural problems, not getting along as well as they used to, and how the quality and richness of their language has diminished”.

These changes have been evident since the millennium, they say. French, a head teacher for nearly three decades in Scottish schools with a range of socioeconomic backgrounds, says: “We’ve gone from slight changes in behaviour to huge changes. Controlling attention is a massive problem. There’s far more conflict.”

While problems with language were more common in low-income areas previously, over the last 20 years the problem “spread across the socioeconomic picture”.

It’s an uncomfortable truth, but higher numbers of parents in work means fewer mums and dads around to help children develop. Screens are increasingly “electronic babysitters”.

French says the Scottish Government has focused on “closing the attainment gap at the expense of everything else”. Yet the attainment gap has simply grown. Upstart believes the current model actually widens the attainment gap.

If children from poor backgrounds are made to compete against youngsters from wealthier families where there’s more access to reading materials and learning experiences, they’ll usually do worse unless the state intervenes to give them a leg up. A kindergarten model is, Upstart says, the very leg-up poorer kids need to close the gap.

Now, however, says French, “some schools present children for tests when they’re still four-and-a-half”, adding: “Apart from that being completely inappropriate developmentally, when I’ve witnessed it, it was actually quite cruel. They had to sit and take these tests, not go to the toilet, they weren’t allowed to do this or allowed to do that. It’s was shocking.”

French bridles at the lack of “art, music and drama. There are no challenges that develop children’s thinking”. Today’s system is all about teachers ticking state-mandated boxes.

As a head teacher, he’s introduced philosophy for primary-aged children. This can be simple debating exercises like “should we wear uniforms to school” so youngsters develop critical thinking, and learn how to discuss and separate fact from fiction.

French was shocked when auality improvement officers in one Scottish school voiced concern that children weren’t “co-creating their learning intentions and success criteria”. This “initiative-itis” about reaching targets drives him mad as an educator.

When it comes to reading and writing in early years, French says, teachers should simply give kids blank paper, offer some inspiration in terms of ideas, and tell them to have fun creating a story. Spelling and grammar are important, but so is creativity.

“They should just let their imagination run free,” he says. “That doesn’t happen now as the ‘learning intention’ states what the experiences and outcomes within literacy for writing should be. To be honest, if I was a pupil at school now – and sorry to be rude – but I’d be bored s**less.”

Boredom clearly has knock-on effects for behaviour. If kids get excited by writing, they’re much more likely to pick up spelling and grammar. Palmer underscores her credentials as a literacy expert and says she wouldn’t advocate any policy which had detrimental effects on children. She’s worked on national literacy strategies.

“Of course you need to teach literacy and numeracy specifically, but that doesn’t mean everything else is put to one side. The curriculum has become outcome-driven and that takes away potential – all the joy goes out of education.”

Poverty

SHE notes that in Finland – with its huge successes – “the first line of their early years curriculum is that children will ‘learn with joy’. We’re learning creatures and learning should make us happy and be something that comes naturally”.

She adds: “The government has been pouring money into the poverty-related attainment gap for the last 10 years and it’s not got any narrower, in fact it’s widened. If we had a more sensible policy we could have saved an awful lot of money. It’s been counterproductive in the extreme.”

Palmer says our education policy is a nasty hangover from the Victorian era when the Industrial Revolution meant poor parents were in factories, so kids were at risk on the streets. It was considered best to get children safely into schools as early as possible aged five.

But for millennia, until they were at least seven, most children were raised and educated by their parents, close relatives, older siblings, and the wider community. Evidently, after seven, they would have to work on the family farm or in their parents’ occupation, but by then they would have become relatively emotionally and socially equipped for life. All the key research says “don’t start school before seven. Instead, use play as your major focus”.

One of the best examples of what kindergarten play-focused early years education can achieve is seen in Estonia, after its switch from formal schooling for under-sevens. In surveys, Estonia was coming out lower than Britain. However, the government decided to adopt a model similar to Finland and now the country is regularly at the top of the charts. “Estonia has gone from being lower than us to miles better.”

Research in America, Palmer says, shows that when African-American children from poor backgrounds were offered “Nordic-style kindergarten”, they were more likely as adults to vote, and less likely to experience jail or relationship problems.

A traditional approach before age seven tends to show children “less likely to enjoy reading, and more likely to have social and emotional problems”. Kindergarten for under-sevens creates “a more level playing fields in terms of children’s backgrounds”.

Palmer has studied the behaviour of children in kindergarten and notes that older children take on caring roles for younger kids, teaching them games and songs. Bullying is uncommon.

As the pair point out, just think of the educational and social value of the games children played in previous generations. The skipping and ball-throwing games girls traditionally played were high in motor skills and had lots of counting and memory involved. Large games of “chase” required social skills. Going off all day to play outside fostered independence. Children cut themselves and carried on playing, teaching resilience. Socialising with lots of other children led to language development.

Play

PLAY is part of “evolution”, says Palmer. “It’s what has been going on throughout the generations, and when you take it out you lose an enormous amount. Play is about bouncing back and working out what risks you can take.”

French says that while a return to outdoor, unsupervised play would be ideal, “society isn’t going to go back. So we’ve got to create a culture for children that’s focused on their developmental needs”.

He notes that today schools are ordered to institute programmes around “respecting rights” and “building resilience”. However, if children aren’t given any experiences to help develop these skills then “all this teaching by manual is a lot of s***. It’s actually really demeaning to children”.

Children are told it’s important their schools “earn Green Flags”. He adds: “It’s not because we want to save the planet or encourage them to be conservationists. It’s ‘let’s do this because you get something for it’.”

That’s why many police officers back the campaign. They see it supporting children to become more socially aware and responsible. Just as senior police latched on to the role poverty plays in driving crime, French adds: “We’ve got many children coming from those backgrounds and what do we do? We start them at the same age as all the other children who have had far richer, more nourishing experiences and expect them to attain in the same way.”

Highly-trained kindergarten staff can pinpoint children ready to start more formal educational work like reading, and those who simply aren’t ready and risk being hindered if pushed too early.

In Finnish kindergartens, educational aids – known as “provocations” – are everywhere. The steps into class are numbered so kids are exposed to counting. Kids are encouraged to tell stories which teachers write down, showing the shapes of words. Some can read fully before age seven when they enter formal education, some can’t. But by Christmas of their first formal year, all are literate. Singing is very important, says Palmer, as it helps language fluency.

In such kindergartens, learning “is just in the atmosphere” so children soak up literacy and numeracy without the strictures of formal education. “They learn organically,” Palmer adds. In one Finnish kindergarten, Palmer watched kids build a “huge pirate ship and invent equipment”. It was a subtle lesson in mathematical shapes, design and science.

Kids are encouraged to talk, and conversation during lunch was especially important. In Finnish kindergartens, children eat locally-sourced food with flowers on the table. The comparison to the “horrible loud halls” in British schools was marked for Palmer. “I don’t know any other country but us and America where we make children ‘feed’ like that.”

French is struck by the maturity and good behaviour of children from nations where there’s a different model. As a head teacher, he noted staff increasingly telling him they thought more and more Primary Ones had ADHD or were on the autistic spectrum. French says he often felt those children “just weren’t ready for school. The culture that pervades now is: if children cannot park their backsides and concentrate then there’s something wrong with them”.

Willie French and Sue Palmer at the Scottish Parliament. Picture: Gordon Terris

Austism

PALMER believes the “huge explosion in development disorders like autism and ADHD” is linked to cultural changes. “Children’s lives have changed and they aren’t developing as they should because they aren’t getting the experiences they should.” Some cases seen as autism or ADHD may be down to “children not having the time and opportunities to develop their physical, emotional and social skills”.

She stresses she doesn’t doubt that there are many children with autism or ADHD. However, even children with “genetic predispositions” for developmental problems may find conditions “ameliorated if they get the right experiences. I’m not saying that severe autism isn’t awful and really hard for parents. But the increases over recent years are eye-watering”.

French says that all children need time to develop at their own rate – and currently, that’s not what the system does. Primary One teachers increasingly report children in nappies or unable to brush their teeth.

Palmer notes the high levels of listening skills, concentration and maturity among children in well-run, play-based early years education, meaning staff have time to observe children, rather than just keeping order. “If you give them time to develop, hopefully you’ll have fewer developmental disorders, more children able to behave in class, and there’s a good chance they’ll catch on to reading and writing quickly and be motivated. We need this cultural change.”

Upstart believes public money will be saved in the long term as there will be fewer physical and mental health problems, children will grow up more productive citizens, and there will be fewer crime and welfare payments. “It’s a no-brainer,” Palmer adds.

Some SNP politicians have come round to supporting Upstart. They are meeting with Children’s Minister Natalie Don-Innes next week. There’s also support from LibDems, Conservatives and Greens. “The most difficult nut to crack has been Labour,” says French. “They were silent to the point of not responding to communications.” However, there have now been meetings with some Labour politicians who have also offered support.

The Upstart team is hopeful that all parties will “refer in some way” to the benefits of their ideas in 2026 Holyrood manifestos. Although the government has paid lip service to “a developmentally appropriate curriculum” that’s not what exists on the ground. “It’s cosmetic.”

One government policy document called Realising the Ambition talks of “world-class early years education” and placing “the needs of our very youngest citizens and their families at the heart of everything”. French adds: “Frankly that’s not what we do, as we present formal education to children aged five, not when they’re developmentally ready.”

SNP

SOME children’s charities have told Upstart they are scared to support them publicly in case it annoys the SNP government. “They worry their funding might be cut. It’s hugely frustrating. We really need their support but they daren’t as they’re frightened.”

Politicians fear antagonising teacher unions, Upstart says. If teacher unions don’t back the change to early years education, politicians have told Upstart “that’ll be a problem”. There’s some resistance among teachers over possible changes to working practices and training although many are on side as they see the benefits to children.

French adds: “There are still some attitudes within the teaching profession where they don’t understand play.” French referred to one school which removed any emphasis on play. “It’s all about raising attainment in literacy and numeracy and that’s coming from quality improvement officers employed by local authorities. Some head teachers are scared to advocate for this due to local authorities.”

However, in schools where play-focused teaching has been introduced for P1s, parents who were initially resistant come fully onboard once they see the improvement in their children, he added. Some staff, however, have been warned about getting involved in the campaign by head teachers. “We’ve had constant issues with teachers telling us they want to speak up but would lose their job,” adds Palmer.

Both Palmer and French believe change is coming. Nobody believed the belt would ever be banned, they say, then one day it was gone. “If you’ve got cultural indoctrination that the sun rises in the east and school starts when you’re five, it’s difficult to make people see differently,” says Palmer.

With minor tweaks, the 1,140 hours of state-funded childcare for all Scottish kids over three could be reconfigured to fund the new model, leaving parents just as free to work. At the moment, pre-school childcare suffers from “gross inequality and a gross variety of different models” across Scotland.

Play-based education could lead to kids acquiring important life skills much sooner than under the current system. Letting children play “shops”, for instance, could allow teachers to impart valuable lessons about business and managing money. Indeed, the current system doesn’t even produce teachers who love learning. French tells of one teacher who “has never read a book in their life –neither fiction or non-fiction. They were made to read in Primary One and were put off. They hated it”.

Might that teacher be a booklover today if they had been allowed to discover the joy of reading on their own or through play? Very likely, Upstart believes.

There’s a difference, Palmer says, in the detrimental effects the current system has on boys and girls. Some boys will “kick out” against the system and misbehave. Girls, who are more social, Palmer says, can become “conforming people-pleasers” who try hard to make their teachers happy even though they hate every minute of school.

For those who think this is all some liberal, “woke” utopia being advocated, Palmer has a response. “I’ve written endless books about grammar. Somebody who writes grammar books is not ‘woke’.”

But the bigger point is this: “If we don’t change the system soon, the mental health crisis will go out of control and we’ll still have the massive attainment gap. At the moment, a third of kids have additional support needs and we’re not employing the people to support them. Something has to change.

“And if it does change then our kids will also get something more precious than anything else – they’ll get their childhood back, and that means being loved and cared for and knowing that you’re a good person because there are people who value you just for being you.”