Mylor Bridge School
Early Years Foundation Stage
Intent
Before starting school life at Mylor Bridge School, we work hard to work closely with parents, carers and pre school providers to ensure that we know as much about our new children before they begin their journey in Reception, in September.
We recognise the importance of a smooth and quality transition, so we arrange several visits to the Reception classroom in the summer term. This enables children to become familiar with our setting, and to establish secure relationships with the Class 1 team.
We also arrange a parents/carers information session, to introduce staff members, give greater detail about our EYFS setting and to answer any questions. During this time, we also ask parents, carers and pre school settings to provide us with as much information about the children as possible so that we can ensure that the setting and learning environment is adapted to best suit the learning styles of all of the children.
We start transition early to ensure that our new children settle in quickly and become part of our 'Mylor Bridge family.'
At Mylor Bridge school we work hard to create a stimulating, exciting and safe environment which enables our youngest children to access a broad and balanced curriculum across the EYFS. The Class 1 team plan a range of challenging, stimulating activities, based around play to cover the prime and specific areas of learning and development.
The Class 1 team use 'Development Matters in the Early Years Foundation Stage' as their key guidance to support planning.
Implementation
At Mylor Bridge School we ensure that children experience a broad and fascinating curriculum through the seven areas of learning. We work hard to meets every child's needs and follow their unique interests and fascinations throughout our well resourced indoor and outdoor spaces. We ensure that all team members are well equipped and highly trained to enable all children to achieve their best.
There are a number of priorities related to learning within the early years, in the first term we believe that personal, social and emotional development alongside communication and language are the key to ensuring that our children settle in to school quickly, enabling them with the confidence and skills to learn effectively. Our staff use high quality questioning skills to develop language skills. "This is a great model, tell me about it."
We recognise that our children learn best through first hand and immersive experiences so we work hard to ensure that we provide a wide range of 'hands on experiences', role play opportunities and outdoor visits. For example, when learning about Harvest and the story 'The Little red hen', we planted seeds, crushed corn, made bread and even had a visit from a real life hen! These learning experiences 'ignite' imaginations and learning opportunities and children are engaged and enthusiastic about their learning.
Learning takes place through 'child initiated' and 'adult led' learning. Children are encouraged to access the learning enhancements through our 'continuous provision' to consolidate and extend all that they have been taught and to practise and apply these skills independently.
Impact
Our practitioners have a secure knowledge and understanding of how children learn and what they need to know. Children are all encouraged to demonstrate their knowledge through high quality provision and questioning skills. Children show a high level of engagement and curiosity because of the relationships that they build with the teachers, their friends and the activities that they are provided with. Children show a positive attitude towards school and their learning. All practitioners work to understand each individual child's abilities and understanding and work together as a team to share this knowledge and then to plan the next steps for each individual child's learning.
We encourage parental involvement in children's learning and we appreciate the value the importance of the school AND the children's family in enabling the children to achieve their very best.
