At Kates Hill Primary School, we deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage Statutory Framework through rich, hands-on experiences and high-quality adult interactions. These experiences are carefully designed to help children learn more, know more, and remember more. We actively promote resilience, ambition, and a lifelong love of learning, while also supporting children to understand and manage their mental health and wellbeing.

We recognise that every child is unique, and we celebrate the diversity of our school community. Our curriculum is thoughtfully developed and adapted each year to reflect the interests and curiosities of each cohort, while ensuring clear progression across the seven areas of learning. We understand that learning is a continuous, sequenced process, building on what children already know and can do and guiding them towards well-defined end points. Our curriculum is purposefully designed to ensure children are well-prepared for a successful transition to Year 1.

Our Aims:

•  To offer a broad and balanced curriculum that provides children with a wide range of meaningful experiences. We believe children should have the opportunity to aspire to what they have seen and explored.
• To widen children’s horizons by encouraging them to try new activities, embrace challenge, and develop a sense of excitement about learning. 
• To set high expectations, fostering perseverance, confidence, and self-belief so that children can solve problems and achieve beyond their own expectations.
• To create a nurturing and inclusive learning environment where every child can thrive, with targeted support in place to help all children work towards achieving the Early Learning Goals.
• To support the development of emotional wellbeing and self-regulation, ensuring that children feel confident, safe, and equipped with the tools they need for a smooth transition into Year 1.
• To continually enhance the expertise of our Early Years team through ongoing professional development, led by the EYFS Lead and supported by external training opportunities.

Our curriculum is guided by the Early Years Statutory Framework and informed by the Development Matters (2022) and Birth to 5 Matters documents. These resources outline the key requirements for learning and development in the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS), and we have used them to shape a well-planned, progressive curriculum.

Using our understanding of each child and ongoing formative assessments, the EYFS team designs stimulating and engaging activities that support children’s progress and provide meaningful learning contexts. This may involve exploring whole-class themes such as dinosaurs, space, journeys, or traditional tales, which allow for rich cross-curricular links. We aim to follow the natural seasons of the year along with key celebrations and dates. We also build in opportunities to follow individual children’s interests as they arise throughout the day.

Our curriculum strikes a balance between whole-class sessions, guided learning, adult-directed play, and child-initiated activities. This ensures that children not only gain the knowledge and skills they need in a structured, cumulative way but also have the freedom to explore their own interests. At the beginning of each academic year, we assess what children already know and understand, and we use this information to ensure every child systematically builds knowledge across all seven areas of learning.

In the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS), children learn through play, active exploration, and critical and creative thinking. These experiences take place both indoors and outdoors. Our outdoor environment is accessible throughout the year and remains open in all but the most extreme weather conditions. Children are encouraged to make independent choices about where they learn best, applying the knowledge they have been taught in meaningful contexts.

The Early Years curriculum is carefully planned to introduce key concepts and foundational knowledge (such as the similarities and differences between ourselves, families and communicates, plant growth, and seasonal changes) that are revisited and built upon in Key Stage 1.

From the outset in reception, children follow Read Write Inc. a Department for Education-validated systematic synthetic phonics programme developed by Ruth Miskin. This scheme supports all children in learning to read and write with accuracy, fluency, and automaticity. It also offers resources for parents to support learning at home. Staff receive regular training and monitoring to ensure a consistent and effective delivery. Children read daily using books that are precisely matched to their current phonics phase, enabling independent reading success.

Targeted interventions are provided for children who are not yet on track to meet national expectations by the end of the year. These interventions are flexible and inclusive, tailored to individual needs, and designed to help children catch up quickly. Parents are involved from the outset to ensure a joined-up approach that maximises each child’s potential to achieve the Early Learning Goals.

A range of formative and summative assessment strategies are used to identify what children know, understand, and need to learn next. The EYFS team gathers evidence of learning through children’s work in their Tapestry learning journals, observations, photographs, and videos, which are regularly shared with parents. This ongoing communication enables parents to engage in their child’s learning journey and to contribute their own observations from home. Families are encouraged to share about their child at home, and a class learning journey is created to document the year’s topics, interests, and experiences. Children are regularly invited to look back upon their learning journey to reflect on and discuss, which supports memory retention and helps consolidate learning.

We use the Wellcomm screening tool to gain understanding of children communication and language development. We use this to inform planning and learning experiences that allow children to fully practice and rehearse their skills. The EYFS team also use this tool to plan carefully matched interventions for those children who need further support.

To ensure accuracy and consistency, our EYFS assessments are moderated both internally and externally with other schools and the EYFS Phase Leader, aligning our judgements with national expectations and government guidance.

We are committed to providing rich, contextual, first-hand learning experiences, especially for children who may not have had such opportunities previously. These include memorable trips and events such as forest school visits or experiencing a farm trip, all carefully planned to enhance and deepen classroom learning.

As the year progresses, we place a strong emphasis on developing children’s independence, gradually increasing opportunities for them to work autonomously. This prepares them effectively for a smooth transition into Year 1. In turn, the Year 1 curriculum and pedagogy are designed to build on the independent learning skills developed in Reception. Collaborative work between the EYFS and Key Stage 1 teams ensures a consistent and coherent approach, strengthening staff confidence and expertise across both year groups.

Our team is deeply committed to creating a nurturing, kind, and joyful environment in which every child feels safe, valued, and respected. We take pride in fostering a positive atmosphere where children's unique personalities are celebrated, and qualities such as resilience, perseverance, and success are recognised and encouraged.

The impact of our EYFS curriculum is evident in the development of well-rounded, happy, and confident children. By the time they transition into Year 1, they possess key knowledge and a strong grasp of overarching concepts that enable them to access and engage with the National Curriculum. Our pupils often become excellent role models within the wider school community.

The quality of teaching and pedagogy is reviewed consistently through monitoring such as learning walks and monitoring learning journeys. The EYFS team works closely to ensure that teaching and pedagogy is focused on the aim of secure, happy and confident learners who have every opportunity to succeed.

The Early Years provision is a core focus within the School Improvement Plan and is supported by a development plan each year. Progress against this plan is closely monitored by the EYFS Lead, Headteacher, and the designated EYFS Governor. This process ensures that all staff have a clear understanding of the Early Years curriculum offer and how it lays a vital foundation for future learning across all subjects of the National Curriculum.

In EYFS, we intend to give children plenty of opportunity to explore Mathematics through their play. We plan adult led learning and provision activities that aim to meet the 6 Mathematics Early Learning Goals that children are assessed against at the end of Reception. Children are encouraged to find Mathematics in the world around them, allowing us to follow the children’s interest whilst sparking their curiosity about number and number patterns.