EEF to accelerate early years evidence work through new Best Start in Life funding

A new partnership between the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) and the Department for Education (DfE) will build new evidence of ways to improve outcomes for young children, particularly those from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds.

The partnership, of up to £9.3m, will develop the evidence base for children under five. The funding will enable the EEF to build on the strong foundations it has established since expanding its work in the early years in 2022.

It will increase the EEF’s capacity to work with programme developers and early years settings to test promising approaches, generate robust evidence about what works, and understand how effective approaches can be implemented at scale.

The first funding round through the partnership is now open, focusing on programmes and approaches that support communication and language for four- and five-year-olds.

Future rounds are expected to focus on priorities set out in the Best Start in Life strategy including:

• personal, social, and emotional development
• building the evidence base for children under two
• transitions
• early numeracy.

This is the first time the EEF has extended its evidence-building work to children under two. This will include reviews of professional development, effective approaches, and everyday choices for educators working with children under two.

The extension of the DfE-EEF partnership will support the EEF to generate more evidence and test how high-potential approaches can be delivered effectively in different settings and children of different ages across the early years. This creates the opportunity scale-up approaches in the future where the evidence is strong.

The EEF will provide findings to support the expanded network of Early Years Stronger Practice Hubs, Early Years Learning Leads, and Early Education Partnerships. New evidence will also inform the development of any DfE-funded professional development frameworks. This will include evidence-based recommendations for providing practical, on-the-ground support to early years settings.