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Curriculum
The Early Years Foundation Stage
We are working towards the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) with all children in the Nursery. This has recently been redeveloped and took full effect from September 2012. The EYFS helps us to build the foundations of children’s learning. With the guidance set out by the government we will ensure that we provide every child with an environment in which they can thrive.
The EYFS has 4 themes which are:
The Unique Child reaches out to relate to people and things through the Characteristics of Effective Learning, which move through all areas of learning:
• Playing and Exploring
• Active Learning
• Creating and Thinking Critically
The Areas of Learning and Development are then divided into 7 areas, with 3 prime areas which are the key to children’s further development these are:
And there are 4 more specific areas which will develop once a child has developed the skills needed from the prime areas these are:
It is especially important to us that you as a parent or carer feel involved whilst your child is with us at Nursery and we encourage parents to tell us about exciting things that you are doing or holidays that you are going on so that we can share the excitement with your child. Your child will be assigned a Key Person who will build a caring and strong relationship with your child. We also operate a key buddy system. Please speak to your key person for further information about this. You can click here to view the official guide to EYFS which is supported by the department of education.
The EYFS has 4 themes which are:
- A Unique Child
- Positive Relationships
- Enabling Environments
- Learning and Development
The Unique Child reaches out to relate to people and things through the Characteristics of Effective Learning, which move through all areas of learning:
• Playing and Exploring
• Active Learning
• Creating and Thinking Critically
The Areas of Learning and Development are then divided into 7 areas, with 3 prime areas which are the key to children’s further development these are:
- Personal, Social and Emotional Behaviours
- Communication and Language
- Physical Development
And there are 4 more specific areas which will develop once a child has developed the skills needed from the prime areas these are:
- Literacy
- Mathematics
- Understanding the world
- Expressive Arts and Design
It is especially important to us that you as a parent or carer feel involved whilst your child is with us at Nursery and we encourage parents to tell us about exciting things that you are doing or holidays that you are going on so that we can share the excitement with your child. Your child will be assigned a Key Person who will build a caring and strong relationship with your child. We also operate a key buddy system. Please speak to your key person for further information about this. You can click here to view the official guide to EYFS which is supported by the department of education.
Our Nursery uses the aspects from each area of development in the EYFS to help us to track each child’s progress and enable us to provide the right activities to help all of the children to achieve, progress and reach their full potential. The aspects for each areas are:
Personal, Social and Emotional Development.
Making relationships, self-confidence and self-awareness, Managing feelings and behaviour.
Communication and Language.
Listening and attention, understanding, speaking
Physical Development.
Moving and handling. Health and self-care.
Literacy.
Reading (enjoying books from an early age).
Writing (learning to make marks of their own).
Personal, Social and Emotional Development.
Making relationships, self-confidence and self-awareness, Managing feelings and behaviour.
Communication and Language.
Listening and attention, understanding, speaking
Physical Development.
Moving and handling. Health and self-care.
The Prime Areas:
PERSONAL, SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
To help each child in our care to develop their Personal, Social and Emotional skills, we will support them:
By doing this we will help the children to develop: Secure attachments, authentic relationships and connection to give children the confidence to explore, experiment and investigate the environments that we create for them. But it is also those trusting relationships that provide:
It is also through relationships that children learn how to interact with others, how to be a good friend, to understand behavioural expectations and why they are important, to keep themselves safe, to be kind and to start to think about the feelings and needs of others. These are essential life skills that children need to navigate life.
- To feel safe and well cared for.
- To feel that they belong.
- To understand that who they are is important.
- To have a voice and to know that they matter.
- To understand, label and manage their emotions.
- To develop resilience.
- To start to understand how to interact with others and to develop and maintain relationships.
- To start to recognise the needs and wishes of others, demonstrating empathy and care.
- To negotiate and resolve conflict.
- To become a self-motivated learner.
- To develop the courage to try new things, to take risks safely and to keep trying when things get hard.
- To celebrate effort as well as success and to recognise when they get better at something.
- To prepare for new experiences such as moving to a new room.
By doing this we will help the children to develop: Secure attachments, authentic relationships and connection to give children the confidence to explore, experiment and investigate the environments that we create for them. But it is also those trusting relationships that provide:
- encouragement when children are unsure,
- comfort and reassurance when things and/or emotions are overwhelming,
- and the support to keep going when things become difficult.
It is also through relationships that children learn how to interact with others, how to be a good friend, to understand behavioural expectations and why they are important, to keep themselves safe, to be kind and to start to think about the feelings and needs of others. These are essential life skills that children need to navigate life.
COMMUNICATION AND LANGUAGE
To help each child in our care to develop their Communication and Language skills, we will support them:
We need to support and nurture the development of receptive and expressive language in order to help children to communicate and to interact/build relationships with the people in their world. It is through everyday opportunities to use language and sensitive interactions from adults that children will be supported to express their needs, views and feelings, to make connections, to develop a good breadth of vocabulary and to build on what they know to better understand the world in which they live.
- To continue to develop and refine the skills they need to communicate their needs, wants and feelings.
- To experiment with sounds and words.
- To develop their listening and attention skills.
- To have a voice and to express their views and opinions.
- To increase their vocabulary and their knowledge of how language works.
- To hold conversations – to understand and to be understood.
- To understand how to be a good conversational partner.
- To recognise the contribution of others.
We need to support and nurture the development of receptive and expressive language in order to help children to communicate and to interact/build relationships with the people in their world. It is through everyday opportunities to use language and sensitive interactions from adults that children will be supported to express their needs, views and feelings, to make connections, to develop a good breadth of vocabulary and to build on what they know to better understand the world in which they live.
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
To help each child in our care to develop their Physical skills, we will support them:
Physical development includes growth and each child’s ability to coordinate the use of large and small muscles to perform specific movements. The body develops rapidly within the first 5 years of life, so it is important that our environments and opportunities encourage children to continue to develop and refine their gross and fine motor control.
This will enable children:
- To develop good core stability.
- To continue to develop their balance and coordination so that they can navigate spaces safely.
- To continue to refine gross and fine motor control.
- To stay safe and learn to manage risks for themselves.
- To manipulate equipment and tools with an increasing level of control and precision.
- To participate in physical games and sports.
- To understand how to keep their bodies healthy including oral Health.
- To grow in their abilities to manage their own personal care needs.
- To experience the world through their senses.
Physical development includes growth and each child’s ability to coordinate the use of large and small muscles to perform specific movements. The body develops rapidly within the first 5 years of life, so it is important that our environments and opportunities encourage children to continue to develop and refine their gross and fine motor control.
This will enable children:
- to navigate our environments safely,
- to develop the ability to undertake a growing number of tasks for themselves such as managing their own clothing, using utensils and tools (including writing implements) with an increasing level of control and precision,
- and to physically explore our environments both in and outside.
The Specific Areas:
LITERACY
To help each child in our care to develop their Literacy skills, we will support them:
Children learn a great deal about books, words, print and writing well before they start formal schooling. But what they learn and the depth of their understanding is rooted in what adults do and provide. Literacy-rich environments demonstrate how literacy is used in everyday life; by adults modelling reading and writing for different purposes, demonstrating the language used for thinking and helping children to share an understanding of a variety of books and print through talk, we will help children to gain a better grasp of the importance of literacy in our everyday lives.
- To develop a life-long love of reading.
- To have access to a literacy rich environment
- To experience the pleasure of shared story/reading time.
- To access a range of texts for themselves.
- To explore mark making tools in a range of exciting ways.
- To explore the purpose of print.
- To understand how to handle books and resources with respect.
- To develop an understanding of story structure.
- To use and develop their imaginative/role play skills.
- To experiment with sounds, words and rhymes.
- To become a good conversational partner.
- To continue to develop their vocabulary and their understanding of how sentences are constructed.
Children learn a great deal about books, words, print and writing well before they start formal schooling. But what they learn and the depth of their understanding is rooted in what adults do and provide. Literacy-rich environments demonstrate how literacy is used in everyday life; by adults modelling reading and writing for different purposes, demonstrating the language used for thinking and helping children to share an understanding of a variety of books and print through talk, we will help children to gain a better grasp of the importance of literacy in our everyday lives.
MATHEMATICS
To help each child in our care to develop their Mathematical skills, we will support them:
Maths forms a huge part of our everyday lives – from finding the right house number when going somewhere new to knowing how much money we have left after we’ve been shopping. Even the simplest tasks such as estimating how much water we need to put in our bath or measuring a space in our bedroom to see if a new piece of furniture will fit are dominated by our ability to apply some aspect of maths. By using number, simple addition and subtraction, the use of shape, space and measure in everyday situations, children will start to develop an understanding of number, capacity, quantity, and develop the vocabulary to use maths to solve problems.
- To incorporate mathematical language, concepts and number operation into play.
- To use maths to solve problems.
- To explore and experiment with mathematical language, concepts and strategies.
- To experiment, estimate and predict with growing accuracy.
- To start to recognise how maths supports us in our everyday lives.
Maths forms a huge part of our everyday lives – from finding the right house number when going somewhere new to knowing how much money we have left after we’ve been shopping. Even the simplest tasks such as estimating how much water we need to put in our bath or measuring a space in our bedroom to see if a new piece of furniture will fit are dominated by our ability to apply some aspect of maths. By using number, simple addition and subtraction, the use of shape, space and measure in everyday situations, children will start to develop an understanding of number, capacity, quantity, and develop the vocabulary to use maths to solve problems.
UNDERSTANDING THE WORLD
To help each child in our care to develop their Understanding of the world, we will support them:
It is important that children grow up in environments where adults understand and respect individuality and what makes us unique so that our children can go out into the world with a mindset of acceptance, respect and inclusivity. To do this, we need to build on what children know and understand (their home environment) and help them to make connections by then introducing them to our community and the world beyond.
- To understand and appreciate their local community.
- To recognise and celebrate our individual differences.
- To learn how to care for our environment and living things.
- To start to understand some of the interesting things about communities beyond our own.
- To experience the elements.
- To confidently explore and investigate the natural world.
- To understand that people may have different views and opinions to our own and that these need to be respected.
- To show curiosity about the wider world.
It is important that children grow up in environments where adults understand and respect individuality and what makes us unique so that our children can go out into the world with a mindset of acceptance, respect and inclusivity. To do this, we need to build on what children know and understand (their home environment) and help them to make connections by then introducing them to our community and the world beyond.
EXPRESSIVE ARTS AND DESIGN
To help each child in our care to develop their Expressive arts and design skills, we will support them:
It is through creative, dramatic, exploratory, imaginary, object, recapitulative, role, rough and tumble, social and symbolic play that children start to understand how the world works and to make meaning and connections for themselves. This requires environments that provide a broad and balanced set of opportunities, experiences, provocations and invitations which include music, movement, dance, art, craft, technology, nature, the world outside of nursery, construction, small world, sand, water, role play, cookery, book and rhymes sharing etc.
We believe that a broad and balanced approach will:
- To experiment, explore and investigate creative media.
- To take pride in their own work and creations.
- To learn to plan things out so that they can execute their ideas.
- To use their senses to explore different aspects of their world.
- To use their imagination to mirror, create and rehearse.
- To express their ideas and thoughts through a range of different creative media.
It is through creative, dramatic, exploratory, imaginary, object, recapitulative, role, rough and tumble, social and symbolic play that children start to understand how the world works and to make meaning and connections for themselves. This requires environments that provide a broad and balanced set of opportunities, experiences, provocations and invitations which include music, movement, dance, art, craft, technology, nature, the world outside of nursery, construction, small world, sand, water, role play, cookery, book and rhymes sharing etc.
We believe that a broad and balanced approach will:
- help practitioners to tune into children’s interests,
- support the development of cultural capital,
- encourage children to try new experiences and to start to form opinions about what they like and don’t like,
- encourage children to develop their own ideas/hypotheses, and to create and carry out their plans,
- help children to make connections and to find the answers to their problems.
