Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)
Welcome to the Early Years Foundation Stage
Every child deserves the best possible start in life and the support that enables them to fulfil their potential. Children develop quickly in the early years and a child’s experiences between birth and age five have a major impact on their future life chances. A secure, safe and happy childhood is important in its own right. Good parenting and high quality early learning together provide the foundation children need to make the most of their abilities and talents as they grow up.
The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) sets the standards that we strive to meet to ensure that children learn and develop well and are kept healthy and safe. It promotes teaching and learning to ensure children’s ‘school readiness’ and gives children the broad range of knowledge and skills that provide the right foundation for good future progress through school and life.
Purpose and Aims
EYFS seeks to provide:
Quality and consistency, so that every child makes good progress and no child gets left behind
A secure foundation through learning and development opportunities which are planned around the needs and interests of each individual child and are assessed and reviewed regularly;
Partnership working between practitioners and with parents and/or carers;
Equality of opportunity and anti-discriminatory practice, ensuring that every child is included and supported.
Overarching Principles of the EYFS
Four guiding principles shape our practice in Early Years.
These are:
Every child is a unique child, who is constantly learning and can be resilient, capable, confident and self-assured;
Positive realtionships enable children learn to be strong and independent;
Enabling environments support children to learn and develop well. Providing experiences that respond to their individual needs and developing a strong partnership between practitioners and parents and/or carers.
Children develop and learn in different ways and at different rates.
The EYFS framework covers the education and care of all children in early years’ provision, including children with special educational needs and disabilities.
The Seven Areas of Learning and Development:
There are seven areas of learning and development that shapes our educational programmes in EYFS. All areas of learning and development are important and inter-connected.
Three areas are particularly important for building a foundations, for igniting children’s curiosity and enthusiasm for learning, forming relationships and thriving
These three areas, the prime areas, are:
Communication and Language development is supported by giving children opportunities to speak and listen in a range of situations while developing their confidence and self expression skills. This all takes place in an intersesting language rich environment.
Physical Development is encouraged by providing opportunities for young children to be active in a range of settings; and to develop their co-ordination, control, and movement. Children are also encouraged to investigate and understand the importance of this physical activity, and making healthy life choices.
Personal, Social and Emotional Development is about helping children to develop a positive sense of themselves, and others; to form positive relationships and develop respect for others; to develop their social skills and learn how to manage their feelings; to understand appropriate behaviour in a range of situations; and to develop confidence in their abilities.
There are also four specific areas in which children must be supported in order to strengthen and apply the prime areas of learning.
These specific areas are:
Literacy allows children to build on communication and language skills, encouraging links between sounds and letters to develop basic reading and writing skills. A wide range of reading and written materials are provided in order to Children are given access to a wide range of reading materials including books, poems, and other written materials to ignite their interest.
Mathematics Developing a strong grounding in number is essential so that all children develop the necessary building blocks to excel mathematically. Children should be able to count confidently, develop a deep understanding of the numbers to 10, the relationships between them and the patterns within those numbers. A wide range of frequent and varied opportunities are provided to build and apply this understanding - such as using manipulatives, including small pebbles and tens frames for organising counting - through these children will develop a secure base of knowledge and vocabulary from which mastery of mathematics is built.
Understanding the World involves supporting children and providing experiences for them to make sense of their physical world and their community through opportunities to explore, observe and find out about people, places, and the environment
Expressive Arts and Design enables children to explore and play with a wide range of media and materials, as well as providing opportunities and encouragement for sharing their thoughts, ideas and feelings through a variety of activities in art, music, movement, dance, role-play, and design and technology.
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