The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) Statutory Framework outlines what adults must do to help children learn and develop and to be healthy and safe.
The EYFS includes seven areas of learning and development which is split into three age bands: birth to three years, three to four years (nursery) and four to five years (Reception class.)
EYFS Curriculum
Our Nursery and Reception Classes follow the Statutory Framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage.
The Early Years prime areas are important because they lay the foundations for children’s success in all other areas of learning and of life:
- Personal, Social and Emotional Development
- Physical Development
- Communication and Language
SS Peter and Paul are passionate that learning should be challenging, creative and fun. To that end, all elements of our broad curriculum (academic, non-academic, religious, extra-curricular and pastoral development) are regularly reviewed to check that themes are well matched to pupil’s interest and development.
- Communication and language
- Physical development
- Personal, social and emotional development
- Literacy
- Mathematics
- Understanding the world
- Expressive arts and design
Please contact Early Years staff or our school office for further details about our excellent provision across these areas of learning.
Indoor Learning
Outdoor Learning
We explore OUTDOORS EVERY DAY! Please make sure your child brings a coat and other appropriate clothing (e.g. hat, gloves, sun hat or cap) as they will spend time outside, even when it’s rainy or very cold. Our EYFS outdoor area is self-contained and has natural and artificial grassed areas with a variety of resources that children can use in many ways, whether they choose to create a train, build a den, make an obstacle course or produce a spider pie in the mud kitchen.
Welly Wednesday and Forest Friday offer a weekly opportunity for children to join in with hands on experiences in the natural environment; our school field is the perfect setting for this. A session will include gathering together in the outdoor classroom and engaging in a group activity; careful listening to the sounds around us or collecting a pair of tapping sticks and tapping rhythms and rhymes are two examples. Blend in or 1, 2, 3 Where Are You involves all children playing a fun game that requires them to be still,and quiet until found; they quickly become very adept at this! There is always an opportunity for child centred exploration when children can follow their own interests or join in with a focus task, such as mini beast hunting. We end the session in the outdoor classroom with our goodbye song.
Also on the school field we have our EYFS trim trail which introduces children to a variety of physical developmental challenges covering balance, lower and upper body strength, core stability, coordination and gross motor skill development. It also gives an opportunity for children to take risks; risk taking is thrilling for children and it enables them to practise physical skills, manage and manipulate their bodies in a variety of spaces and to become resilient to minor bumps, cuts and grazes. Adults work directly with children to support them in their chosen challenge and to support them in managing the risks involved.
Outdoor Learning
Transitions
We know that transitions can be challenging for children, particularly our youngest learners, so we have a carefully planned approach to supporting them with this, initially with the daily transitions from one part of the day to another, using visual timetables and now and next boards.
We begin to prepare our nursery children for transition into our Reception class from the Spring term, when they take part in a weekly ‘freeflow’ session.This involves them being in mixed groups with children from the Reception class, then spending time in one of three areas: Reception class, Nursery or outside. The staff rotate around these spaces, enabling children to become familiar with all of the team and every EYFS learning space long before it is time for them to progress to the next year group.
We also liaise with other settings, when children are moving to or from a different school or nursery, and where possible we visit the child in that environment, enabling us to gather information and get to know about their likes and interests.
When children transition from Reception to Year 1 we plan sessions for them to meet their new teacher in the Reception class environment, before allowing them to visit their new classroom. Staff hold detailed transition meetings, sharing and gathering all of the information needed to support the next stage of their learning journey.
At SS Peter and Paul we pride ourselves on ensuring that our children and families feel welcomed, safe, nurtured and develop a sense of belonging.
A Day in EYFS
Nursery
A typical session in our nursery begins with a warm welcome, then children immediately engage with ‘continuous provision’, selecting where they would like to be actively involved in learning. Later children will gather together as a class to pray and go through the visual timetable. Direct adult teaching will follow, either as a whole class or in key person groups. Children can then choose indoor or outdoor learning time and have a healthy snack of fruit and milk or water (water is available throughout the day.) At the end of the session they join their key person group for some more adult directed teaching and story time, a prayer and then home time.
On specific days children may also use the school hall for PE, have music time with Miss Barrett (our music teacher) or take part in Welly Wednesday or Forest Friday activities.
Reception
Our day begins with the children independently organising their coats and book bags, signing in and settling to a ‘walk into learning’ Literacy or Numeracy focus task. Following a prayer session led by the children, every child joins a specific Read Write Inc phonics group, where they actively take part in a 30 minute daily phonics session. During the rest of the morning every child will take part in a focus mathematics session and enjoy free choice learning time, both indoors and outside to explore, develop and display their knowledge, skills and understanding. A healthy snack and drinks are available daily, free of charge for the children to enjoy. Following lunch in the hall and an outside play, we gather together for more adult led learning. During the rest of the afternoon the children are exploring the indoor and outdoors environments during free choice and completing adult led activities such as shared reading or a focused writing activity. Our day finishes with a whole class song and story time. On specific days we enjoy Forest activities (whatever the weather!), use the hall for PE activities and enjoy a music session with Miss Barrett.
The school community says…
Phonics
Kinetic Letters
Maths Family Workshop
This workshop gave an introduction to families around the expectation for their children in maths within Early Years, but also ways in which we teach this in school to enable parents to support learning at home.
Documents
Please view our EYFS Policies on our Policies page here.
