This article explains what the Insight Card is, highlight its features, and walk through how it functions.
As a teacher, once you login to the App, you see a Tab with a flower icon on it. Choosing this tab displays information that a teacher will find helpful as they work with their cohort (group of learners or in your case group of children in that classroom).
Insights for early years are designed to provide information on how children are doing developmentally in the five principal domains:
- Social
- Emotional
- Language
- Cognitive and
- Physical
To understand the Insight Card, it’s important to first grasp a few key concepts found in the top half section.
1. Median Physical Age
The median physical age is the age that falls right in the middle of a group of children when you line up all their ages from youngest to oldest.
- It’s not the average (that's called the "mean").
- Instead, it tells you the middle point—so half the children are younger than this age, and half are older.
Example:
If you have children who are: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 years old
The median age is 4, because it's the one in the middle.
If there's an even number of children (like 4 kids): 3, 4, 5, 6
The median is halfway between the two middle ages: (4 + 5) ÷ 2 = 4.5
This helps you understand the age level that’s most common in the classroom — not too young, not too old. It's useful when thinking about developmentally appropriate activities for your group.
In the image above the median physical median age (13.6m) is represented as a black dotted line, and traverses across all the domains.
2. Median Developmental Age
Just like the median physical age, the median developmental age is a number that provides the median developmental age of the group in a given domain.
In the image the coloured dots represent the developmental age of the group in a given domain. For example, in the image:
- The Social Median Age and Cognitive Median Age of this group of children is quite a bit ahead of their physical age. i.e. children’s social and cognitive age is ahead of their physical age.
- The Emotional Median Age of this group of children is slightly below their physical age. I.e. children’s emotional age is less than their physical age.
The long colored lines in each domain indicate the lowest and highest developmental ages of the children in that particular domain. For example, in the image:
- The lowest developmental age in the social domain is 11m, while the oldest developmental age is 21m
- The lowest developmental age in the language domain is 10m, while the oldest developmental age is 21m
In the image above, the ages shown in the extremities in black font are the lowest and highest physical age range configured for the classroom (Note this is only for classroom configuration purposes, and has no bearing on the actual developmental work done on the cohort).
Based on this visual cue, the teacher can derive a degree of confidence that the children are doing well with their Social and Cognitive skills, but that they can focus on developing the children’s Emotional skills.
What is the bottom half of the Insight Card?
The bottom half of the insight card consists of 3 explicit tabs, that tell the teacher three areas the teacher can focus on:
1. SKILL FOCUS – the most important skills to focus on in each domain based on their current developmental stage/level.
Skills Focus Tab and Recommending Ideas
The Skills Tab suggests the next set of skills and indicators the teacher can focus on across each domain. It is important to note that, these are suggestions, and teacher can take them in their planning if they so choose.
Accompanying the suggestions is a new toggle (“on-off”) button against each skill. This button when “on” provides the teacher an option to explore ideas to introduce this skill to the classroom.
As soon as the teacher clicks on a button, (they can choose one or all of the buttons), the “Recommend Ideas” button at the bottom of the card enables.
Selecting the button, takes the teacher to an “Inspiration Hub”.
2. DOMAIN FOCUS – the domain that needs the most attention for the cohort.
Domain Focus Tab and Recommending Ideas
The Domain Focus Tab suggests the domain and the skill the teachers can focus on if they have extra time.
In the sample image the teacher is suggested to work on Receptive Language Skills for the children in the Cohort.
3. SPECIAL ATTENTION – This tab which child in the group needs the most help in, and what particular skill can the attention be focused on.
Special Attention
The Special Attention Tab suggests the skill the teacher can focus on for a particular child that needs additional help.
In the sample image the teacher is asked to work on XDK’s Sense of Self .
How often is the Insight Card generated?
The insight card is generated at the beginning of every week, where the teacher is provided with insights on their cohort’s development based on the results of observations from the previous weeks. All the information presented must be consumed in the week for which it is generated.
How should a teacher use the Insight Card?
The teacher can use this insight card to develop ideas, strategies for teaching and inspiration for activities for the diverse needs of the group of children they are working with.