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Cedar Park School

Be Kind. Be Inspired. Believe.

EYFS

Welcome to the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS)

 

Welcome to all our Cedar Park children and their families.

We look forward to an action-packed half-term full of fun learning.

Please see a member of staff if you have any questions.

 

Mrs Franek and Mrs Van

  

The EYFS Team:

Mrs Franek - Nursery teacher, Forest School and Early Years Lead 

Mrs Van - Reception teacher

and our fantastic teaching assistants: 

Nursery based

Miss Ashfield (Monday-Friday)

 

Reception based

Mrs Warner HLTA and EYFS PPA teacher cover 

(Monday-Friday)

Miss Taylor (Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoon)

 

 

 

Our topic for Spring One is:

 

'People Who Help Us’

 

 

Week 1:  Postal Workers.

Have you visited a post office – what did you see? What do you need on a letter or parcel before posting it? What are weighing scales in a post office used for? How are letters and parcels delivered? 

 

Key text:

Nursery: ‘The Jolly Postman and Other People's Letters' by Allan Ahlberg. We will read a letter from Goldilocks, a postcard addressed to a giant up a beanstalk... and even a note for the Big Bad Wolf! 

Can you write a party invitation and include the following information?

  1. To…
  2. Time…
  3. Place…
  4. From…

Reception: TBA

 

 

Week 2: The Emergency Services – Fire Service. If we need a fire engine in an emergency, what number do we call? Do you know what’s inside a fire engine? How do fire engines work? Do they have a siren? How do firefighters put out fires? What do they wear? Why are there ladders on a fire engine? What colour are fire engines?

Key text:

Nursery: 'Barn on Fire' Usborne Farmyard Tales, by Heather Amery.

Reception: Non-fiction text. We will be discussing features of non-fiction books e.g. bold titles and sub-headings, photographs, bullet or numbered points, labels and captions, and writing our own pages.

Can you draw a picture of a fire engine and label it? For example: hose, ladder, door, wheel ….

 

 

Week 3: Medical Centre – surgeries and hospitals. Where do we go if we feel unwell? How do we check-in when we arrive? What is a prescription? Where do we take a prescription to? Sometimes patients visit a hospital for an appointment and other times they might need to stay in hospital – who helps them while they are there? If we need an ambulance in an emergency, what number do we call? What does a paramedic do? What is inside an ambulance? Does an ambulance have a siren?

Key text:

Nursery and Reception:

Non-fiction. We will be writing a non-fiction page. 

Can you write a short prescription? You will need to include the following information:

  1. The name of the patient
  2. Their age
  3. What they need e.g. medicine for earache OR bandage for leg
  4. Your name e.g. Doctor….

 

Week 4: Vets. We will be talking about the animals that might need to visit a vet and how they could be treated. What does a vet do? Do they keep poorly animals overnight in their hospital area? Can you name some animals that we call ‘pets’? Can a snake be a pet? Do vets visit farms?

Key text: 

Nursery: Mog the Cat  (various titles by Judith Kerr)

Reception: Mog and the V.E.T, by Judith Kerr

Picture books include: ‘Six Dinner Sid’ by Inga Moore / Where's Spot? by Eric Hill

Can you draw your favourite pet and label your picture e.g. ‘foot’ / ‘tail’ / ‘fur’ / ‘leg’(as appropriate).

 

Week 5: Ticket collectors.

Nursery and Reception:

Key text: The Train Ride, by June Crebbin 

What is a steam train? What is a journey? Can you describe a steam train?  

Can you make a train ticket and write your name and where you are travelling to on it? Can you make a lighthouse using junk materials?

 

Week 6:

We will be celebrating Chinese New Year. Which animal is this year named after? How many animals are there in the Chinese Zodiac? Can you name some or all of them? Which animal year where you born in?

Can you name some traditional Chinese dishes? What are chopsticks and how are they used?

 

For further information about our learning, please look out for our half-termly EYFS Curriculum Newsletter which will shortly be available at the bottom of our class page.

 

In addition to the information given here, there will be a more detailed overview of your child's focused learning posted every week on Tapestry. 

 

Please feel free to upload any learning or achievements at home into your child's Tapestry Learning Journal.

 

Mrs Franek, Mrs Van and the EYFS team.

 

 

Schemes that support our learning in EYFS:

 

EYFS Phonics:

Supersonic Phonics Friends:

https://www.supersonicphonicfriends.co.uk/

 

Nursery:

Maths 

https://masterthecurriculum.co.uk/nursery-maths-scheme/

 

Reception:

Power Maths

https://www.pearson.com/international-schools/british-curriculum/primary-curriculum/power-maths.html

Read to Write

https://www.literacycounts.co.uk/readtowrite

 

Nursery and Reception:

 

PSED

http://www.jigsaweducationgroup.com/

 

 

PE

https://pe.getset4education.co.uk/

https://pe.getset4education.co.uk/lesson/eyfs/introduction-to-pe-unit-1?years=1006,1007

 

Art

https://www.accessart.org.uk/primary-art-curriculum/

 

Developing Experts (Science) - EYFS planning overview will be available shortly 

https://www.developingexperts.com/

 

Music

https://charanga.com/site/

 

RE

http://www.jigsaweducationgroup.com/

 

 

 

 

A weekly guide:
Reading and shared wordless books


Wednesday (return day)
Reading and shared (wordless) books, reading records and library books:
These need to be returned so they can be changed and ready to go home every Friday. 
Nursery children will not have a shared (wordless) book until after half-term.

 

Friday (going home day)
Reading and shared (wordless) books and reading records:
Books go home. Please make a short comment about your child's reading and interest in their book/s. If you have any queries, please come and see us.

Reading books and records should be kept in your child's book bag every day as they may be shared with an adult in school (see above for return details). 

 

 

 


Library:
We have a fantastic school library with an excellent range of picture books for our EYFS children to enjoy choosing from and to share with their family at home. 
We plan to visit the library every Friday to select one book to bring home every week. Please make sure that your child's library book is returned after five days (the following Wednesday morning). Unfortunately, we are not able to issue a new book unless the previous one has been returned. 

 

PE:
Children wear their PE kit to school for the day:

Their usual jogging bottoms (shorts in the spring / summer) with their House t-shirt and trainers (no lace-ups).

Please refer to the school uniform list.
 
 

 


General Information:

 

Our Philosophy

 

At Cedar Park School, our philosophy is to value every child as a unique individual, who enjoys learning and thinking for him or herself. Our aim within the Early Years Foundation Stage is to provide a happy, safe and stimulating environment, which allows all children to feel secure and valued and therefore ready and eager to learn. We provide a supportive and secure environment in which every child can flourish and learn at their own pace and in their own individual way. Our role is to stimulate and encourage their development and enjoyment of learning through a variety of different activities, both adult directed and child initiated in secure indoor and outdoor situations. 

 

We believe the relationships which the children develop in the Early Years, with each other and with our staff, are central to their happiness and will lay the best possible foundation for them to become independent lifelong learners. 

 

Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum Intent

 

Children in our Early Years phase follow the Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum, which consists of seven areas of learning. We teach children by ensuring challenging, playful opportunities across both the prime and specific areas of learning. We recognise that all children develop and learn at different rates and so our EYFS curriculum is designed flexibly to meet the needs of all individuals. We support individual learning through our skilful interactions and observations which lead to detailed next step planning. The Characteristics of Effective Learning underpin our curriculum and pupils learning, through an enabling and well-planned environment we ensure we provide meaningful opportunities for playing and learning, active learning and creating and thinking critically. As children utilise and develop these characteristics, they become effective and motivated learners who demonstrate high levels of well-being and involvement.

 

 

Characteristics of Effective Learning

 

The characteristics of effective learning underpin our pupils learning within the Early Years Foundation Stage. The ways in which they engage with others and their environment – playing and exploring, active learning and creating and thinking critically – underpin learning and development across all areas and support children to remain effective and motivated learners. We make judgements about a child's demonstration of the Characteristics of Effective Learning at their particular age / stage of development and whether or not the learning behaviours defined within these characteristics describes the child.

 

 

Leuven Scales of Well Being and Involvement and Well Being

 

The Leuven Scales acknowledge the critical importance of a child’s emotional well-being on the quality and depth of learning. We use the Leuven Scales to indicate a child's level of Well-Being and Involvement at the time of assessment (low, medium or high level). 

Well-being is defined as ‘the state of being comfortable, healthy, or happy’. Involvement is defined as ‘the fact of being involved with or participating in something’. The Leuven Scales support accurate and authentic summative assessment of a child’s knowledge, skills, understanding and learning behaviours.

 

Tapestry

    

We use Tapestry to record children’s knowledge, skills and learning dispositions in individual Learning Journals, and to assess the characteristics of effective learning. It is a consistent and reliable way of demonstrating progress through the EYFS.

 

Through daily observation and interaction, we can build a rich and accurate understanding of each child across all aspects of learning and development. Observations are shared with families. You can share all the wonderful things you do with your child at home using Tapestry, by uploading via the website or App.

https://tapestry.info/

 

Whilst we would love to show you all the wonderful things your child has been doing throughout the day, it is not practical as we value the importance of being with the children and not always having a tablet in between us. Therefore, some weeks you will have more observations than others because we have been engaging and playing and didn’t want to stop the flow to take a photograph or video clip. Our observations are then used to support our ongoing assessments on Target Tracker.

 

Assessments are meaningful and impact on our children’s learning and development as we use them to inform next steps, which are personalised and challenging.

 

At the end of Reception, Learning Journals can be downloaded for you to keep and treasure.

 

 

Forest School at Cedar Park

 

Forest School is a magical place....

 

Forest School is an inspirational process that offers all learners regular opportunities to achieve and develop confidence and self-esteem through hands-on learning experiences in a natural environment with trees.

 

 

Principles Of Forest School:

 

Forest school....

 

Takes place in a woodland setting on site which children cannot access during break times; this supports the development of a relationship between the learner and the natural world.

 

Uses a range of learner-centred processes to create a community for development and learning.

 

Aims to promote the holistic development of all those involved, fostering resilient, confident, independent and creative learners.

 

Offers learners the opportunity to take supported risks appropriate to the environment and to themselves.

 

Thank you for your support.

 

Please feel free to ask if you have any questions.

 

Mrs Franek (Forest School Lead)

 

 


Further information about the EYFS can be found on 'Parent Zone' - 'Information for EYFS Parents' and on Tapestry.

 

 

 

 

 

Being Safe Online:

 

 

 

 

 

Reception Maths Workshop - January 2025

Nursery Maths Workshop - January 2025

EYFS Curriculum Newsletter Autumn 1 2024

EYFS Curriculum Newsletter Autumn 2 2024

EYFS Curriculum Newsletter Spring 1 2025