Seedlings
Here’s everything you might like to know about Seedlings Class at St Bartholomews Primary School.
In Reception there are three prime areas of learning and four specific areas of learning. The prime areas are:
· Communication and Language,
· Physical Development,
· Personal, Social and Emotional Development.
The specific areas are:
· Literacy,
· Mathematics,
· Understanding of the world,
· Expressive Arts and Design.
Progress and attainment is achieved through conversations and getting to know your children inside out. We make on-going observations on the remarkable things that our children do in the prime and specific areas of learning plus the three characteristics of effective teaching and learning.
We want your children to feel as comfortable with us as possible and our ‘in the moment’ learning really aims to bring out all their strengths and build on the wonderful experiences you will have provided them with so far. It is our aim to set your children up to feel safe and happy at school and to allow them to flourish as they move through school. Children's ideas and opinions are valued and respected by adults and the other children, creating an environment in which children are not afraid of making mistakes and taking risks. The children particularly enjoy regular visits to our forest school area and love to visit the different challenges in our indoor and outdoor environment. This consists of areas where the children can experience; mark making, role play, arts and craft, construction area, water and sand play, board games, working with letters and numbers and of course getting messy!
In Seedlings Class your children will meet some lovely grown-ups who will look after them whilst they are at school. Their names are Mr Goodall, Ms Street, Mrs Hanbury and Mrs Hall.
Seedlings Class has lots of different areas for children to explore. We try to make things as natural and appealing as possible.
In the morning children will be brought into Seedlings classroom where they will meet their teacher.
Inside they will have their own special area to put their coat, bag and drink and a trolley for their lunchbox. They will then start the day by completing Rainbow challenges and learning through play in child-initiated time.
We aim to give the children in Reception the best start to their education through child initiated and adult led activities. We follow the non-statutory Birth to Five Matters curriculum and use a cross curricular ‘big question’ approach to enable links in their learning from one area to the next. The Harmony curriculum is built upon and is something that continues throughout the school. A high emphasis is placed upon all children acquiring a good level of development and progress in reading, writing and mathematics. To help develop these areas we use child friendly materials such as Little Wandle Letters and Sounds for teaching phonics and early reading, Pie Corbett’s Talk for Writing and White Rose Hub and NCETM for maths.
We provide a curriculum which takes account of, and responds to, the children’s developmental needs and allows them to make progress related to their differing abilities. On entry to reception a child’s age is taken into account and each child is assessed and a baseline is given to see if they are showing a typical level of development for their age. By the end of the year it is expected that all children should be working within the 17 Early Learning Goal descriptors.
The end of year report made to parents will state whether the child is:
· Emerging – working below national expectations.
· Expected – working at national expectations.
These terms continue throughout the school. As well as assessing the children against the Early Learning Goals, parents will also receive a report on how their child’s learning has progressed in areas of the curriculum. This report is also given to the Year 1 teacher.
We think that the ‘wow’ factor we provide is even better if you can visit our amazing learning environment where we keep children safe, happy and flourishing in their learning. Please contact the school office to book an appointment to come and see us.