Planning for Learning
During the day there will be an opportunity for creative play, painting, dough, sticking and collage, water play, outdoor play, dressing up, and a wide variety of jigsaws, toys and books, puzzles, games, farms, cars and train track, dolls etc, as well as larger outdoor equipment such as slides, sandpit, wheeled vehicles, to encourage the larger motor skills.
There is plenty of opportunity for socialising when we visit the toy library, tots groups and outings relating to the network that I am a member.
I monitor your child's progress on a weekly basis. Each child has a file for observational records, developmental progress records, work books and some examples of their work; these are available for you to see at all times and will be presented to you when your child starts school.
Most of the activities that the children take part in are planned and will help them to progress towards the early learning goals Infants and toddlers will not necessarily follow the same schedule as the pre-schoolers. They may need morning naps, etc. While older children engage in free play I try to take some time to play with the infants and toddlers. Feeding time and nappy changing times are good times for interaction with infants and toddlers. Of course all children develop differently and whenever these little ones wish to join in with the older ones (unless it is not a safe activity for them) they will be allowed.
Since infants and toddlers cannot communicate well enough to parents I will fill in the daily diary and along with the monthly 'Newsletter' I will hopefully keep you all well informed of our themes and outings.
Young children, toddlers and babies enjoy a structured schedule that allows for flexibility. A schedule helps the day to flow more smoothly, allows the child to anticipate forthcoming events and aids in achieving a variety of goals. We will adhere to our written schedule to the best of our ability, keeping in mind that anything can happen when children are involved.
The children's learning will be promoted by the teaching of the 6 areas of the curriculum:
Personal, social and emotional development
Communication, language and literacy
Mathematical development
Knowledge and understanding of the world
Physical development
Creative development
Most children will be expected to achieve the early learning goals by the end of the foundation stage. My planned curriculum will hopefully help the children make good progress towards and where appropriate beyond these goals.
Children aged three, four and five are constantly encountering new experiences and seeking to understand them in order to extend their skills, develop their confidence and build on what they already know. They learn in many different ways. Practitioners have a crucial role in this learning and should draw on a range of teaching and care strategies and knowledge of child development. Children deepen their understanding by playing, talking, observing, planning, questioning, experimenting, testing, repeating, reflecting and responding to adults and each other. Practitioners need to plan learning experiences of the highest quality, considering both children's needs and achievements and the range of learning experiences that will help them make progress. Well-planned play is a key way in which children learn with enjoyment and challenge during the foundation stage
Monitoring of each child's progress throughout the foundation stage is essential to ensure that they are making progress and those particular difficulties in any of the areas of learning, whatever the cause, are identified and addressed. Prompt and appropriate action at this stage could help to prevent children from developing learning difficulties later in their school career.
I will now be using long, medium and short-term plans; these are available for you to view any time you wish. The long and medium term plans will be displayed on the wall and the short-term plans are in a folder. In this folder is a weekly report of how the activities went, what the children learned that week and any areas of learning and stepping stones to be born in mind for the following week.
The long-term plan is drawn up in preparation for up to a year ahead. It sets out in broad terms what I intend the children to learn. The medium term plan bridges the gap between the broad outline of the long-term plan and the day-to-day detail of the short-term plan. The short term plan is based on the long-term plan and developed using ongoing observations and informal assessment of the children. This is drawn up on a weekly basis, it includes, for example, sequences of experiences and activities designed to promote new learning or to consolidate or apply things just learned. This is a guide and is not followed rigidly it will be changed to take account of interests and needs of the children and to capitalize one unplanned events, particularly those initiated by the children and is drawn up with individual or groups of children in mind.
I hope this helps you to know what your children will be doing during the day and if you have any questions feel free to ask me.
