Children's development and learning
The provision for children's care, learning and development is guided by the Early Years Foundation Stage which provides guidance inclusive of all children from birth to five, issued by the Department for Children, Schools and Families, as part of Change for Children and the Every Child Matters agenda.
The Early Years Foundation Stage consists of four overarching themes which inform effective practice in settings where babies, toddlers and pre-school children are being cared for. The themes also express principles underpinning this effective practice;
- A Unique Child
Every child is a competent learner from birth who is resilient, capable. confident and self-assured.
- Positive Relationships
Children learn to be strong and independent from a base of loving and secure relationships with parents and their Key Person.
- Enabling Environments
The environment plays a key role in supporting and extending children’s development and learning.
- Learning and Development
Children develop and learn in different ways and at different rates and all areas of Learning and Development are equally important and inter-connected
Each Theme with its underlying Principle is made up of four Commitments, which describe how the Principles can be put into practice.
At Serendipitys we strive to ensure that the care we offer reflects both the Principles and the Commitments set out in the Early Years Foundation Stage and that we are providing effective learning and development opportunities which are appropriate and accessible for all children.
One of the four Themes of the Early Years Foundation Stage provides guidance for the Learning and Development of children from birth to five. This Theme contains four Commitments;
- Creativity and Critical Thinking
- Areas of Learning and Development
Although the whole Early Years Foundation Stage document provides us with the Commitments and Principles that underpin our ethos and guide the care we provide, the fourth commitment of the Learning and Development Principle outlines the expectations and requirements for children's learning and development from Birth to the Early Learning Goals to be achieved by the end of the child's reception year of their education.
The Learning arid Development Commitment consists of six areas of learning, which in turn support and correlate with all other Themes, Commitments and Principles according to the Early Years Foundation Stage.
Each area of Learning and Development and its subsequent Aspects of Learning allows us to identify and trace children's progress according to relevant ages and stages of development which all overlap and are inter-connected. Our settings use the development matters guidelines, leading to the Early Learning Goals to provide learning opportunities and activities which are age and stage appropriate as well as relevant to the individual child’s needs and development, ensuring all children are provided for and are helped to progress and learn.
The six Areas of Learning and what they mean for children;
Personal, Social and Emotional Development
For children, being special to someone and well cared for is vital for their physical, social and emotional health and well-being.
Being acknowledged and affirmed by important people in their lives leads to children gaining confidence and inner strength through secure attachments with these people.
Exploration within close relationships leads to the growth of self-assurance, promoting a sense of belonging which allows children to explore the world from a secure base.
Children need adults to set a good example and to give them opportunities for interaction with others so that they can develop positive ideas about themselves and others.
Children who are encouraged to feel free to express their ideas and their feelings, such as joy, sadness, frustration and fear, can develop strategies to cope with new, challenging or stressful situations.
Communication, Language and Literacy
To become skillful communicators, babies and young children need to be with people with whom they have warm and loving relationships such as their family or carers and, in a group situation, a key person whom they know and trust.
Babies respond differently to different sounds and from an early
age are able to distinguish sound patterns. They use their voices to make contact and to let people know what they need and how
they feel. They learn to talk by being talked to.
All children learn best through activities and experiences that engage all the senses. Music, dance, rhymes and songs support language development.
As children develop speaking and listening skills they build the foundations for literacy for making sense of visual and verbal signs and ultimately for reading and writing. Children need varied opportunities to interact with others and to use a wide variety of resources for expressing their understanding, including mark-making, drawing, modeling, reading and writing
Problem Solving, Reasoning and Numeracy
Babies’ arid children’s mathematical development occurs as they seek patterns, make connections and recognise relationships through finding out about and working with numbers and counting, with sorting and matching and with shape, space and measures.
Children use their knowledge and skills in these areas to solve problems, generate new questions and make connections across other areas of Learning and Development.
Knowledge and Understanding of the World
Babies and children find out about the world through exploration and from a variety of sources, including their families and friends, the media, and through what they see and hear.
Babies and children need regular opportunities to learn about different ways of life, to be given accurate information and to develop positive and caring attitudes towards others.
Children should be helped to learn to respect and value all people and learn to avoid misapprehensions and negative attitudes towards others when they develop their Knowledge and Understanding of the World.
Children should be involved in the practical application of their knowledge and skills which will promote self-esteem through allowing them to make decisions about what to investigate and how to do it.
Physical Development
Babies and children learn by being active and Physical Development takes place across all areas of Learning and Development.
Physical Development helps children gain confidence in what they can do.
Physical Development enables children to feel the positive benefits of being healthy and active.
Physical Development helps children to develop a positive sense of well-being.
Good health in the early years helps to safeguard health and well-being throughout life. It is important that children develop healthy habits when they first learn about food and activity. Growing with appropriate weight gain in the first years of life helps to guard against obesity in later life.
Creative Development
Creativity is about taking risks and making connections and is strongly linked to play.
Creativity emerges as children become absorbed in action and explorations of their own ideas, expressing them through movement, making and transforming things using media and materials such as crayons, paints, scissors, words, sounds, movement, props and make-believe.
Creativity involves children in initiating their own learning and making choices and decisions.
Children’s responses to what they see, hear and experience through their senses are individual and the way they represent their experiences is unique and valuable.
Being creative enables babies and children to explore many processes, media and materials and to make new things emerge as a result.
While providing opportunities for all children in our care to learn and develop we maintain a Learning Through Play approach, believing that children learn at the highest level through play and exploration, with opportunities to learn alongside their peers. The activities and equipment we provide encourage active learning and engages children in sustained play and thinking, allowing them to discover different resources and situations, developing understanding and being supported by adults to think critically and ask questions of what is happening around them. Our continuous observations of individual children's learning and progress allows us to identify next steps for children in conjunction with the Areas of Learning to continue to provide challenging and stimulating learning experience.
