Curriculum Overview in Early Years at St Richard's C of E First School

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) applies to children from birth to the end of the Reception year.

The Early Years Foundation Stage is based upon four themes:

•     A Unique Child

•     Positive Relationships

•     Enabling Environments

•     Learning and Development

Learning and Development

In the Early Years Foundation Stage framework there are seven areas of learning and development. The seven areas are split in to two categories- Prime and Specific. The Prime areas are particularly crucial for igniting childrens curiosity and enthusiasm for learning, and for building their capacity to learn, form relationships and thrive.

Staff will also support children in four Specific areas, through which the three prime areas are strengthened and applied.

Prime Areas:

•     Personal, Social and Emotional Development

•     Communication and Language

•     Physical Development

Specific Areas:

•    Literacy

•    Mathematics

•    Understanding the world

•    Expressive arts and design

Here is a link to the EYFS Framework if you would like to do some further reading;

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/974907/EYFS_framework_-_March_2021.pdf

The Learning Environment

The Early Years Foundation Stage classrooms are organised to allow children to explore and learn securely and safely. Our aim is to make learning practical, fun and engaging. Teaching and learning will take place through adult led activities/ teaching and through child initiated exploration. The classroom is set up for child led continuous provision which is enhanced to link with our phonics, literacy, maths and topic themes as well as the children’s interests and needs. As a Church of England school, we have a RE lesson weekly and collective worship sessions daily.

Characteristics of Effective Learning:

Alongside the Prime and Specific areas of learning, we also focus on the Characteristics of an Effective Learner (this is how a child learns rather than what they are learning). The emphasis on how children learn has huge potential to transform Early Years practice and empower children as confident, creative, lifelong learners.

To make these skills accessible for the children we have linked each characteristic to an animal, for example if we see a child being curious or engaging in an open-ended activity they are awarded an 'Exploring Elephant' certificate.

The Characteristics of an Effective Learner are as follows:

Our curriculum over the year

Our topic highlights will give you an idea of some of the topics we intend to cover over the school year  however these may change to allow us to follow the childrens interests.

Our curriculum in action

To see our curriculum in action please click on the link below. Here you will find photographs of the children exploring the provision and our classroom environment.

Enriching our curriculum through Forest School

In Early years we are lucky enough to be able to visit our Forest School area weekly. Below is a link to our Forest School page.