Curriculum – Early Years Foundation Stage
In the Early Years at Queen Boudica, children learn within a safe and secure learning environment which gives children the opportunity to experiment, explore and progress in their own creative ways.
The Early Years Foundation Stage Framework provides us with the scaffold for our Early Years curriculum. We offer a broad and balanced curriculum that is based on real life experiences, meets the needs of all children and builds upon child interests and fascinations. Each half term, we introduce a new theme to provide an inspiration for learning. To support our learning themes, we provide an environment which is welcoming, stimulating and ignites curiosity. We recognise the importance of being outdoors (in all weather) and take full advantage of our well-equipped reception gardens, school playground and on-site nurture garden. We also regularly visit the local woodlands during our Forest School sessions. This enables children to experience a different location, engage with the natural world and safely manage risks. We have a dedicated Forest Schools leader who helps the children learn how to use tools in the outdoor environment as well as teaching about fire safety – the children love toasting their own marshmallows!
We encourage a love of books right from the first moment a child joins us at Queen Boudica Primary as we place reading at the heart of our Early Years curriculum. Our half-termly themes include a broad variety of texts which have been specifically chosen to support children with fostering a love of reading whilst also developing their oracy, vocabulary and comprehension skills.
We value the importance of play, therefore in Reception, our timetable is carefully structured and balanced to enable children to receive directed teaching sessions as well as have daily opportunities to play, explore and extend their learning in our continuous provision. We believe that play, with all its language, physicality and social interaction, is what gives children the skills and appropriate grounding for their educational journey.
“A child’s greatest achievements are possible in play.”
Lev S. Vygotsky
