The learning ladder
First Steps, Walking, Running, Leaping.
English arrives in a child the way walking does — first steps, then steady feet, then running, then off the ground. Outloud names its bands for that progression, and maps each one to the public CEFR scale so a parent always knows where their child stands against a real standard.
First Steps
BuiltCEFR Pre-A1 · Cambridge YLE: below Starters
A child's very first English, before any formal exam.
- →Greet, and say their own name and age
- →Name things they can see in a picture
- →Say short sentences about home, family, and pets
- →Answer a simple spoken question out loud
Walking
ComingCEFR A1 · Cambridge YLE: Starters
Steady on their feet: short exchanges about familiar things.
- →Ask and answer simple everyday questions
- →Follow a short illustrated story and retell its gist
- →Talk about likes, routines, and what they are doing now
Running
ComingCEFR A2 · Cambridge YLE: Movers
Moving with momentum: past tense, reasons, longer turns.
- →Tell a short story about something that already happened
- →Give a reason — because… — and describe people and places
- →Hold a simple back-and-forth conversation
Leaping
ComingCEFR B1 · Cambridge YLE: Flyers
Off the ground: opinions, across time, handling the unexpected.
- →Explain and justify an opinion out loud
- →Move between past, present, and future in one telling
- →Cope when a conversation goes somewhere they didn't plan
The built band, up close
Inside First Steps: four steps
First Steps is the band Outloud has built completely. Within it, a child climbs four steps — difficulty tiers that run across the whole band, from first sounds to a small story told start to finish. The model places a child on a step and moves them up it as their position genuinely shifts.
- 1Sounds and first wordsThe phonics pre-band. Single words from the fifty-four-word set; naming what's on the page.
- 2First sentencesTwo and three words held together. “I have a dog.” “Bear is here.”
- 3Saying a little moreShort sentences strung in a row; answering a simple question without a model.
- 4A whole small storySeveral sentences about one event, in order — and ready to step up to Walking.
Steps are not movements
The four steps here are difficulty tiers across the whole First Steps band — where a child is in their English. The four movements on the how-it-works page are the home–away–home shape inside a single episode — where the child is in the story. Different things, deliberately kept apart.
Age is a prior, not a constraint
CEFR describes what a learner can do, not how old they are. A five-year-old in Manchester and an older child new to English can both sit in First Steps, and the path forward is the same shape for each of them.
So age only sets where a child starts. From the first spoken response onward, assessment moves them freely along the ladder — children who race ahead don't wait for an age band, and children who need more time aren't pushed past one. How placement and movement work →
How a child moves up it
Each band is climbed across three skills at once — speaking and listening, reading, and writing — with speaking out in front. And the gate from one band to the next holds until a child is solid across all three, not just the one they're fastest at. The weakest skill sets the pace, so no child is ever pushed on lopsided.
See how the climb works — the gate, the three skills, and the named outcome behind every step →
One band, built completely — and three more to climb to.
CEFR is the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages. Cambridge Young Learners English (Starters, Movers, Flyers) is a trademark of Cambridge University Press & Assessment. Outloud English is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or derived from Cambridge Assessment; these marks are referenced as public standards for orientation only.