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  • Home
  • About Us
    • About SJSJ
      • Headteacher’s Welcome
      • School Vision
      • Safeguarding
      • Our Church
      • Anti-Racist Statement
      • Staff List
      • Awards & Achievements
      • Inclusion & Equalities
      • SEND: Special Educational Needs and Disabilities
      • We are a Rights Respecting School
      • Facilities for Hire
      • Current Vacancies
      • COVID Catch Up Funding
      • School Development Priorities
      • School Self Evaluation
    • School Policy
      • School Policies
      • Primary Advantage Policies
      • OFSTED & SIAMS Reports
      • Results
      • Pupil Premium Strategy
      • PE & Sport Premium
      • Financial Benchmarking
      • Union Officials Information
    • Governance
      • Our Governors
      • Local Advisory Board
    • Primary Advantage
      • Introduction
      • Our Partnerships
      • Our Teaching Schools
      • Primary Advantage Vacancies
  • News & Events
    • News Archive
    • Calendar
    • Newsletters
    • Term Dates
    • Letters for Parents
  • Curriculum
    • Teaching & Learning
      • Our Curriculum
      • Homework & Home Learning Links
      • Assessment
      • Early Years
    • Subjects
      • Art
      • Computing
      • Diverse Britain
      • Geography
      • History
      • Maths
      • Music
      • Oracy
    • Subjects
      • Physical Education
      • PSHE & Citizenship
      • Reading
      • Religious Education
      • Science
      • STEAM
      • Spanish: Modern Foreign Languages (MFL)
      • Writing
  • Wellbeing
  • COVID-19
    • Managing the Virus
    • COVID Related Communication
    • Year Group Learning Resources
    • Home Learning
    • Useful Resources & Support
  • Children
    • Year Groups
      • Nursery
      • Reception
      • Year 1
      • Year 2
      • Year 3
      • Year 4
      • Year 5
      • Year 6
    • Pupil Voice
      • RRS Team
      • School Council
      • Green Team
      • Digital Leaders
      • Sports Crew
      • Wellbeing Leaders
  • Parents
    • Admissions
      • Admissions Process
      • Extended Nursery Provision
    • Parent Information
      • Introduction & Important Information
      • The School Day
      • Behaviour
      • Attendance, Punctuality and Absence
      • School Meals
    • Parent Information
      • School Uniform
      • Online Safety
      • FAQs
    • Extended School
      • Clubs
      • Holiday Camp
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Early Years

Early Years

Home > Curriculum  > Teaching & Learning > Early Years

Our Early Years setting is an exciting and nurturing place where children learn through play and creativity. Our curriculum celebrates diversity and supports the children’s spiritual, moral, social and cultural development allowing them to feel safe and secure, cared for, valued and respected. Every child is recognised as a unique individual who is constantly learning and we aim for our children to become capable, confident and self-assured learners. Children leave reception with strong foundations which enable them to thrive in year 1.

We understand that children develop at their own rates and ensure that all focus work is tailored to children’s varying abilities. We encourage children to be independent and our indoor and outdoor environments enable children to select their own resources to further their learning.

We extend and enrich the children’s vocabulary through story time, rhymes, role-play, group discussions and a language rich environment. We have carefully designed our literacy curriculum using quality texts that reflect our wonderful and diverse school community. We are passionate about reading and it is one of our fundamental aims that we support and encourage the children to develop a love of books and lifelong reading for pleasure.

We aim for children to achieve mathematical understanding and a firm foundation for mathematics through practical and problem-solving activities. Children are given opportunities to solve problems, investigate, make decisions and experiment in all areas of learning.

We take pride in creating a highly inclusive environment, where children of all abilities demonstrate high levels of enjoyment in their education. Learning is carefully designed to ensure all children have the opportunity to reach their full potential. Those who are most able, are challenged to master a concept and learning is extended. Pupils who are identified as needing more support are given additional opportunities to work in a small group to embed skills, to develop at their own pace and learn in a way which is suitable for their individual needs.

Teaching in Reception and Nursery is organised through a range of approaches and provides a balance of child initiated and adult led activities:

  • planned focused activities where adults work with a small group of children at a time. Teachers will differentiate the activity to meet the needs of every child participating and build on pupils’ prior learning
  • small group teaching of early reading and writing through our phonics based programme and talk for writing for approach
  • whole class teaching for short periods of time such as shared story time, direct teaching (for example of maths), songs, rhymes and discussions
  • opportunities for teacher to work alongside children as they develop their own interest in particular areas of the curriculum
  • develop children’s enthusiasm and promote a love for reading as this is fundamental in helping to develop their language skills and in closing the word gap.
  • use core texts that stimulates discussion about the world around us and enable us to promote a love of learning through real-life and engaging experiences.
  • provide high-quality interactions with adults where staff act as role models to the children they teach in order for children to develop their own speaking and listening skills.
  • use high-quality questioning and interactions to check understanding and address misconceptions.
  • value the importance of effective communication which encourage all our children to communicate effectively using a wide range of strategies.
  • carefully assess what the children are doing and then using this to inform the next steps of learning

 

In the Foundation Stage the curriculum is made up of seven areas of learning:

The Prime areas are fundamental and work together, and filter through all other areas to support development:

  • Personal, social and Emotional Development
  • Communication and Language
  • Physical Development

The Specific areas include essential skills and knowledge for children to participate successfully in society:

  • Literacy
  • Mathematics
  • Understanding the World
  • Expressive Arts and Design

 

Clear and open communications with parents and carers is a priority for us. We work with parents to ensure that every child settles quickly into the setting and continue to work in partnership with them throughout their child’s time in the early years.

EYFS News

  • Latest News
    What's happening in Reception - Week 5
    This week in Reception, we have been exploring the composition of 7 and challenging ourselves to see how many different ways it can be made. We used a variety of concrete resources to support us inclu...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Nursery - Week 5
    In Nursery this week, linked to our topic 'transport' and literacy core text 'Naughty Bus', children have enjoyed learning the words and actions to the song 'The Wheels on the Bus.' As a class we crea...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Reception - Week 4
    Reception class went on a visit to  The Discovery Centre this week to have an interactive story experience. They visited the 100 Story Hotel and worked together to solve a mystery. The children loved ...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Nursery - Week 4
    This week in PE our learning intention was to perform toe taps with a large ball. Miss Korbay set children a challenge of 5 toe taps in a row whilst maintaining balance for 5 seconds, having the sole ...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Reception - Week 3
    An important part of the Reception curriculum is learning about different celebrations. This week we had lots of fun getting familiar with Chinese New Year. We used chopsticks, tried some new foods an...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Nursery - Week 3
    This week in Nursery in celebration of Chinese New Year on Sunday 22nd January, children made their own lanterns. We discussed that most lanterns are almost always red to symbolise good luck. ...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Reception - Week 2
    This week in reception, we have started to explore capacity and the concepts of full, empty and half full. We did experiments to see how much was needed in different size objects to be completely full...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Nursery - Week 2
    Our learning in Nursery was linked to our topic 'winter' and our core text ‘The Snowy Day’ written by Ezra Jack Keats. The children created snips and cut shapes in a folded piece of paper to make a pa...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Reception - Week 1
    This week in Reception, we have kicked off our Spring term topic of transport. Children were challenged to use recycled materials at home to make their own vehicles over the holidays. We loved seeing ...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Nursery - Week 1
    Linking to our new topic 'Winter', this week in nursery children drew their own snowmen. Children thought about the shape of the snowman's body and how many circles they needed to draw. Children were ...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Reception - Week 7
    This week in Reception it was hard to choose just one highlights. We loved the pantomime performance of The Snow Queen, singing for our families at church and making and wrapping our own presents for ...
  • Latest News
    What's happening in Nursery - Week 7
    For many of our Nursery children, it was their first time experiencing snow! We went on a sensory walk around our playground, listening to the sound our footprints make in the snow. We also filled a t...
Related Pages
  • Our Curriculum
  • Homework & Additional Learning Links
  • Assessment
  • Early Years
Get in Touch

St John and St James C of E Primary School,
Isabella Road,
Hackney
E9 6DX

Tel: 020 8985 2045
Fax: 020 8985 5768
Email: office@johnjames.hackney.sch.uk

Executive Principal: Sian Davies
Headteacher: Joanne Smith

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