Early Years Room
The ratio is one member of staff to eight (over three years of age).
In this area of the nursery our aim is to continue to provide a very warm, caring and secure environment. Many of the foundation activities that begun in 'Big Nursery' will be continued in the Early Years Room.
Throughout the course of the day we are constantly preparing the children socially for school. By this we mean that children will learn that there are times in the day when they will be expected to tidy up, be quiet, sit still, concentrate and listen.
They will also learn that they will need to be able to go to the toilet by themselves, and to dress and undress themselves, and to be responsible for their own belongings. All of this will help the children to adjust more easily to school and feel confident in the school environment.
The emphasis in this room will be on early literacy, numeracy and the development of personal, social and emotional skills. Presented as six areas of learning, they provide a foundation for later achievement.
The areas of learning and development in the Early Years Foundation Stage are:
- personal, social and emotional development
- communication, language and literacy
- problem solving, reasoning and numeracy
- knowledge and understanding of the world
- physical development
- creative development
Aims of the Early Years Room
We aim to ensure that when children leave Silks Farm Nursery School to go to primary school they are confident, independent, take pride in their achievements and enjoy learning.
We aim to provide a high quality foundation for children, with the possibility of rapid advance in attainment for children who are able and well motivated. Most children will:
- Be able to write their own names.
- Have good observational skills.
- Possess some preliminary reading skills.
- Have good pencil control.
- Be creative using a variety of media.
- Can count to ten - many may be able to count much higher.
- Can sort and match colours and shapes.
- Have a basic understanding of the variety of life forms.
- Have a basic understanding of common materials and their properties.
- Have an appreciation of French making them feel at ease with foreign languages.
The organisation of the Early Years Room is based on the following principles:
- Continual assessment of children's progress with parent evenings organised to discuss a child's individual progress.
- Orderly structured atmosphere.
- Broad curriculum plus other specialist activities and projects.
- Creative projects and activities.
- Close co-operation with parents.
- Computer assisted learning.
"Children are developing good information technology skills through the use of a computer, metals detectors and programmable toys such as Bee-Bot". Ofsted, November '06