Nursery Curriculum

Personal, Social and Emotional Development (PSED)

In Nursery, the children will be reading books as inspiration to begin discussions about the things that make us feel emotions, and how to deal with these feelings. The children will also be encouraged to discover activities and skills that they are good at, and to share these with their peers.

Physical Development

The Nursery children will also have a continued fine motor focus with daily finger gym activities incorporating a variety of different resources. The children will also be playing a variety of collaborative games incorporating the skills of throwing, catching and rolling.

We provide space and time for the children to develop their larger muscle groups outside using bikes, climbing and balancing equipment as well as mini led exercise sessions. Children are encouraged to develop independent self-care skills and learn how to make healthy choices in relation to eating, exercising and hygiene.

Communication and Language

The children in Nursery will be challenged to work in teams in various situations, listening to others ideas, sharing their own ideas and maintaining attention and concentration on particular tasks. Across the foundation stage, there will be a focus on science activities in the afternoons, providing opportunities for children to make predictions, describe what they have observed and give explanations for these observations.

Literacy

In Nursery, the children will also be exploring the world of non-fiction texts and using these to support solving daily tasks, whilst also having regular opportunities to read and listen to a variety of high-quality stories, poems, rhymes and songs. They will continue to write their names on a daily basis and use these to support turn taking and small group work. There will be continuous provision aimed at providing opportunities for the children to make marks and write independently in a variety of contexts

Mathematics

The children in Nursery will be consolidating skills in using numbers to ten, with daily counting and ordering activities. There is a strong emphasis on adults encouraging children to solve the problems that occur in their play. Children learn about shapes and their properties by handling and making arrangements with shapes. They also develop the vocabulary and concepts of measuring length, time, size and weight.

Understanding of the World

The children in Nursery will talk about the things that they have observed and discovered, ultimately learning to show care and concern for living things and the environment.

Expressive Arts and Design

In Nursery the children will have daily access to a Creation Station and be encouraged to create representations of the experiences. They will explore media, such as clay, collage and junk modelling to name a few.

Along with daily opportunities for singing in all classes, we will continue to come together for weekly singing assembly, where we will work on choral singing, singing in rounds and learning rhythmic songs.

Enrichment Opportunities

Throughout the term, we will be inviting members of the community to come and share their expertise.

Each week, our specialist teachers visit the Nursery. At Charles Dickens Primary School and Nursery we have a specialist teacher for French. Our French Teacher focusses on developing conversational skills, pronunciation and a love of language learning. Our Art Teacher supports the children in exploring a variety of mixed media and techniques, including colour mixing. Our Music Teacher uses the Kadály pedagogy to develop early musicianship. In addition to all this, we have an amazing school garden where children grow plants.