Curriculum – Early Years Foundation Stage
Curriculum Overview
View our EYFS Policy on our Policies page
View our 30 Hour Nursery Provision Policy on our Policies page
View our Supporting Children and Young People with Medical Conditions Policy on our Policies page
Download: Nursery – Long Term Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Reception – Long Term Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Reception – Summer 1 Overview 2025 [PDF]
Download: Nursery – Spring 2 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Reception – Spring 2 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Nursery – Spring 1 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Reception – Spring 1 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Nursery – Autumn 2 Oveview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Reception – Autumn 2 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Nursery – Autumn 1 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Download: Reception – Autumn 1 Overview 2024-2025 [PDF]
Follow our X feeds to see all the wonderful enrichment activities we have been doing in EYFS.
EYFS Curriculum Drivers
Language – In the Early Years, the development of language is at the centre of everything we do. In Nursery and Reception, children are exposed to a language rich environment, linked to their interests and the world around them. Adults are skilled in modelling language and extending vocabulary through their daily interactions with children. These quality interactions support the children’s ability to use a wider vocabulary, extend their sentences, talk about thinking, tell stories, describe a range of emotions and develop the ability to self-regulate. Effective language development is crucial as it impacts on all areas of learning. (Faith in Our Voice)
Diversity and Inclusion – From an early age, we celebrate and talk about the diversity of the St Oswald’s family and the wider community. Children’s are given opportunities to talk about their life stories and families. We support them in talking about the differences they notice and encourage positive discussions about different appearances such as skin colours and hair types. The learning environment is developed to reflect different families and cultures and we enjoy learning about different celebrations including Christmas, Divali and Chinese New Year. We use a range of stories, rhymes and poems to enhance the children’s understanding of our diverse world. Developing positive relationships is key to effective early years provision and we promote a respectful and supportive culture. Practitioners know the children well and ensure that all children, regardless of their needs, are supported in learning and growing at their own pace. Children are provided with the support and opportunities needed to ensure they have an equal chance to thrive. (Faith in Others)
Resilience – Life is full of challenges and in the EYFS we start to develop the skills and habits that will help children to deal with challenges in the here and now and throughout their lives. These early skills help the children to bounce back after challenges: from problem solving in their play and using different tools, to bereavement, moving house, or starting school. We do this by helping children to develop positive relationships with adults and peers, developing independence and self-help skills and through exploring different feeling and learning how to manage these. Adults act as role models, demonstrating that when things go wrong, we can carry on, that we like challenges and display a clear ‘have a go’ attitude. We use the Mr Men and Little Miss characters to help reinforce the characteristics of effective learning, for example talking about how Mr Clever has his own ideas and Mr Bump keeps on trying and never gives up. (Faith in Ourselves)
Enrichment – Enrichment activities are important because they give the children real life, first-hand experience of the wider world. We carefully plan and range of activities, experiences and outside visitors to support and enhance our curriculum. We love to invite special visitors into school as part of our topics. Our visitors include a range of people including: paramedics, dentists, police officers, priests and bakers. As well as arranged and trusted visitors, we take the children out into the local environment, for example, we may go for a walk around the local area, visit the vets, library, shops or church. Visits beyond our local area include farms and the beach. (Faith in our Journey)
Intent – EYFS
At St Oswald’s Catholic Primary School, the EYFS curriculum is designed to encourage independent, inquisitive and happy learners, with the Gospel values at the heart of everything we do. We place a strong emphasis on the religious, spiritual, moral and cultural development of all our pupils. We recognise that all children are unique, celebrating and welcoming differences within our school community.
Our EYFS curriculum is designed to provide motivating first-hand experiences whilst supporting children in building resilience, interpersonal skills and a love of learning. We recognise that children are eager to explore the world around them, seeking new experiences and knowledge, and should be provided with opportunities to engage their inquisitive minds. Through a well organised, stimulating environment, the children are provided with opportunities to organise their own play and demonstrate positive characteristics of effective learning – playing and exploring (engagement), active learning (motivation) and creating and thinking critically (thinking).
We recognise children’s prior learning and various starting points, and aim to build on the wealth of knowledge and skills children already have when they arrive. We work in close partnership with parents and carers throughout the year to support their learning and to encourage children to reach their full potential. The curriculum evolves to provide children with important foundational skills and knowledge that will later be built upon and embedded in KS1.
Implementation – EYFS
Nursery and Reception work closely together to ensure continuity and progression across the Foundation stage. Timetables are organised effectively to ensure a balance of teacher directed and child-initiated activities. We use the environment to ensure the children’s needs are met through continuous provision and enhanced provision both indoors and outside, and by following their interests. The characteristics of effective learning are viewed as an integral part of all areas of learning and are reflected in our observations and assessments of children. The children are introduced to different aspects of learning through Mr Men and Little Miss characters such as Mr Bump who likes to keep trying or Little Miss Curious who likes to investigate.
The curriculum is planned in a cross-curricular way to enable all aspects of the children’s development. Collaborative planning, involving teachers and teaching assistants, takes place on a weekly basis to ensure all adults are involved in evaluating learning opportunities and planning the next steps for learning. Topic themes in the EYFS are based on foundational ideas coming from the EYFS curriculum: from ‘All about me’ as part of PSED, to ‘Our Sensational Seasons’ related to UW.
Time is allocated to allow for the rigorous directed teaching in Literacy, Mathematics and Phonics. These sessions are followed by group work where children work with a member of staff to develop their individual targets. This focused group time enables the teacher to support and challenge children at a level specific to their individual learning needs, systematically checking for understanding and responding to misconceptions quickly. These groups are fluid and flexible according to children’s progress and needs. Immediate verbal feedback is provided which results in a strong impact on the acquisition of new learning.
Throughout all areas of the curriculum, Reading and Writing are prioritised and key vocabulary is prominent. Phonics is taught through the ‘Read Write Inc’ systematic synthetic phonics programme. Children enjoy reading a variety of books through quality shared, guided and individual reading sessions. Reading for pleasure is prioritised through the enjoyment of daily story sessions, accessing a range of books in class reading areas and exploring books in different areas of learning. Starting in Nursery the children are able to choose their own reading for pleasure books to take home and share with their families. As the children’s phonics knowledge and reading ability progresses, they also take home reading books tailored to their individual phonics level.
We follow the ‘White Rose’ Maths Mastery approach in Reception with an emphasis on studying key skills of number, calculation and shape so that pupils develop deep understanding and the acquisition of Mathematical language. Pupils learn through games and tasks using concrete manipulatives which are then rehearsed and applied to their own learning during exploration and in adult directed activities.
Our inclusive approach means that all children learn together, however we also use a range of additional interventions to support, enhance and scaffold children who may not be reaching their potential or to help move on children who are having difficulties making progress. Some examples of this include our ‘Think Yourself Great’ programme aimed at supporting children with low confidence, poor self-esteem or behaviour issues or a range of funky fingers activities to develop fine motor skills. Improving and extending the communication and language skills of our children is a priority at St Oswald’s. Using the WellComm and NELI programmes in Nursery and Reception respectively ensures that children requiring additional support with communication and language skills are identified and catered for through a structured programme.
At St Oswald’s we use both formative and summative assessments to inform medium term and weekly planning for our younger children. We start with a baseline assessment at the beginning of the school year. Ongoing individual observations of children’s learning, play and interests, are used to support teachers in making assessments and inform potential next steps for each child. Assessment information is also used to support the identification of, and planning for, children requiring targeted interventions. These interventions are then planned for by the teacher using SMART targets. They are delivered by teachers and TAs. All interventions are reviewed after an eight-week cycle and the impact recorded.
Observations of learning are shared with families on a regular basis through the Class Dojo app, providing opportunities for parents and carers to share in their children’s successes and comment on their achievements. We also encourage families to share learning from home or ‘wow’ moments by adding these to their individual portfolios.
The progress of individual children is monitored throughout the year and teachers discuss this during termly Pupil Progress meetings, allowing us to assess the impact of our teaching and ensure intervention measures are in place to help children that need it. Moderation sessions are held within year groups and across the EYFS Phase. Staff also attend sessions facilitated by the LA in order to moderate judgements with colleagues from other schools, ensuring judgements are accurate. These judgements feed into the Statutory EYFS Profile, recording each child’s level of development at the end of the EYFS.
Nursery Mouse Club and Home Learning Challenges
Download: Mouse Club 2023 [PDF]
Download: Mouse Club Welcome Letter [PDF]
All children in Nursery will be given a toy mouse within the first few weeks of starting with us. Mouse will help them to develop skills which will prepare them for learning in the early years. Mouse will live at home with the children and will help them with home learning challenges. Along with the mouse you will receive a pack of useful information about ways in which you can help at home. This ranges from establishing and keeping good routines around bedtime and toilet training, through to helping your child with reading and writing.
We invite families into nursery once each half term to join in with our stay and play activities. The dates for this will be shared at the beginning of each half term.
Mouse home learning challenges will also be shared from time to time throughout the year and families are asked to send in photos, videos or notes, through class dojo, telling us about what the children have done at home with mouse for such challenges. The children love to share their news and achievements from home. When you send them in we put them on the board in class and the children have the opportunity to talk about and share their news from home.
If you have any questions about mouse club or would like support or advice in any area of your child’s development please ask one of the nursery team or send us a message through class dojo and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
Nursery Library
Early reading skills are developed in nursery through a range of pre-phonics and early phonics activities. This ranges from listening to sounds in the environment, learning about rhymes to beginning to hear sounds in words. To support this at home we ask that children are regularly read to. The importance of bedtime stories is paramount to children’s mastery of language and literacy skills. We invite you and your child to come to our Nursery Library every Friday (8:30-9:00 for the morning session or 12:30-1:00 for the afternoon session), to choose a book to borrow. We ask you to share the book with them, looking at the pictures and read the story to them, talking about characters and what is happening in the story.
We encourage families to come in and choose books with the children, however, if you are unable to do this we will choose a book with your child and send it home for you to share at home. If you are unable to come to our library sessions please remember to bring the book and bag back each Friday for us to change with your child.
Nursery Lending Library
In addition to our book library, we invite you to come along to our ‘Lending Library’. The library contains a wide variety of educational resources including story sacks, games and activity packs that you can borrow, all free of charge. All that we ask is that resources are shared with the children, enjoyed and well looked after.
Once registered for the ‘Lending Library’ you can borrow the resources on a weekly basis – when your resource is returned to nursery on the planned return date, you can then choose another item to borrow from the library. To ensure the upkeep and quality of the lending library we would ask a nominal fee of £2.50 for any lost or damaged resources.
Lending library will be open at the same time as our book library, every Friday from 8:30-9:00 for the morning session and 12:30-1:00 for the afternoon session.
Homework in Reception
Throughout the year we will send home a range of different activities that you can do at home to support your child’s learning. This will link with the seven areas of learning: Communication & Language, Personal & Social Development, Physical Development, Literacy, Mathematics, Understanding the World and Expressive Arts and Design.
Homework will alternate between phonics and maths, including some activities based on our half termly topics or relevant celebration weeks or events and will be sent home in homework books. These books will be sent home on Tuesday and should be returned to school each Monday (or before) for marking and for the new homework task to be issued to the children.
The Classdojo app is a fantastic tool for sharing learning and integral to the strong home/school links we strive for in St Oswald’s. On your child’s class story, you will find informative posts to help with your home learning such as phonics videos, links and top tips for reading with your child.
Children will receive a book bag containing a reading record shortly after joining us in Reception. Each week children will take home a ‘reading for pleasure’ book from our class libraries. These books are chosen by the children and provide families with quality literature based on the children’s interests to share together at home. We do not expect the children to read the reading for pleasure book to you!
As children begin gaining more confidence in their phonics and blending, they will receive an additional book based on their phonics level. Children will have read this book at school during their phonics lessons and bringing it home will be a chance to celebrate their growing confidence in reading with families. Word cards containing ‘red words’ or non-decodable words will be sent home in bookbags for children to practise. These words must be learnt on sight and need constantly reinforcing at school and at home to help children gain confidence when reading captions and sentences.
Other Important Information
Summer Term 2024
Monday – Prayer Assembly
The children gather each Monday morning to share Sunday’s Gospel and explore current initiatives from the Catholic Church. These sessions provide a great opportunity to teach the Gospel Values to children at a level that they can understand and implement in our EYFS setting. Later in the year some of the older Nursery children begin to go along to the assembly as part of their transition preparation for going to Reception.
Monday – Reception PE
Please ensure children in Reception have a full PE kit (t-shirt, shorts and pumps) in school ready for this. PE kits can be left in school and taken home for washing at the end of each half term (if you wish to wash kits weekly please ensure they are back for the following week). Children cover a range of PE skills through dance, gymnastics and games lessons. Please make sure that all items are clearly labelled with your child’s name.
Friday – Praise Assembly
On Friday afternoons we gather together for our weekly celebration of the amazing things our children do. Certificates are awarded for outstanding behaviour and star of the week. All children will get the chance to receive a certificate for their hard work throughout the year. During this assembly we also celebrate dojo points achieved across our house point teams and attendance. Weekly class attendance winners are able to convert their points to pounds and the winning class of the half term can then use these pounds for a class reward of their choice. Later in the year some of the older Nursery children begin to go along to the assembly as part of their transition preparation for going to Reception. Prior to this and for the younger children in Nursery, these things are celebrated in class and they all have the opportunity to receive certificates in a smaller, age appropriate gathering.
Friday – Nursery PE
Nursery children have their PE sessions in the hall on Fridays. PE kits are not necessary for Nursery children.
Additional Information for Parents
Download: St Oswalds Nursery Welcome Booklet 2023 [PDF]
Download: Class Dojo at St Oswald [PDF]
Download: Maths Workshop for Parents – EYFS [PDF]
Starting School Together – guides for helping children with different areas of learning:
Download: Happy Talk [PDF] – Most early years teachers agree that, for a child starting school, being able to talk about what they think and explain how they feel are more important than any academic skills.
Download: Listen and Learn [PDF] – School involves a lot of listening – to their teacher and other adults – so practising good listening skills before your child starts school will help them get off to a great start.
Download: Make a mark, make a start [PDF] – Ideas for mark making, art, and early writing activities.
Download: Physical Development [PDF] – A guide to helping children with their developing physical skills as they approach the start of school.
Download: The Numbers Game [PDF] – Help your child to prepare for learning maths at school with these simple games, rhymes and everyday activities.
The following external links provide information for Parents and carers about learning and development within the Early Years (Nursery and Reception) and a variety of websites that can be used to support different areas of learning.
External Link: https://www.gl-assessment.co.uk/assessments/products/wellcomm/ Information about WellComm (used in Nursery).
External Link: https://www.ruthmiskin.com/parents/ – Information, advice and frequently asked questions about our Read, Write, Inc. phonics scheme.
External Link: https://whiteroseeducation.com/ –
Information, videos and downloads about the White Rose Maths scheme of learning.
External Link: https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/shows/my-first-festivals – Interesting videos exploring and celebrating different cultures.
External Link: https://www.stoandsts.co.uk/ – Mass times and information about our Parish community.
External Link: PhonicsPlay – a site packed with interactive phonics games.
External Link: Phoneme Pop Game
External Link: CBeebies – uses a combination of puppets, animation, and a range of different hosts to teach young children skills such as letters, numbers, shapes, colours and emotions.
External Link: CBeebies Numberblocks – Covers key maths topics and skills that help children to build natural number sense and a solid foundation of mathematical understanding.
External Link: Oxford Owl – Interactive books and reading activities to share with your child at home.
External Link: Fun with Spot – A firm favourite with pre-schoolers, Eric Hill’s lovable puppy Spot introduces children to new experiences through friendship and play. Fun activities including making your own Spot story.
External Link: BBC School Radio – Nursery Songs
External Link: NRICH – EYFS Books linked with Mathematical Development
External Link: Top Marks – Games of varying quality to support a range of areas of learning
External Link: Cosmic Kids Yoga
External Link: Let’s Talk PANTS – This link takes you to the NSPCC website which will support you to help your child to stay safe and have confidence to say no if the feel vulnerable. There is a video with a song that the children will enjoy and delivers a valuable message for children.