Our St Martin’s EYFS Curriculum

We believe it is very important within the EYFS to have a play-based pedagogy, using observation, assessment and planning to tailor the curriculum around the unique child. 

We aim to: 

• Provide a safe, challenging and supportive learning environment which is sensitive to the needs of all children
• Ensure opportunities for children to learn through planned, purposeful play
• Enable choice and decision making that positively impacts learning
• Work in partnership with parents/carers, the school family and wider community 

As set out in our statutory framework, we teach the 7 areas of learning: Personal, Social and Emotional, Physical Development, Communication and Language, Literacy, Mathematical Development, Knowledge of the world, Expressive Art and Design. We have a balance between teacher- led, discrete lessons on the carpet and child-led learning through play in our continuous provision each day.

Through our curriculum planning, we have identified specific learning intents based on providing a broad and balanced curriculum that builds upon the knowledge, understanding and skills of all children, whatever their starting points. The curriculum has been carefully sequenced to ensure that the small steps approach builds on their learning over time and retrieval activities are regularly used to enable pupils to revisit prior learning throughout the year.

The curriculum has been planned to provide foundational knowledge, looking at the Bailiwick Curriculum and intent documents, to ensure pupils are ready to build on this learning throughout the rest of their St Martin’s Primary journey. 

We acknowledge that young children’s learning is often driven by their own interests, so flexibility is planned in to allow for the unique child to take ownership of some aspects of their learning. This is supported within our enabling environment where staff plan in enhancements linked either to our discrete teaching sessions or pupils’ own interests.

Teaching pupils about The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child is a key aspect of our EYFS curriculum. Pupils learn about the importance of rights through focusing on Article 28 The right to an education and Article 19 The right to be safe. These rights support pupils in voicing their own feelings and the language of rights becomes embedded in daily conversations to support positive interactions.

Discrete Learning Sessions

The following ‘carpet’ based learning sessions take place each week:

Daily Phonics lessons following Little Wandle, Revised letters and Sounds.

Daily Maths lessons which are based on White Rose Maths alongside our own small steps maths curriculum. Maths lessons are hands on and collaborative with pupils actively learning through using equipment, working in their teams or shoulder partners and taking part in high quality conversations planned to help them in developing a strong understanding of numbers and how they are composed. Using Early Number Sense sessions 3 times per week pupils further develop the ability to verbalise and justify their understanding of number. The Early Number Sense programme begins with children subitising one and two and develops their understanding of quantities to ten. They develop skills in subitising, manipulating, and partitioning of numbers to 10 and supports children to see their different properties.

Drawing Club

We use Greg Bottrill's Drawing Club Approach to promote joy and inspiration within early writing. Pupils attend 3-4 focused sessions each week based around a familiar text, a text from our repeated reads basket or a trip back in time to a nostalgic cartoon, exploring new vocabulary and letting their imaginations run wild. Pupils then respond to this stimulus through mark making, word writing and eventually writing in full sentences as the year develops. The expectation builds through the year and it is amazing to see not only the progress they make but also all the fun they have getting there.

Handwriting Lessons

Pupils have 3 weekly handwriting lessons using the Kinetic Letter handwriting program. This focuses on developing the correct pen grip, developing muscles for writing and learning the correct formation for each letter from the first day it is taught.

Weekly Music Lesson

Our music lessons are planned using Kapow for music. Pupils love the engaging lessons and take part in activities including listening, singing, performing and composing. The children listen to songs from different cultures and being to recognise similarities between pieces of music, talk about music and express their preferences. They explore percussion instruments, how to use their bodies as an instrument and develop the ability to tell the difference between different pitches and speeds of music.

Weekly Personal, Social and Emotional Development Sessions

We have a planned PSED session each week linked to the St Martin’s PSHE curriculum, The UNCRC and Kagan collaborative learning. We teach lessons planned to equip pupils with the necessary skills to manage their feelings and behaviour and the importance, as well as how to keep healthy both physically, emotionally and mentally. Although we plan for these lessons in weekly carpet sessions, PSED learning happens daily in every area of the curriculum and environment. Staff support pupils with these ‘in the moment’ aspects of PSED.

Weekly RE

Using Discovery RE pupils explore all the amazing religions and different beliefs from around the world. Pupils learn about key festivals, the celebration of new year around the world and the importance of respecting others’ beliefs. This is delivered through one carpet teacher-led session each week.

PE lessons 

PE lessons include foundation skills (jumping, landing, moving safely, finding space) dance, gymnastics, games and ball skills. These lessons are based on Get Set for PE. During the first half term of the Autumn term and the whole summer term, pupils learn to swim using our indoor swimming pool.