Foundation Stage...

St John's is a fully integrated through primary with admission to the nursery from age 3. 

The integration of the school phases; Foundation, Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 ensure a happy, fully integrated progression throughout the school for all the children.

The Foundation Stage is the first stage of the National Curriculum that focuses on the distinct needs of children aged three until the end of the reception year. It is a broad, balanced and purposeful curriculum, delivered through planned play activities to help ensure all children have the opportunity to reach their full potential and experience the best possible start to their education.

Our topic for the first term is ‘Nursery Rhymes’.  Each week’s activities will be focused around a well known rhyme such as Humpty Dumpty,  ‘Hey Diddle Diddle’, ‘Old King Cole’ and ‘Jack and Jill’.

We will be introducing big books to the children in order to share stories & rhymes and to teach the children literacy skills.  The children will also be working through the Jolly Phonics scheme, learning the sounds and names of letters of the alphabet.  In numeracy the children will be learning to count and recognise numbers to 10.  We will begin to talk about the shapes of everyday objects and compare objects by size eg. bigger, smaller, longer or shorter.  

We will develop the children’s general knowledge and understanding by encouraging them to show an interest in the world in which they live and to ask questions about why things happen.  They will learn how to operate simple equipment such as a tape recorder and describe significant events both in their lives and in the lives of family & friends.

We will be encouraging children to become more independent in their learning and to be able to persist for longer periods of time at an activity.  They will be encouraged to dress and undress themselves for PE and approach new experiences confidently.  In PE we will be playing games to develop listening skills and observing the effects of exercise on our bodies. 

Through our creative activities the children will learn to combine different media to create collages and how to mix colours using paint.  They will explore the different sounds made by instruments and tap out simple rhythms. 

They will have opportunities for role-play in our castle and have free access to our ‘creative area’ to make models, paintings etc.

The Nursery children have been busy exploring different nursery rhymes. We have also had a different colour focus each week. On Fridays we all dress up in the colour of the week. Here we are wearing red!