Introduction to the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)

In the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) at North Scarle Primary School, we want all our children to be happy, independent, active learners, to learn through play and exploration and to be the best they can be! We build positive relationships and pride ourselves in knowing how our wonderful children learn and develop best. We help and guide our children through transitions into and within school with careful planning ensuring they build trusting relationships with their key adults. 

The children experience adult led play, teacher directed tasks and child-initiated play. The staff teach the children the key skills they will need in their learning and the children transfer and apply those skills to their chosen activity. By observing the children at play, staff gain a thorough knowledge of the children’s strengths and areas to develop; staff can then support or extend the activity to ensure the children make the most progress possible and teach them their next steps. We continually build upon children’s knowledge and our curriculum is designed to help children build their learning over time. 

Language development forms a large part of our Early Years Curriculum, being able to use language to help self-regulate and improve a child’s executive function will ultimately help improve learning, social skills and their ability to adapt to different learning and social situation.  

The children learn through the three prime areas: Communication and Language (CL); Personal, Social and Emotional Development (PSED) and Physical Development (PD) and the four specific areas Literacy (Lit), Maths (M), Understanding the World (UW) and Expressive Arts and Design (EAD) 

The children play a key part in developing their learning. The children are taught to be independent and to get out their own resources and put them away again! They choose some of the topics we learn about and help us develop the classroom accordingly. We have a spacious classroom with carefully selected resources, and a large outside learning area, giving children the opportunity to learn both inside and outside whatever the weather! 

The staff record evidence of each child’s learning and experiences through their learning journal. We use Class Dojo to share photos and updates of the children’s learning, parents can comment on and add experiences of learning that have occurred at home, which encourages home/school partnership. Dojo also gives parents the option to send a direct message to class teacher and other members of school staff. 

Parents will be invited for parents evening in October and March and at the end of the year each child will receive a report on their progress over the year in the areas listed below. They will be given an attainment level (emerging or expected) in each area. The "expected" level is where a child is expected to be working at for their age group. A child that is "emerging" has not yet reached the expected level and staff will be putting additional support in place to support them. Parents are welcome to speak to the adults in school at any point.

Please see below Statutory framework for the early years foundation stage

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-years-foundation-stage-framework--2

Please see below Development Matters in the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)

http://www.foundationyears.org.uk/files/2012/03/Development-Matters-FINAL-PRINT-AMENDED.pdf