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Chesterton PlaygroupParents' Guide to the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework (EYFS)

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) is how the Government and early year’s professionals describe the time in your child’s life between birth and age 5. This is a very important stage as it helps your child get ready for school as well as preparing them for their future learning and successes. From when your child is born up until the age of 5, their early year’s experience should be happy, active, exciting, fun and secure; and support their development, care and learning needs. At Chesterton Playgroup we are registered to deliver the EYFS and we must follow a legal document called the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework.

The EYFS framework sets out:
  • The legal welfare requirements that everyone registered to look after children must follow to keep your child safe and promote their welfare
  • The 7 areas of learning and development which guide professionals’ engagement with your child’s play and activities as they learn new skills and knowledge
  • Assessments that will tell you about your child’s progress through the EYFS
  • Expected levels that your child should reach at age 5, usually the end of the reception year; these expectations are called the "Early Learning Goals (ELGs)"

The 7 areas of development:
  • Physical
  • Literacy
  • Communication and Language
  • Personal, Social and Emotional
  • Mathematics
  • Understanding the World
  • Expressive arts and design

The seven areas of development are used to plan your child’s learning and activities, observations will be made and next steps will be planned for each child so that keyworkers and staff can follow a child's unique needs and interests.
Children in the EYFS learn by playing and exploring, being active, and through creative and critical thinking which takes place both indoors and outside.
Each child will have a keyworker who will make observations and write two year checks and termly reports for your child. The key person also compiles learning journeys for your child and provides a link with the family and the pre-school.

When a child has turned two years old they have a two year check with the health visitor and also a two year check at pre-school that involves written summary of how your child is progressing against the 3 prime areas of learning:
  • Communication and language;
  • Physical development;
  • Personal, social and emotional development.

This two year check will be discussed with parents during a meeting with their child’s keyworker. This check will highlight areas where your child is progressing well and if there are any areas where they might need some extra help or support. The keyworker will discuss any issues or concerns with the family and plan next steps with parents during the two year check meeting.

When a child is ready to move to school the pre-school staff will compile a report for the child’s foundation stage teacher, discussing the report with parents before it is sent. Visits by the staff will be made to a child’s new school where possible and every possible avenue will be explored in order to make a child’s transition to school as smooth as possible.

Downloads
What to expect in the Early Years Foundation Stage
Guide to Starting School    
Musical Development Matters    
Development Matters In the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)    
The Road to School    

Vision and Ethos

Our curriculum is based around the seven areas of learning for children.
We form our assessments on children's development using the development matters program which is from birth until the end of the reception year.

Our aims for children are based on their individual abilities and skills, so will vary for each child, but our broad aims for children when they move up to school is for:
  • each child to be able to recognise their name in different places, which is great preparation for finding school drawers and pegs
  • to be able to write their name if able, in particular the first letter of their name
  • to be able to put their coats and shoes on by themselves, which is also great preparation for PE lessons at school and going out to play
  • to be able to listen and be attentive during group time
  • to be able to follow simple instructions
  • to be able to communicate their needs with adults and peers and hold a two way conversation
  • to instil a love of reading and listening to stories, research shows that this increases children's vocabulary and brain development. Children have better school readiness and make more progress across the curriculum when they are read too regularly.
  • develop skills through phonological activities and games, moving through these activities we will include listening to letter sounds and recognising initial letter sounds.

Through developing these skills we also want all children to develop numeracy skills, learn about other cultures and festivals, develop respect for others and learn to be expressive and creative. The most important thing is for the children to have fun and learn while forming great friendships at playgroup.

You can see through our weekly blog our topics and activities what we plan with the group and all children have their own goals they are working towards and skills they are developing. It is important to the staff team that every child is valued and included in our setting and we appreciate the uniqueness of each child.
Chesterton Playgroup            The Village Hall            Alchester Road            Chesterton            Oxfordshire            OX26 1UN
Contact Details Julia Shillito and Claire Hall 01869 360593 (Playgroup Manager Team)

General e-mail contact admin@chestertonplaygroup.org.uk