Intent

Our intent is that all children feel happy, safe and valued as they develop a love of learning through play at Whitecross.

Our ethos is to enable all children to flourish from their individual starting points. We embrace what each child brings to our setting and work with their families to support their children to become independent learners.

Children develop and learn through positive relationships, meaningful play, strong communication.  They build on their experiences with others and the development of the characteristics of effective learning.

Implementation

Children build positive relationships with others through play and quality interactions with adults.  All adults are ambitious for every child to achieve; they value children’s choices and decisions, get to know their individual learning styles and recognise that each child develops in their own way.

 “Children learn and develop well in enabling environments with teaching and support from adults, who respond to their individual interests and needs and help them to build their learning over time” (Statutory Framework for the EYFS March 2021)

Our engaging environment at Whitecross enables children to follow their interests and fascinations by exploring and developing their learning. Children are given wide-ranging experiences that allow them to build on their knowledge both indoors and outside.  We learn through a carefully planned, well-balanced curriculum that provides a mixture of adult-led and child-initiated learning in all areas.  

Children find out for themselves by playing and exploring, actively learning and having a go at activities, and thinking critically. The opportunities they have to revisit their learning supports children to practise and consolidate their understanding and transfer experiences and skills into their long-term memory.

There are many opportunities for learning in our inviting, enabling environment and through positive relationships, all children actively learn each day. All encounters with adults and other children support each child's development and personal learning journey. Children are challenged and encouraged to take risks in their play to develop resilience.  They are taught a wide repertoire of rhymes and songs and their love of reading is extended through valuing books and through sharing of interesting and inspirational texts.

Impact

All of our children are happy to be at Whitecross Nursery School. They all make good or better progress from their individual starting points. The needs of each child are assessed by the staff team and activities are planned in response to their emerging and developing needs. They become keen, highly motivated learners who are able to persevere even when faced with challenges. They demonstrate good concentration, imagination and enquiry skills to ensure deep learning.

During their time at Whitecross, children develop self awareness and learn self-regulation skills to support their mental health and wellbeing. They leave as happy, independent individuals who are confident in their abilities, and they are ready to embrace new learning throughout their lives beyond Whitecross.

Here is the link to 'Development Matters 2021' for parental information.

Our curriculum is spilt into different areas of learning development appropriate to young children. 

There are three prime areas:

• Communication and Language
  • Listening and Attention
  • Understanding
  • Speaking
• Personal, Social and Emotional development
  • Making Relationships
  • Sense of Self
  • Understanding Feelings
• Physical development
  • Moving and Handling
  • Health and Self-care

There are four specific areas.

• Literacy
  • Reading 
  • Writing
• Maths
•  
• Understanding the World
  • The world
  • technology
• Expressive Arts and Design
  • Creating with materials
  • Being Imaginative and Expressive