The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) is the stage of Education for children from birth to the end of their Reception year.

Intent

At Norwood Primary school, our EYFS curriculum aim is to support all of our children to develop into confident, happy and independent learners. Through a nurturing environment, the children are enabled to develop the necessary skills, knowledge and attitudes to achieve fulfilling lives.

Through working in partnership with parents, we will:

• promote independence, perseverance and the confidence to ‘have a go’.
• support the development of social skills, friendships and fundamental bonds.
• provide a safe, secure and loving environment for young children to develop, learn and explore.

Our intent is to secure solid foundations for learning and to nurture individual talents by offering a range of opportunities to support children’s holistic development.

Implementation

At Norwood Primary School, the Early Years Foundation Stage is one class. We have a well-resourced classroom and outdoor learning space with a canopy area. We plan key objectives in a play-based approach to learning. This provides the children with opportunities to play and explore, actively create, learn and think critically. Through skilful observations and play partnerships, staff are able to adapt their teaching and move learning forward, successfully enhancing the continuous provision, both inside and outside.

The children have a well-established routine so they can anticipate what is happening each day. With for example:  daily self-registration, wake up song, days of the week song, name writing, dough disco, changing reading books, drink and snack time, play time, play to learn time, maths, music, phonics, home time song.

Each day we have a playtime on the hill to encourage gross motor skills and to learn playtime games together. With each season, we go on nature hunts and make use of our school field and trees to investigate the nature around us and notice changes. Once a week we have a PE session focusing on gymnastics, multi skills or team games.

As a class, we take pride in being kind and celebrate this in many ways. Several times a week, the children are given opoortunities to support well-being such as ‘peer massage’, brain breaks, show and tell and mindfulness activities.

We like to engage with our local and wider community as much as possible to enrich the children’s learning and give them real life experiences.  Visits to the local farm, local nature walks and visits from the emergency services are some examples planned for this year.

We have lots of parent engagement activities planned throughout the year where we love to share our learning.

Phonics, reading and writing are taught using the Read Write Inc scheme and Talk for Writing. Our curriculum encourages the children to become life-long learners. We provide interesting and engaging opportunities and expand on the skills and knowledge of the children, giving them a secure foundation upon which they can grow and develop as they move up through the other key stages. 

The Early Years curriculum is made up of 3 prime areas:

• Personal, Social and Emotional Development (PSED)
• Communication and Language (CL)
• Physical Development (PD)

and 4 specific areas:

• Literacy (L)
• Mathematics (M)
• Understanding the World (UW)
• Expressive Arts and Design (EAD)

Impact

At Norwood Primary school, the children in our Early Years Foundation Stage will demonstrate high levels of engagement in both Child-Led and Adult-Led activities. By developing their speaking and listening skills, we are enabling them to access more areas of learning and communicate with adults and other children. They will develop concentration, persistence, co-operation and most importantly become willing and confident to ‘have a go’.

The children will develop a sense of the wider world around them and will draw on these experiences during interactions with others, linking this to new learning. They will also be able to apply their knowledge to a range of situations, making links by explaining their ideas and understanding. The children will be confident to take risks and discuss their successes and failures with adults, drawing on their experiences to improve or adjust what they are doing.

From their own unique starting points, we expect all children, even those at risk of disadvantage, to achieve age-related expectation and/or make excellent progress academically and socially. All children will be given the best foundations to prepare them for a life-long learning journey.