At Kates Hill Community Primary School, we place great value on the development of children as individuals and providing them with the skills, knowledge and understanding that they need in order to prepare them for the challenges in Key Stage One and beyond. Our aim in the EYFS is to build strong foundations rooted in academic success as well as moral and spiritual development, so that ultimately our pupils can go on to be active citizens of society and happy, curious life-long learners. Our curriculum is therefore the cultural capital we know our pupils need so that they can gain the knowledge, skills and understanding they require for success. They can only do that if we embed the right habits for learning through the EYFS Characteristics of Effective Teaching and Learning – Play and Exploration, Active Learning and Creative and Critical Thinking. Many of our pupils arrive well below national expectations for their age and a high proportion come from disadvantaged backgrounds and with complex needs. We have to teach them how to listen, speak and meet the high expectations for behaviour by working together and being kind. As such, we prioritise personal, social and emotional development and communication and language in the Nursery Curriculum. Our enabling environment and warm, skilful adult interactions support the children as they begin to link learning to their play and exploration. As the pupils move into Reception, we invest time and energy into helping pupils set and reflect on their own goals by aiming high and developing a love of reading, writing and number. This is delivered through a holistic curriculum which maximises opportunities for meaningful cross-curricular links and learning experiences as well as promoting the unique child by offering extended periods of play and sustained thinking following children’s interests and ideas. We value imagination and creativity and seek to create a sense of enjoyment and fascination in learning through a vibrant continuous indoor and outdoor provision.

Pupils learn through a balance of child-initiated and adult-directed activities. The timetable is carefully structured so that children have rigorous directed teaching in the Read Write Inc, systematic synthetic Phonics programme, White Rose Maths and a bespoke Topic everyday with regular circle time sessions to focus on PSED. These sessions are followed by child iniated play and group work. This focused group time means the teacher can systematically check for understanding, identify and respond to misconceptions quickly and provide real-time verbal feedback which results in a strong impact on the acquisition of new learning. Children are provided with plenty of time to engage in ‘exploration’ throughout the variety of experiences carefully planned to engage and challenge them in the provision. Learning in both inside and outside classrooms are given equal importance. It is also planned in a cross-curricular way to enable all aspects of the children’s development, which include Understanding the World and Expressive Art and Design, as well as to promote sustained thinking and active learning. After some research, we introduced a new concept into EYFS to encourage all children to seek challenges, ‘have a go’ and try new activities by completing planned challenges throughout the week. The Rainbow Challenges are planned purposeful play based learning experiences based on our assessments and the needs of the children in different areas of learning. Throughout the week children are encouraged to complete up to seven different challenges and on completion, they can gain a coloured stick to add to the rainbow challenge wall. Each challenge has a different colour stick assigned and by the end of the week, the children should be able to make a rainbow with their coloured sticks. Challenges are differentiated to ensure all children can access the learning opportunities, take risks and succeed. The children are strongly motivated by the Rainbow Challenges and experience satisfaction and deep learning as they play. In their play, children are sustaining concentration for longer periods of time and are communicating with others to maintain and develop their play. The EYFS Phase Leader regularly asks questions such as; “What do our children need to learn or are curious about? What embedded learning have we observed in this area? What can be changed to exploit the learning and interests of the children/individuals in this area?” In this way, we ensure that the children have agency over their environment and that the provision leads to depth of learning across the curriculum. Reading is at the heart of our curriculum. Children follow the rigorous and highly successful Read, Write Inc phonics program. We have a daily shared reading session with the children in Nursery and Reception where high-quality texts are chosen and a story is read over the course of a week. We follow White Rose maths in Reception with an emphasis on studying key skills of number, calculation and shape so that pupils develop a deep understanding and the acquisition of mathematical language. Pupils learn through a daily maths lesson which are then applied to their own learning during exploration. Nursery pupils begin to develop these key skills during daily maths where they explore sorting, quantities, shape, number and counting awareness. These early mathematical experiences are carefully designed to help pupils remember the content they have been taught and to support them with integrating their new knowledge across the breadth of their experiences and into larger concepts. Our inclusive approach means that all children learn together but we have a range of additional intervention and support practices to enhance and scaffold the learning and development of children who may not be reaching their full potential. This includes, for example: 1-1 phonics, Wellcomm and fine motor development. Staff also use ‘pinny time’ which is a quick, on the spot intervention focused on sight words, blending and number retention with targeted individuals. These characteristics of effective learning are viewed as an integral part of all areas of learning and are reflected in our observations of children. Our regular monitoring of teaching and learning includes coaching and feedback from the phase leader using the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale so that teachers develop a good subject knowledge and are effectively supported. We tailor our staff CPD to be early years specific and are focused on moderating outcomes across the phase so that every member of our team feels confident in making accurate judgements about where individual pupils are and their next steps for learning

It is vital that our curriculum meets the needs of all of our children, including our disadvantaged pupils and those with SEND, therefore we spend time looking at and evaluating how children are learning. This is achieved through talking to children, looking at their work, observing their learning experiences and analysing data and progress by year group, class, groups and individuals. Every member of staff uses ongoing observational assessment to identify children’s starting points and plan experiences which ensure progress. We use this information on a weekly basis to plan learning experiences and next steps so that knowledge and skills are built cumulatively. During each assessment window, three times a year, teachers update the progress that children have made onto Integris which allows us to assess the impact of teaching and evaluate whether it has been enough. Evidence of children’s learning including observations, work samples, photographs and contributions from parents are kept in ‘learning journeys’ which the children use to reflect on their progress through pupil voice. Our curriculum and its delivery ensures that children make good progress. Children in our early years, on average, arrive with much lower starting points than national. Pupils make good progress toward their age-related expectations before transitioning into Year One. We believe our high standards are due to the enriched play-based exploration alongside the rigour of assessment and teaching the children have as they move through the early years. A rich diet of balanced learning experiences is undoubtedly the best way to develop happy, curious children.