EYFS

Our Intent

Every child deserves the best possible start in life and the support that enables them to fulfil their potential.

At Shillingstone CE Primary school we aim to provide the highest quality care and educational provision for all our EYFS children, thereby giving them a strong foundation for their future learning. We work hard to create a safe and exciting environment with rich experiences that enable our children to become happy, independent and curious whilst fostering a love for learning that will always stay with them.  We want our children to make excellent progress, therefore we are aspirational in all areas of our curriculum. We value and celebrate all our children as special individuals and recognise the importance that diversity can bring in developing children’s understanding.  We strive to create positive relationships with parents and carers as we fully understand the impact that good parenting and high-quality early learning has together. They provide the foundation children need to make the most of their abilities and talents as they grow up.

How we implement our Early Years Curriculum

The statutory Framework for The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) sets the standards that all early years providers must meet to ensure that children learn and develop well and are kept healthy and safe. It also gives the children the broad range of knowledge and skills that provide the right foundation for good future progress through school and life.

There are 7 areas of learning within the EYFS and these areas of learning and development help us to shape the activities and experiences provided for our EYFS children.  The seven areas are;

·         Communication and Language

·         Physical Development

·         Personal, Social and Emotional Learning

·         Literacy

·         Maths

·         Understanding and Knowledge of the World

·         Expressive Arts and Design

At the end of their Reception Year children will be assessed against Early Learning Goals (ELG’s) in all these areas to see if they have reached a Good Level of Development (GLD)

Our provision within EYFS enables children to access all of these key areas. Our Early Years classroom is a rich and stimulating environment that allows our children to select their own resources and offers them lots of opportunities to explore and investigate their own interests.  We have an exciting and motivating curriculum that is introduced through both continuous and enhanced provision. This provision is planned carefully from observing and assessing their learning through play, this allows us to really know our children and to plan opportunities to enhance the next steps in their learning.

Observations and assessments also help us to identify any gaps or missed learning.  For those children who may be finding some things challenging or may not be on track to mean the ELG’s, we provide effective and focused interventions.  This is intended to help them catch up quickly with their peers.  This provision is flexible depending on the needs of our individual children and is inclusive in that every child has access to support to ensure that they have every chance to achieve the Early Learning Goals.

Our Reception children are also taught alongside some of our Year 1 children and our EYFS curriculum is adapted to allow the teaching of this mixed age class.  By being able to draw on learning opportunities from the Key Stage 1 curriculum we are able to broaden our EYFS curriculum and it allows our EYFS children to begin to have opportunities to encounter concepts and knowledge that they will re visit in Key stage 1.

The impact of our Early Year’s curriculum

The impact of the EYFS curriculum is reflected in us having happy, independent children who are excited to come to school and have a love for learning.  Our children show through their exploration and play that they are motived to learn and they love to share their knowledge and understanding with others.  Our EYFS class is a place where positive relationships between the children and staff are shown through attitudes and behaviour that allow our children to know they are safe and to feel confident to take on new challenges and seek support if it is needed.   Our children see themselves positively as learners and understand that they are valued for the special individuals that they are.