Intent, Implementation and Impact in the EYFS

Welcome to the Clyst St. Mary Primary School learning family

Our Intent, Implementation, and Impact targets for the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS).

The Early Years Foundation Stage incorporates the period of learning and development from birth to 5 years old. In our school we have one Reception Class and work closely with feeder pre-schools and Nurseries in the surrounding area to support transition for our Reception children. We are also working closely to build and maintain links between our on-site Pre-school, Clyst Valley.

At Clyst St. Mary our delivery of the EYFS curriculum aims to provide a variety of opportunities for our children to develop as independent, resourceful, and positive learners. We want our children to have a desire to learn new things and challenge themselves each day. We work extremely hard with the children to develop their independent learning skills and their approach to challenge.

Intent –

At Clyst St Mary Primary School we design our curriculum and learning to build upon the children’s prior learning, in their pre-school and Nursery settings, as well as from their experiences at home. We recognise that every child is unique, and we embrace this. Our learning is led by the interests of the children and our planning and delivery complements this. We work closely with our parents and carers to provide positive and engaging learning experiences and provide the children with a strong and united support network. It is extremely important that the children feel excited, engaged, and encouraged throughout their learning journey. We work with our parents and carers to foster a strong relationship and our ‘open door’ policy invites and always encourages parents and carers to engage with us and foster strong links between ourselves and our families.

As a team we work extremely hard to create an indoor and outdoor learning environment that inspires the children to investigate, question and challenge themselves. The children can explore the different areas throughout the day and access a wide range of continuous provision opportunities incorporating sensory, physical, writing, number work and creative role play activities.

We want to provide our children with every opportunity to fulfil their potential and work on reaching the Early Learning Goals at the end of the Early Years Foundation Stage and ensure that the children make, at least, good progress from their initial starting points.

With the incremental challenge the children face as they move into KS1 it is important we support this transition by ensuring our children leave us ready and excited to take on new challenges. We actively support our children throughout their final term in Reception with transition opportunities to aid their move into KS1.

Implementation

Within the EYFS at Clyst St. Mary, we follow the Early Years Statutory Framework, provided by the Department for Education (DFE). The framework sets out the requirement for learning and development within the EYFS and focuses on prime and specific areas.

These are broken down into seven areas of the EYFS Curriculum –

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

Communication and Language

Physical Development

Literacy

Mathematics

Understanding the World

Expressive Arts and Design

These areas are used in our planning for the children’s learning and their activities. Planning is flexible to meet the needs and interests of our children. Ultimately our curriculum and topics are centred on the children. We always encourage active learning and aim to develop the learning characteristics that will support lifelong learning. At Clyst St. Mary we want all our children to -

• Learn actively – Where children try their best and persevere even when they face challenges.
• Play and explore – Children investigate and experience things and are willing to ‘have a go’
• Create and think critically – Children develop their own ideas both independently and in collaboration with others.

The children engage in independent learning opportunities, as well as adult guided group work. We use questioning to encourage the children to query the world around them and through their own exploration they develop their independence, creativity, and problem-solving skills. Throughout their day the children have a mix of opportunities to work collaboratively, independently and with members of staff.

Impact

We work hard to ensure that all our children’s progress across the EYFS curriculum is good, based on their various starting points. Evidence and observations of the children’s progress is recorded via Tapestry online learning journeys. We use our observations of the children to make formative assessments of their attainment and to inform future planning and build upon the children’s current knowledge. Our summative assessments look at children’s attainment in relation to age related expectations, taken from the Development Matters. Our assessment is moderated both internally and with other external schools, including schools within our Three Rivers Federation.

The impact of our curriculum can be measured by the way in which our children are inspired and excited about their learning. We work to ensure our children develop into confident and positive learners, who are excited by new challenges and not put off by difficulty. We endeavour to ensure that our children leave the EYFS ready to move with confidence into KS1 and their lifelong learning journey.