Miss Gooch                  Miss Weston                 Miss Gartside 

Foundation Stage 1 - Nursery 

At Rivelin Primary School Nursery, we take children from 3 years old to school age. We offer a variety of attendance patterns – full time (30 hours), mornings (15 hours), afternoons (15 hours), start of the week (15 hours) or end of the week (15 hours). We are also able to be flexible if you require a different attendance pattern or some additional hours. Please contact the school office for more information.

The Curiosity Approach 

Within the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) at Rivelin Primary School, which includes reception and nursery, we follow the Curiosity Approach.  

A key aspect of the Curiosity Approach is viewing the learning environment as an important part of how children learn in the early years. As Loris Malaguzzi said, “There are three teachers of children: adults, other children and their physical environment.” In line with the Curiosity Approach, we believe the nursery classroom should be homely, comfortable and calm. Every display and resource is carefully considered and aimed at ensuring the best opportunities for learning and development for all children. 

A further important element of the Curiosity Approach is based on the work of Rudolf Steiner, who said, “What a difference there is between playthings that leave as much as possible to the power of imagination and giving finished toys that leave nothing for the child’s own inner activity.” In nursery, we ensure we provide the children with a wide variety of loose parts and open-ended resources so they can use their imaginations in their creative activities and play. Loose parts and open-ended resources also provide children with problem solving opportunities. We use natural materials as often as possible since these provide children with a far broader range of sensory experiences than plastic resources. 

Finally, the Curiosity Approach also focuses on the use of authentic resources rather than resources that are tailor made for children. Using full-size pans and utensils in the role play kitchen, for example, gives children a better understanding of the weight and feel of real objects and it lends an authenticity to the children’s role-play activities that would otherwise be missing. In addition, old, authentic and aesthetically pleasing items draw children in and spark their innate sense of curiosity. They create opportunities for awe and wonder as well as unique learning opportunities for children to investigate and explore items they may have never seen before. 

Children process and absorb everything through their senses. Their environment should provide a wide variety of sensory experiences without being overwhelming. To this end, we use neutral and calming colours in most areas of the classroom with carefully chosen splashes of colour so children are not overwhelmed by visual stimulation. 

The Nursery Day 

We prioritise child-led learning and learning through play in our nursery, in line with current research on how young children learn best. We join the children within their chosen activities and support their learning through play. We also believe in the importance of ‘free flow’ use of the indoor and outdoor spaces. We are lucky enough to have a fantastic, spacious outdoor environment at Rivelin. Allowing children to choose where they would like to play enables them to better understand and listen to their own bodies and needs. If they need quiet, calm play they can choose an indoor activity, however if they have a lot of energy and feel they need to engage in more energetic play they can choose an outdoor activity. They can also monitor their own temperature and decide what layers they need for the weather. Of course, we support the children with this while they are still learning to listen to their bodies. Outdoor play in all weathers is important for children’s understanding of, and sensory experience of, weather, as well as the changing seasons. 

We have ‘carpet times,’ at the beginning and end of the morning and afternoon sessions, where we come together as a class. We do a variety of activities during these carpet times, including counting practise, singing, learning poems, sharing stories and activities to support the children’s physical development, including Flipper Flappers, Dough Disco and Squiggle Whilst you Wiggle. 

Finally, to ensure all children have equal access to important learning of new skills, regardless of their chosen attendance patterns, we do short, practical, adult-led activities in small groups. Within these group times we follow Little Wandle Foundations for Phonics and Little Wandle Love of Reading. We also teach maths sessions based on Master the Curriculum and Philosophy for Children (P4C) sessions, which supports the development of the children’s speech and language skills as well as their personal, social and emotional development. 

Assessment 

We assess the children using Development Matters. Assessment in nursery is done through teacher observations. We meet as a nursery team regularly to discuss our observations and decide what areas need additional focus. Those areas then inform changes to the continuous provision, the adult-led teaching groups, support of children within their chosen activities and our carpet sessions when needed. 

Inclusion 

Rivelin Primary School is a very inclusive school. All staff in nursery work together to ensure we foster an atmosphere of mutual respect, acceptance and belonging. In nursery, we celebrate our differences and learn about what makes us who we are. 

We ensure we adapt all aspects of the curriculum to support the needs of every child. We have positive representation of disabilities within our taught curriculum, as well as through our continuous provision. We encourage and support neurodivergent children to be themselves and act in ways that support their own development and emotional regulation. We focus on all children’s individual strengths and build learning opportunities into our provision which support these strengths and include their individual interests. 

The Curiosity Approach we have embraced within EYFS, is excellent for children with additional needs, particularly autistic children who may be hypersensitive to visual stimulation. We are lucky enough to have a dedicated sensory room with fantastic resources for our children with additional needs or for any other children who would benefit from quiet, calm time with an adult 1-1 or with a small group of friends. 

Our nursery staff are experienced and knowledgeable about special educational needs and disabilities and are happy to discuss with parents any additional needs they feel their child may have. 

Zones of Emotional Regulation 

At Rivelin Primary School, we use the Zones of Emotional Regulation to support all children to have a better understanding of their own feelings and how to regulate them. In nursery, we link the Zones of Emotional Regulation to one of our key texts – The Colour Monster. An important aspect of Zones of Emotional Regulation, which is explicitly taught in nursery, is that no emotions are bad. There are appropriate times and contexts for all feelings. We do not expect children to be in the green zone (calm and ready to learn) at all times. This is unreasonable and unrealistic. We teach children that it is OK to feel angry, for example, if someone knocked down the castle they were building. It is not OK to show that anger by hurting someone. Instead, we teach the children what they can do, either on their own or with the help of a trusted adult, to manage their feelings. 

Maths 

We teach maths in a number of ways in nursery: 

• Through the classroom environment where we provide a wide variety of resources to encourage the development of different mathematical skills and opportunities for mathematical problem solving. 

• Through reading books linked to mathematical topics. 

• Through the adult support of child-led learning within the continuous provision. 

• Through our carpet sessions, where we sing number songs, practise counting, estimating, subitising and linking numerals and quantities. 

• Through our adult-led, taught, small group sessions. 

We use Master the Curriculum to inform our planning of small group maths teaching. We build new learning on previous learning and explain connections to the children to support the development of problem solving skills. We ensure our maths group work is practical and fun for the children, to support retention of new learning. There are consolidation weeks built into the planning and topics are revisited often and in a variety of ways to support a deep understanding of the mathematical skills and concepts learnt. 

You can support your child at home by building counting opportunities into your day, e.g. counting the steps as they walk upstairs and looking out for numerals in their environment, such as door numbers and road signs. 

Please see our Nursery Maths Curriculum Overview below for more information. 

Phonics 

At Rivelin Primary School, we follow Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised Programme. As part of the programme, Little Wandle provides a scheme of learning for nursery called Foundations for Phonics. Little Wandle Foundations is aligned to the non-statutory guidance on Development Matters and Birth to 5 Matters, as well as the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) statutory framework. We use it as part of our wider provision for Communication and Language, and Literacy. 

Within Foundations for Phonics the children develop the skills they need for learning to read and write when they move into reception. The primary focus of Foundations for Phonics is on developing the children’s listening skills. 

During Autumn 1 half-term, we follow the Rhyme Time planning. The children learn some nursery rhymes and take part in short activities related to the nursery rhymes they are learning. The activities teach the children listening skills and an understanding of rhyming, alliteration and syllables through fun practical activities. 

Autumn 2 onwards, the children learn phonemes (the sounds letters, or graphemes, make). They engage in a variety of activities to support their pronunciation of the phonemes as well as their ability to hear what phonemes make up different words (segmenting) and how to blend sounds to work out what word is being segmented. Blending, segmenting and correct pronunciation are all vital skills needed for learning to read and write. 

You can support your child at home by encouraging them to listen out for and identify sounds they can hear in the environment, e.g. cars, birds, aeroplane…etc. 

Please see our Nursery Literacy Curriculum Overview below for more information. 

Writing 

Before children learn to write, they first need the physical skills to be able to hold a pencil comfortably and manipulate it successfully and accurately. In nursery, we focus on ensuring children have a wide variety of opportunities, both inside and out, to develop these physical skills. We also teach physical skills in our carpet sessions, for example Squiggle Whilst you Wiggle, Dough Disco and Flipper Flappers, as well as within the continuous provision through activities the children have chosen to engage in. 

We encourage the children to engage in mark-making opportunities and then drawing when they are physically ready and in a medium of their choosing. We provide opportunities for larger mark making activities such as chunky chalks, water and large paint brushes on the EYFS yard or large pieces of paper and cardboard with pens on the floor in the classroom. For those children who are ready, we have opportunities for mark-making using fine motor skills. We provide a variety of resources, which we rotate, in our writing area as well as our creative area, such as pastils, paint sticks, pens, pencils, whiteboard pens and boards, poster paints or water colours and fine paintbrushes. 

Focusing on developing physical skills, mark-making and drawing enables us to ensure children are able to form letters accurately when they are ready to learn to write, rather than learning to write before they are physically ready and consequently developing ‘bad habits’ with regards to their letter formation, which will later impact their handwriting, writing speed, and the quantity they are able to write. 

You can support your child at home by giving them lots of opportunities to practise their physical skills, both gross and fine motor, as well as encouraging them to engage in mark-making and drawing activities when they are ready. 

Reading 

We LOVE books in nursery! We strongly believe that a love of reading starts before children can read themselves. It starts with a love of listening to stories being read and looking at interesting illustrations. We encourage a love of books in our nursery children in a variety of ways: 

• We provide children with a wide range of high quality literature to appeal to all of their individual interests and experiences. 

• We rotate the books we provide to maintain their interest. 

• We read books to children everyday – individually, in small groups and as a class. 

• We provide relevant and interesting books around the classroom, as well as on the playground. 

• We link books to different areas of provision and resources so children can include them within their play. 

• We provide props linked to books so children can act out familiar stories. 

• We send books home for the children to read with their parents/carers. 

• We send home a ‘reading scrapbook,’ in which the children, with adult support, can informally review their favourite books. 

• We visit the school library. 

• We hold termly open classrooms, for parents/carers to attend with a focus on reading for pleasure 

Listening to stories being read regularly supports the development of communication and language skills; it helps to improve a child’s understanding of spoken language, as well as increasing their vocabulary.  

Fiction also supports children’s imaginations; it increases the range of scenarios and environments that the child is aware of and can use in their own story telling and role-play. In addition, the illustrations alone do not tell the whole story, children use their imaginations to picture what is happening in the words they are hearing. 

Non-fiction books encourage a child’s innate curiosity about the world they live in. They provide information in child-friendly ways on topics the children are interested in. There are so many fantastic non-fiction books available in nursery to spark the children’s interest in a wide variety of topics. 

You can support your child at home by reading books to them on a regular basis. We have what we call our ‘nursery library’ where the children can take a book from our library box home for their grown-ups to read to them. Once they have finished with the book they can bring it back and exchange it for another book. This is available every week. 

Rivelin has a school library as well, which is open to parents and children after school. All children from nursery to year 6 are welcome to borrow books from the school library. 

The following are some great books we recommend for nursery age children. For more suggestions please see our Nursery Literacy Curriculum Overview below. If you would like further recommendations, or recommendations on particular topics, please do ask a member of staff and we will be happy to help. 

We currently have  free funded sessions avaliable in our FS1 provision, please contact the school office on 01142341304 or email enquiries@rivelin.sheffield.sch.uk for more information.