EYFS

Our Foundation Unit

We have a 60 place Foundation stage unit which is split into 2 classes. The children are able to access both of the classrooms freely, with both sides of the unit being shared by all the children during independent free choice activities. We also have our own Foundation outside area. 

The teachers in the Foundation Stage are Mrs Galloway, Mrs Oakes and Mrs James. Have a look at the bottom of this page for some videos of the teachers reading some stories. 

Our Curriculum

Here at Lady Bay, we understand the importance of high-quality provision and teaching within EYFS. We have designed our own curriculum to ensure we are building solid foundations providing opportunities to develop the necessary attitudes, knowledge and skills to prepare them for their educational journey. We pride ourselves on working closely with our families and together we provide a nurturing, supportive and caring environment for children starting their primary education in our setting.

The intent of our EYFS Curriculum is to:

-Develop happy, confident and resilient learners that feel valued and secure.

-Encourage a life-long love of learning.

-Appreciate all children are unique and help them become inquisitive, active learners.

-Give children the opportunities to spark their curiosity and their critical thinking skills.

-Create a play-based active curriculum that builds on children's previous learning and understanding.

-Prepare children to achieve the Early Learning Goals.

-Equip our children with the knowledge and skills needed for the next stage of their learning journey.

How we implement this:

-Throughout all of the seven areas, we embed learning and understanding ensuring children make progress consistently across the curriculum. The teaching of these areas of learning is practical and playful with support and challenge from adults in class sessions, small groups sessions and when working with individuals. 

The three prime areas should be developed first as they are considered to be the most essential for the healthy development and future learning of our children. These include:

• Physical Development Personal – involves providing opportunities for young children to be active and to develop their co-ordination, control and movement. Children are helped to understand the importance of physical activity and healthy eating.

• Communication and Language – involves supporting the children to listen and respond to relevant questions to clarify their understanding. It helps them to engage in conversations with both peers and adults offering their own ideas, offering explanations why things might happen using the tenses correctly. 

• Social and Emotional Development  – involves helping children to develop a positive sense of themselves and others. It helps them to to form positive relationships and develop respect for others whilst supporting them to develop social skills and learn how to manage their feelings. Children are helped to understand appropriate behaviour in groups and to have confidence in their own abilities.

As children grow and make progress in the prime areas, they naturally develop skills within the four specific areas which are:

• Literacy – the early teaching of literacy involves encouraging children to link sounds and letters and to begin to read and write. Children are given access to a wide range of reading materials (books, poems and other written materials) to ignite their interest.

• Mathematics – the early teaching of mathematics involves providing children with opportunities to develop and improve their skills in counting; understanding and using numbers; calculating simple addition and subtraction problems; and describing shapes, spaces, and measures.

• Understanding the World – this involves guiding children to make sense of their physical world and their community through opportunities to observe, explore and find out about people, places, technology and the environment.

• Expressive Arts and Design – this involves enabling 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.

-We use a variety of diverse/ cultural books to develop a love and enjoyment of reading and as a stimulus for our topics. 

-There is a combination of adult-led, teacher taught sessions as well as a wealth of stimulating continuous provision opportunities.

-Daily guided activities are set up and planned that cover different areas of the EYFS curriculum and allow children to develop their next steps in learning.

-Areas of need and next steps are identified for all children to ensure good progress is made. -In planning and guiding children’s activities we acknowledge the different ways that children learn and reflect these in our practice.

Assessments

Baseline

Your child will be participating in the reception baseline assessment within the first 6 weeks of starting reception. This is a requirement for all reception children in the UK. The purpose of the assessment is to understand how well schools support their pupils to progress between foundation and year 6. The baseline is not about judging  your child or putting them under any pressure. Your child cannot ‘pass’ or ‘fail’ the assessment. Its main purpose is to create a starting point to measure the progress schools make with their pupils. We’ve found the baseline assessment to be a positive experience in which the child can get to know their teachers. If you have any further questions about this, please speak to your child’s class teacher.

Early Years Foundation Stage Profile 

At the end of your child’s foundation year, their teacher will submit a statutory review of your child’s progress against 17 early learning goals to the Local Authority. This assessment is designed to inform you about your child’s progress in relation to the early learning goals, as well as supporting their transition to year 1.

Please visit our Foundation class page for more information!

Starting School in the Foundation Stage

Welcome to Lady Bay Primary School. We are incredibly excited to meet you all. This page is for all of our families who have children starting new to school in Foundation. Below you will find all of our welcome information.

Please click here to see a welcome video from Mr Border along with some video tours of our school and some information about the application process from Mrs Masters in the school office.

I hope you have had the opportunity to explore our school website as it holds lots of information for parents and children and shows what a wonderful curriculum the children experience. Please click here to have a look at our curriculum page. 

Recently, we have updated the school ethos and created a set of values which we try to encourage our children to understand and apply in their every day school life. Please click here to find out information about our school ethos. 

If you need any further help or information, please do not hesitate to phone the school office on 01159 747 001 or email me at head@ladybay.notts.sch.uk

Important Information

Staff Stories!