OxTalks is Changing
Oxford Events, the new replacement for OxTalks, will launch on 16th March. From now until the launch of Oxford Events, new events cannot be published or edited on OxTalks while all existing records are migrated to the new platform. The existing OxTalks site will remain available to view during this period.
From 16th, Oxford Events will launch on a new website: events.ox.ac.uk, and event submissions will resume. You will need a Halo login to submit events. Full details are available on the Staff Gateway.
Putting Common Elements of Effective Early Childhood Education to Work: The Early Years Library, Practitioner Agency and Professional Learning
High quality early childhood education (ECE) can make a crucial contribution to equal life chances for children. ECE staff tend to have a wide range of qualifications and experience, with variable skills and knowledge to support children’s development. In this talk, we will share recent collaborative work by our team from Cambridge, the Early Intervention Foundation and the Centre for Evidence and Implementation that aims to develop ECE workers’ professional learning using a novel methodology. We systematically reviewed ECE programmes with a strong research evidence base, then we extracted the common elements of practice from those programmes. These common elements were the basis for developing our Early Years Library. Next, we worked collaboratively with early years practitioners and implementation experts to co-design training and support materials through a series of rapid cycle testing and refinement. This talk situates the common elements methodology among other approaches to generating robust evidence, like more traditional randomized trials. We examine the notions of feasibility and enablers for implementation in the context of non-manualised approaches to professional learning.
Bio: Prof Sara Baker is a Professor of Developmental Psychology and Education (Faculty of Education, Cambridge) and a 2022 UNESCO-IBE Senior Fellow in the Science of Learning. Dr Julia Birchenough is a Research Associate, Faculty of Education, Cambridge. This work is funded by the Nuffield Foundation
Teams link: teams.microsoft.com/meet/3825967966058?p=oaa4boDA3tu5ZnqMja
Date:
10 March 2026, 12:45
Venue:
15 Norham Gardens, 15 Norham Gardens OX2 6PY
Venue Details:
Seminar Room E and online
Speakers:
Speaker to be announced
Organising department:
Department of Education
Organiser:
Professor Sonali Nag (University of Oxford)
Part of:
Child Development and Learning Research Group Seminars
Booking required?:
Not required
Audience:
Public
Editors:
Hannah Freeman,
Kristina Khoo,
Shaena Sinclair
