Listen, prompt, pause is a classroom-talk routine for formative assessment: notice what a child shows, offer a neutral invitation, then leave room for a response. Use that evidence to choose the next teaching interaction.
In EYFS, the question is what experience should come next. Keep the words, actions, support and uncertainty together so the reception teacher can review and change the decision.
This guide is for early years practitioners, assessment leads and SENCos in England. Sources were checked on 6 October 2026. The extended reception example uses wholly synthetic details, including all dialogue and dates.
It follows one adult-child interaction. For simultaneous whole-class responses, use the separate ask, commit, reveal, respond hinge routine.
Choose the decision before choosing the prompt
The EYFS statutory framework in force from 1 September 2026 places ongoing assessment within learning and development. Day-to-day observations can inform teaching without a written record; assessment shouldn't demand excessive paperwork.
Development Matters also ties proportionate assessment to what a child needs to learn next. A tick list of completed activities won't answer that question.
DfE early-career classroom practice material supports planned formative tasks, follow-up questions and appropriate wait time. EEF's 2026 Check. Adapt. connects pupil evidence with teaching choices while retaining professional judgement.
These sources inform the choices below. Dylan Wiliam's 1999 rich-questioning paper is original research context for formative questioning. It doesn't validate a branded three-step routine called listen, prompt, pause.
Monday's unfinished count leaves a question open
On Monday 5 October, a child lines up four animals in familiar small-world play. The reception teacher adds two and asks, “How many are there altogether?” The child restarts the count, then leaves without answering.
The teacher's purpose is to choose between more practice keeping track of objects and a task combining two small sets. Monday's response doesn't distinguish those choices.
Her brief note, written straight after the interaction, records the date, activity, two added animals, exact question and observed actions. It also records a busy transition and the absence of the child's usual visual communication board.
The curriculum plan shows recent practice counting objects one by one. Combining sets has had less attention.
The register shows two missed mornings, including one counting session. That shows opportunity to learn; it doesn't explain the response.
A parent message dated 4 October reports counting plates at home and using gesture before words. The teacher keeps this as a parent-reported source. It supports a question to explore; she didn't observe the home activity.
Counting knowledge, language, access to support and the interaction itself remain possible explanations. Non-response is recorded as no answer observed in those conditions. It isn't scored as failure or treated as proof of a need.
Tuesday's exchange: listen, prompt, pause, then look again
On Tuesday 6 October, the same teacher joins familiar animal play after a settled start. Six animals are on the mat. The usual communication board is available, objects can be moved, and the child chooses to stay in the activity.
The teacher is checking how the child tracks objects while counting. She isn't yet checking whether the child can combine two sets mentally. The support keeps the task accessible without supplying the total.
Listen to the action before interpreting the answer
Child: touches five animals in sequence and says, “Five.” One animal sits behind a larger toy and hasn't been touched.
Annotation: the teacher observes the touches and spoken answer separately. She has evidence of a counting attempt and an object left out. “Cannot count six” would go beyond this exchange.
Prompt without providing the missing answer
Teacher: “Show me how you're working out how many animals are here.”
Annotation: this asks for the child's method. It doesn't name six, identify the hidden animal or tell the child to add one. The teacher records the prompt because prompted performance needs its conditions attached.
“You missed one; that makes six” may be a teaching explanation. A prompt that supplies the answer cannot support the same inference about the child's own counting. Record the explanation and check again in a later interaction.
Pause long enough for this child to respond
Teacher: stays quiet and leaves the objects within reach. After about eight seconds, the child moves the larger toy, points to the untouched animal and says, “Missed that one.”
Annotation: eight seconds describes this invented exchange. It isn't a universal timer. The adult watches for thinking, communication, discomfort or a wish to stop, and allows time suited to the child and task.
Let the child reflect and correct the record
Child: moves each animal into a clear line, touches each once, recounts and says, “Six.” Teacher: “Show me what you changed.” Child: points to the animal that was behind the toy.
Annotation: the child corrects the count before the adult identifies the missed object. The gesture then clarifies the correction. The teacher can describe tracking six objects after a neutral prompt, with usual support available.
Speech, gesture or AAC can show a response, depending on the learning question. AAC means augmentative and alternative communication. Record the mode and usual support; don't equate a spoken answer with more secure understanding.
If no response follows, keep the gap open. Check access, wording and willingness to continue. The adult can teach or return later. Silence alone can't establish what the child knows, and another prompt changes the conditions again.
The next interaction tests the tentative interpretation
The teacher's short note on 6 October preserves the exchange, approximate pause, response mode and available support. It separates observed actions from her interpretation and the parent's earlier report.
Her provisional decision is to offer another familiar counting opportunity with clearly arranged objects and the usual communication support. Monday's unanswered combining question stays unresolved.
She'll review two further opportunities by Friday 9 October. The EYFS lead will discuss the reasoning then if moderation is needed. This is a teaching review point chosen for the example, not a statutory assessment schedule.
If the child tracks objects across different arrangements with usual support and without answer-bearing prompts, the teacher may introduce a small combining task. If counts vary, she may revisit tracking and inspect the conditions.
A missing opportunity postpones that judgement. A correct answer after an adult supplies the total doesn't settle it. New child actions or family context may change the question and bring the review forward.
The child can show, say or use AAC to correct what the teacher thought happened. A parent or carer can discuss the note with the class teacher and add or correct context. Record disagreement alongside the adult interpretation.
The EYFS lead can challenge the evidence claim. The SENCo or an involved communication professional can question support where relevant. The class teacher owns the next teaching decision and records any revision and its reason.
Keep the inference and the statutory boundary clear
This interaction doesn't diagnose, label, determine a group, score risk or trigger a referral. One corrected count can't establish general ability or future attainment. Concerns follow the school's established human review procedures.
Later success wouldn't prove that the pause, adjustment, teacher or product caused progress. Teaching exposure, practice, maturation, access and missing evidence all affect what can be inferred.
Keep personal notes within authorised school access and retention arrangements. Small cohorts can produce unstable comparisons and identify children. Suppress or aggregate such reporting; don't turn this exchange into a pupil ranking.
This classroom routine isn't the reception baseline assessment (RBA). The 2026 RBA has its own administration, accessibility and participation rules, including administration within a pupil's first six weeks in reception.
It isn't an EYFS Profile judgement either. The handbook updated on 17 September 2026 covers end-of-EYFS assessment, usually in the final term of the year a child turns five, with completion and submission to the local authority by 30 June.
Early learning goals are an end-of-stage measure. They aren't a curriculum for tomorrow's activity. Classroom support doesn't automatically create a formal access arrangement; follow the rules for the assessment, year and jurisdiction.
KS2 teacher assessment guidance updated on 14 September 2026 identifies day-to-day formative assessment, in-school summative assessment and statutory end-of-key-stage assessment. Those KS2 rules don't govern reception play.
Where Student Radar fits
Student Radar's EYFS Assessment lets staff manually record and review observations, preserve explicit “Not seen” or missing evidence, and use optional moderation.
Student Radar doesn't automatically listen to, grade or retain classroom talk. Staff decide what to record, what the evidence means and how a child, parent or professional can correct the context.
Assessment Entry provides another route for staff assessment records. Availability depends on the school's configuration and permissions; check the workflow available to your team.
To review how staff could keep these conditions and decisions together, request an assessment-focused walkthrough.
Sources and further reading
- Early years foundation stage statutory framework, Department for Education, updated 1 September 2026. Current frameworks apply in England from that date; providers must use the version for their provider type.
- Development Matters, Department for Education, non-statutory curriculum guidance; updated 4 September 2023.
- Classroom practice: assessment, feedback and questioning, DfE Support for early career teachers, Education Development Trust materials. Planning formative tasks, follow-up questioning and appropriate wait time; reviewed 6 October 2026.
- Checking for understanding that leads to action: adaptive teaching, Education Endowment Foundation, 23 February 2026. The Check. Adapt. resource supports professional judgement in choosing responses to pupil evidence.
- Formative Assessment in Mathematics Part 1: Rich questioning, Dylan Wiliam, 1999, Equals: Mathematics and Special Educational Needs, 5(2), pages 15 to 18. Original paper held by UCL Discovery; context for questioning, not validation of the editorial routine in this article.
- Early years foundation stage profile handbook, Department for Education, updated 17 September 2026.
- 2026 reception baseline assessment: assessment and reporting arrangements, Standards and Testing Agency, updated 24 July 2026, for academic year 2026 to 2027.
- Key stage 2 teacher assessment guidance 2027, Standards and Testing Agency, updated 14 September 2026. Its separate assessment purposes provide context; its statutory rules aren't the rules for this EYFS interaction.