EYFS: Parent Guide for Ladders at Home
Please find this EYFS Parent Guide for Ladders at Home attached as a Word Document to send out to your parents. For more information about launching Ladders at Home in your school, read EYFS: A Guide to Launching Ladders at Home in the Foundation Stage
Welcome! Your child’s school has decided to launch Ladders at Home to foster collaborative partnerships with parents.
With a wealth of research showing the benefits of ongoing, consistent communication with parents, there has never been a better time to embark on this launch.
“The effect of parental engagement over a student’s school career is equivalent to adding two or three years to that student’s education.”
John Hattie
This guide provides all of the information parents will need to effectively communicate with their child’s teacher and to support learning at home.
Login
Parents can login to Ladders at Home at any time, from any device. Simply navigate to the URL https://laddersathome.co.uk/login.
The email address and password will be the one a parent has supplied to school and used in the registration process.
A parent is able to reset their password by clicking on, ‘recover your account’.
Parents should contact their child’s school if they encounter any issues logging in to Ladders at Home.
Accessibility
All of the information in Ladders at Home can be translated into over 100 languages. Settings for amending text size and colour preferences enable further accessibility.
Watch a video explaining how to change accessibility settings below:
Multiple siblings
Parents use the same login details for all of their children attending the school. The information displayed is relevant to the school phase your child is currently in, with one view for Early Years and another for Primary.
Watch a video explaining the main differences between information shared for Early Years and Primary phases below:
Homepage
The homepage of Ladders at Home enables parents to monitor communications from school.
A parent is informed of the number of new observations or homework tasks shared.
This page also displays the latest observations shared by the teacher, leading with the most recent.
Observations
Viewing observations
Parents view their child’s observations by clicking on Observations in the left-hand menu.
Observations are central to Early Years assessment, used by teachers to record significant moments in learning and build a picture of development over time.
Conversations about learning at home are improved when parents know what their child is learning in school. Teachers share observations with parents to promote opportunities for celebrating learning, inform parents of significant moments in development, and foster partnerships with adults at home.
Top Tips for using observations to open up conversations about learning:
- Find a quiet time where your child has your full attention
- What were you doing in the picture/video/audio file?
- Who were you doing the activity with?
- How did it make you feel?
- Is there anything else you enjoy doing outside/inside?
- Specific praise, “I can see you are concentrating here!”, “You look like you persevered and didn’t give up!”
- Why did you choose that activity?
Parent observation sharing
‘Share an Observation’ allows parents to create observations to share with the teacher. Teachers benefit from the information shared in parents' observations as it offers insight into further contexts of children applying skills and demonstrating development in real-life scenarios.
Watch a video explaining how a parent can share an observation with the teacher below:
Click Share Observation, upload a file (photograph, video, audio file). Alternatively, an observation can be created with only a description.
Useful details to include in an observation include:
- What was the child doing in the picture/video/audio file?
- Who was the child doing the activity with?
- Where is the observation taking place (seaside, garden, party etc.)
- How did it make the child feel?
- Is this a new development or something they have shown several times?
Common Observation FAQs
Do I need to respond to every observation?
There is no expectation for parents to respond to every observation. Two-way communication exists to enable parents to respond to what they have seen in the observation, ask questions or share details of development at home.
How often will teachers share observations?
Each school creates their own policy for sharing observations, customising Ladders at Home to release observations in accordance with this.
Two-Way Communication
Parents can respond to learning shared, including, an observation, home learning task, or pupil report. Two-way conversations enable parents to provide feedback, ask questions, or request further clarification.
Parents are alerted to a response from the teacher through ‘Your Notifications’.
Watch a video explaining how to use the two-way communication tool below:
Homework
Accessing and completing home learning tasks
Schools have the option to share a home learning task with parents through Ladders at Home. If your school has ‘Homework’ enabled then this will display as an option on the left hand menu.
Watch a video explaining homework in the Early Years below:
There are two ways of accessing homework; clicking ‘Homework to do’ on the home page or clicking the ‘Homework’ button on the menu.
Students access homework tasks via a parent’s login. Parents are encouraged to guide their child through accessing, completing and reflecting on the task provided.
Each homework informs the parent of the date set, the date due and details of the task. Teachers have the option to share suggested links of resources to challenge or extend learners.
There are several types of home learning tasks teachers can share with parents. Homework can be set for an individual student, groups of students, or the whole class.
Reflective Thinking
After the child has completed the task, Ladders at Home provides an opportunity for children to engage in reflective thinking.
Children in the Early Years are at the beginning stage of thinking about their learning and this process will be the first step in developing reflective thinking skills.
After an activity, it is helpful for an adult to model their reflective thinking out loud. For example:
“We really had to think about only counting each of the bears once, didn’t we?”
“I think the easiest part was... what do you think the easiest part was?”
“We needed the tens frame to say one more than a number, didn’t we?”
Age-appropriate visual cues of expressive faces support a child in reflecting on their understanding of the task. A text box below enables parents to scribe their child's reflection or communicate feedback to the teacher.
Feedback from children and parents informs future teaching, supporting the planning of learning opportunities in school.
Two-way communication tools enable a parent to respond to the task, opening up the conversation about the learning covered.
Articles
Ladders at Home Articles
Ladders at Home articles unlock language used in observations and two-way communications.
Research shows that progress in learning is highest when parents understand what their child is learning about in school, but most significantly when parents understand how they can guide learning outside of school.
Articles written by qualified practitioners explain how development is scaffolded in school and provide tips and suggested activities for parents to model learning at home. Articles signpost parents to further reading and online resources to support every unique child with their development.
The Early Years Framework arranges developmental skills across seven areas of learning, with three overarching characteristics of effective learning. Ladders at Home provides support articles for all areas.
A parent clicks on Articles, selects EYFS and views the required article. Articles are translated using the translate tool, removing language barriers.
Watch a video explaining how to access articles by clicking on the link below:
School Articles
A school is able to create their own bespoke articles to support parents in specific strategies and approaches taught in their own school. The article may be shared with one specific parent or to a whole class.
Questions
Parents should contact the school in the first instance with any further questions they may have about accessing or responding to the information shared in Ladders at Home.
Common FAQs
What happens to the Ladders at Home account at the end of the year when my child moves classes?
Ladders at Home migrates students into the next academic year in August. A parent’s login details remain the same and can be accessed from the very beginning of the following academic year.
Can more than one adult in the register for a Ladders at Home login?
A child can have multiple adults registered to receive Ladders at Home updates. The key identifier is the email address and so any additional adults must register using a separate email address.
What happens to a child’s information on Ladders at Home when they move out of the Foundation Stage?
A school is able to use Ladders at Home from EYFS through to Primary and all of the information shared in the Foundation Stage will continue to be accessible.
How does the information shared in Ladders at Home remain secure and a child safeguarded?
Schools will adhere to their own safeguarding policy when sharing information about children through Ladders at Home. Any safeguarding concerns should be directed to the school.
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