The Early Years Foundation Stage

 Every child deserves the best possible start in life and the support that enables them to fulfil their potential. Children develop quickly in the early years and a child’s experiences between birth and age five have a major impact on their future life chances. A secure, safe and happy childhood is important in its own right. Good parenting and high-quality early learning together provide the foundation children need to make the most of their abilities and talents as they grow up.

 

The Pre-School Curriculum.

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) sets the standards that all early year’s providers must meet to ensure that children learn and develop well and are kept healthy and safe. It promotes teaching and learning to ensure children’s ‘school readiness’ and gives children the broad range of knowledge and skills that provide the right foundation for good future progress through school and life.

This framework is mandatory for all early year’s providers, maintained schools, non-maintained schools, independent schools, and all providers on the Early Years Register.

  

The EYFS is now organised into seven areas of learning these are as follows:

 

Communication and language development involve giving children opportunities to experience a rich language environment; to develop their confidence and skills in expressing themselves; and to speak and listen in a range of situations.

 

Physical development involves providing opportunities for young children to be active and interactive; and to develop their co-ordination, control, and movement. Children must also be helped to understand the importance of physical activity, and to make healthy choices in relation to food.

 

Personal, social and emotional development involves helping children to develop a positive sense of themselves, and others; to form positive relationships and develop respect for others; to develop social skills and learn how to manage their feelings; to understand appropriate behaviour in groups; and to have confidence in their own abilities.

 

Literacy development involves encouraging children to link sounds and letters and to begin to read and write. Children must be given access to a wide range of reading materials (books, poems, and other written materials) to ignite their interest.

 

Mathematics involves providing children with opportunities to develop and improve their skills in counting, understanding and using numbers, calculating simple addition and subtraction problems; and to describe shapes, spaces, and measures.

 

Understanding the world involves guiding children to make sense of their physical world and their community through opportunities to explore, observe and find out about people, places, technology and the environment.

 

Expressive arts and design involve enabling children to explore and play with a wide range of media and materials, as well as providing opportunities and encouragement for sharing their thoughts, ideas and feelings through a variety of activities in art, music, movement, dance, role-play, and design and technology.

   

The Early Years Foundation Stage is based around four themes:

 

• A Unique Child

• Positive Relationships

• Enabling Environments

• Learning and Development

 

A Unique Child recognises that every child is a competent learner from birth who can be resilient, capable, confident and self-assured.

 

Positive Relationships describes how children learn to be strong and independent from a base of loving and secure relationships with parents and/or a key person.

 

Enabling Environments explains that the environment plays a key role in supporting and extending children’s development and learning.

 

Learning and Development recognises that children develop and learn in different ways and at different rates, and that all areas of learning and development are equally important and inter-connected.

 

This approach ensures that the EYFS meets the overarching aim of improving outcomes and reflects that it is every child’s right to grow up safe; healthy; enjoying and achieving; making a positive contribution; and with economic well-being.

We use the framework to help us to plot each child’s learning and record progress. They also enable us to provide appropriate activities to help all children move towards achieving their early learning goals. In some of these activities’ children decide how they will use the activity and in others, an adult takes the lead in helping the children to take part in the activity.

Play helps young children to learn and develop through doing and talking, which research has shown to be the means by which young children think.

 

How we plan our play:

Planning is the key to making children’s learning effective, exciting, varied and progressive. However, it is important to remember that no plan written weeks in advance can include a child’s interest in a spider’s web on a frosty morning or a particular group of children’s interest in transporting small objects in a favourite blue bucket, yet it is these interests, which may lead to some powerful learning. Plans should therefore be flexible enough to adapt to circumstances.

 

Long-term planning is kept very simple and done up to a year ahead. It gives an overview of the themes and topics that are going to be covered over the coming months

 

Medium term planning shows more detail around the activities we are going to organise and how these link to the different areas of learning and development

 

Using long and medium-term plans helps us to produce short-term plans based on these and the observations and assessments we have made on the children in our care. Short term plans need to be flexible and pick up on the changing interests of the children ensuring that we are planning for the requirements of the individual child.

 

We will keep a record of each child’s progress; parents are welcome to see the record and discuss it with their key worker

We will measure each child’s development by reference to Birth to Three, The Development Matters frameworks and using our own experience. Activities are arranged either on an individual basis or appropriately challenging group work that will help each child to reach their goal.

 

We will keep parents informed of the theme/topic by a notice newsletter and information on the notice boards.

We very much appreciate and see a mutual benefit of parents becoming involved in their children’s learning positively encourage parent involvement to support some of the activities by helping in session, bringing in materials and other items connected with the theme or topic and sharing their own experiences.

 

We will formally discuss the curriculum and achievement with parents at open events and on request, and parents are welcome to view the learning journeys at any time.

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Should you require any more information or would like to discuss any issues please do not hesitate to talk a member of staff.                        

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