We follow the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) curriculum which sets out the statutory requirements for preschool to adhere to and the standards that all providers must meet to ensure that children learn and develop well and are kept healthy and safe.
Our Intent
We believe that our children deserve the best start in their Early Years education. We are committed to making them the centre ofpreschool and put children first to support their continuous growth and development. We provide a stimulating, motivating and exciting environment that will encourage their learning and development through adult and child initiated activities.
We support children to develop their confidence and independence with a have a go attitude at new and challenging experiences through trial and error. We also encourage children to ask for support when needed, develop social skills and to make respectful relationships with others. We want all our children to be given opportunities to reach their full potential.
We will provide opportunities for our children to:
Explore, learn, enjoy and practise their new skills
Develop a “have a” go attitude, try new challenges and take risks in their play
Develop confidence to understand their ability to achieve
Use what they already know to build on and further their learning and development
Provide environments both indoors and outdoors for active learning.
Through these opportunities we want our children to:
Be happy, active, confident and curious learners with a positive attitude to learning
Feel part of our community, to be included and valued
We will:
Follow the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework and use our curriculum in accordance with the education programmes.
Have highly qualified staff who will support and implement learning opportunities
Maintain a resource rich environment
Provide opportunities that are adult and child led
Value, respect and include the crucial role of parents and carers in their child’s learning journey
Our Implementation
At St Joseph’s Preschool children learn through play, exploring and being active. Adults follow child initiated interests in the setting and we also offer and implement adult led activities to build upon what they already know to support their future development and learning and for them to make positive steps to move forward.
The British Values of rule of law, individual liberty, democracy and mutual tolerance and respect are embedded throughout the curriculum.
We give children the opportunity to adapt their play and use their imagination and creativity. We use a variety of strategies such as loose parts play, which enables childrento use resources to enhance and support their imagination and creative thinking. This play also supports their communication and language and will provide opportunities to enhance their language skills and to express their own ideas through play.
We provide a range of resources for children to support their learning and development in all areas of the curriculum and ensure that we are meeting the requirements of the education programmes that are set out in the EYFS.
We use the non-statutory guidance of Birth to Five (2021) and deliver education programmes from the Early Years Foundation stage through the seven areas of learning.
The 3 prime areas:
Personal, Social and Emotional Development
Communication and language
Physical Development
The specific areas of learning are:
Literacy
Mathematics
Understanding of the world
Expressive Art and design.
The seven areas of learning are delivered through a careful and appropriate balance of child initiated and adult led learning.
We work closely with parents to ensure that children have the best possible start at preschool. Throughout their time with us we work together to develop and complete 2 year old checks if appropriate, to gain knowledge about their child’s interests and to support future learning and development. We recognise that it is important for key workers and families to develop a good relationship.
We recognise that all children learn differently and differentiate our curriculum to meet their needs, building upon their prior learning to enable progression. We work with parents and other professionals if required, to support the learning and development of our children who require extra support to make sure that no child is left behind.
We maintain high standards of teaching and invest in our staff by providing high quality Continued Professional Development (CPD) This is done through training and working alongside each other, with peer observations, key work supervisions and appraisals.
Impact
St Joseph’s Preschool recognises that the EYFS is a large part of preparing children to be school ready when they leave our setting. However, it also gives the children the very best start in life generally. Practitioners support all children and give them every opportunity to fulfil their own personal best, reaching their optimum potential in every area of learning and their personal targets. Having a key person allocated to every child to build relationships and to identify gaps in their development, through assessments, observations and working together with parents and other professionals helps every child to thrive.
We recognise that language and communication are vital in all areas of a child’s development. We welcome children from culturally diverse backgrounds and many of our children are at an early stage of learning English as an additional language (EAL). Communication and language development is therefore a consistent focus enhanced by preschool being a nationally accredited Elklan Communication Friendly Setting.
Characteristics Of Effective Learning
These are part of the Early Years Foundation (EYFS) and set out the ways in which the children learn. Preschool environment and highly skilled practitioners ensure children are given opportunities to implement the characteristics into their play
Playing and exploring
children investigate and experience things, and ‘have a go’.
Active learning
children concentrate and keep on trying if they encounter difficulties, and enjoy achievements
Creating and thinking critically
children have and develop their own ideas, make links between ideas and develop strategies for doing things.
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