An Introduction to the Foundation Stage at IBIS (Ages 3-5)

An Introduction to the Foundation Stage at IBIS

Children develop and learn fastest in their first years of life. In order to foster this, IBIS provides a stimulating curriculum and environment to ensure that your child has every opportunity to explore, share experiences and learn basic skills.
The Foundation Stage Curriculum begins in Kindergarten and is completed by the end of Reception Class. The Foundation Stage Curriculum has six areas of learning:

• Communication, Language and Literacy
• Mathematical Development
• Knowledge and Understanding of the World (Science, History, Geography and Information Technology)
• Physical Development (Sport, fine and gross motor co-ordination)
• Personal, Social and Emotional Development
• Creative Development (Art, Design and Technology, Music and Drama)

Each area of learning has a set of related early learning goals. The Foundation Stage teachers plan work aimed at meeting the diverse needs of all children. By the end of the Foundation Stage most children will have achieved the early learning goals, some will go beyond them. The learning programme is planned around a two-year rotating topic cycle.

Kindergarten Two-Year Topic Cycle

Rotation one

Autumn first half-term Food	Autumn second half-term Toys and Games
Spring first half-term Sea Life	Spring second half-term Bears
Summer term Holiday Stories

Rotation two

Autumn first half-term Colours	Autumn second half-term Stories
Spring first half-term Hot and Cold	Spring second half-term Creatures of the Garden
Summer term Nursery Rhymes

Some children will do more than one year in Kindergarten.

Reception One-Year Topic Cycle

Rotation one

Autumn first half-term All About Me	Autumn second half-term The Body / Senses
Spring first half-term Outdoor Environment	Spring second half-term Weather
Summer term Animals – pets and wild animals

 

Teaching Methods

At IBIS we use an integrated approach to learning, meaning that the areas of learning are taught through topics. The children work as a class, in small groups and individually. The children are encouraged to make choices in the different areas of sand, water, construction area, craft area and role play area. They are guided in choosing some activities for themselves. We encourage the children to use their interests and ideas in their learning; this helps them become independent learners. In this environment learning occurs both incidentally and in planned groups.
In Reception Class we combine an integrated day together with focused mathematical, reading and writing sessions. Towards the end of the year we teach literacy and numeracy for an hour each per day.
Play is a valued part of the Foundation Stage Curriculum. Through play children can explore, discover and develop learning experiences and practices. They are able to build up ideas, concepts and skills.

Assessment

The children are assessed continually throughout the year to ensure progress in their learning. We respect the previous learning that each child brings to school and consider each child as an individual. We assess the children through observation, discussion and by looking at their work.

The Foundation Stage Profile is used as the basis of assessment. We record in it whenever a child achieves a specific early learning goal. Each of the following areas of learning is assessed:

• Personal, social and emotional development
  • disposition and attitudes
  • social development
  • emotional development
• Communication, language and literacy
  • language for communication and thinking
  • linking sounds and letters
  • reading
  • writing
• Mathematical development
  • numbers as labels for counting
  • calculating
  • shape, space and measures
• Knowledge and understanding of the world
• Physical development
• Creative development

The assessment process determines our planning and the next step in your child's learning.

 

Homework

The children are not given homework on a formal basis. However, books are taken home to share and they may be asked to bring items in for discussion linked with their topic work.

German

In Reception Class non-native speakers receive two German lessons per week. Through a programme designed for the early stage of learning a foreign language the children get to know the different sounds and melody of German, understanding words and short sentences and imitate and start to speak them.

In the first year of German we cover the following topics including seasonal festivities: greetings – family – animals – colours – numbers 1-10 – parts of the body – clothes – means of transport – school related things – furniture – fruit – playground – relevant adjectives, prepositions and verbs.

For more details of the German scheme of work please refer to the Introduction to Modern Foreign Languages.

 

EAL

 

In Reception Class non-English speakers receive two English support lessons per week. Here they practise speaking in a small group and basic vocabulary is reinforced.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Early Learning Goals

Communication, Language and Literacy

• Enjoy listening to and using spoken and written language and readily turn to it in their play and learning.
• Interact with others, negotiating plans and activities and taking turns in conversations.
• Sustain attentive listening, responding to what they have heard by relevant comments, questions or actions.
• Listen with enjoyment and respond to stories, songs and other music, rhymes and poems and make up their own stories, songs, rhymes and poems.
• Extend their vocabulary, exploring the meanings and sounds of new words.
• Speak clearly and audibly with confidence and control and show awareness of the listener.
• Use language to imagine and recreate roles and experiences.
• Use talk to organise, sequence and clarify thinking, ideas, feelings and events.
• Hear and say initial and final sounds in words and short vowel sounds within words.
• Link sounds to letters, naming and sounding the letters of the alphabet.
• Use their phonic knowledge to write simple regular words and make phonetically plausible attempts at more complex words.
• Explore and experiment with sounds, words and texts.
• Retell narratives in the correct sequence, drawing on language patterns of stories.
• Know that print carries meaning and, in English, is read from left to right and top to bottom.
• Show an understanding of the elements of stories, such as main character, sequence of events, and openings and how information can be found in non-fiction texts to answer questions about where, who, why and how.
• Use their phonic knowledge to write simple regular words and make plausible attempts at more complex words.
• Attempt writing for different purposes, using features of different forms such as lists, stories and instructions.
• Write their own names and other things such as labels and captions and begin to form simple sentences, sometimes using punctuation.
• Use a pencil and hold it effectively to form recognisable letters, most of which are correctly formed.

Mathematical Development

• Say and use number names in order in familiar contexts.
• Count reliably up to 10 everyday objects.
• Recognise numerals 1 to 9.
• Use developing mathematical ideas and methods to solve practical problems.
• In practical activities and discussion begin to use the vocabulary involved in adding and subtracting.
• Use language, such as more or less, to compare two numbers.
• Find one more or one less than a number from one to ten.
• Begin to relate addition to combining two groups of objects and subtraction to taking away.

Knowledge and Understanding of the World

• Investigate objects and materials by using all their senses as appropriate.
• Find out and identify some features of living things, objects and events they observe.
• Look closely at similarities, differences, patterns and change.
• Ask questions about why things happen and how things work.
• Build and construct with a wide of range of objects, selecting appropriate resources, and adapting their work where necessary.
• Select the tools and techniques they need to shape, assemble and join materials they are using.
• Find out about and identify the uses of everyday technology and use information and communication technology and programmable toys to support their learning.
• Find out about past and present events in their own lives, and in those of their families and other people they know.
• Observe, find out about and identify features in the place they live and the natural world.
• Find out about their environment and talk about those features they like and dislike.
• Begin to know about their own cultures and those of other people.

Physical Development

• Move with confidence, imagination and in safety.
• Move with control and co-ordination.
• Travel around, under, over and through balancing and climbing equipment.
• Show awareness of space, of others and of themselves.
• Recognise the importance of keeping healthy and those things which contribute to this.
• Recognise the changes that happen to their bodies when they are active.
• Use a range of small and large equipment.
• Handle tools, objects, construction and malleable materials safely and with increasing control.

Creative Development

• Explore colour, texture, shape, form and space in two or three dimensions.
• Recognise and explore how sounds can be changed, sing simple songs from memory, recognise repeated sounds and sound patterns and match movements to music.
• Use imagination in art and design, music, dance, imaginative role play and stories.
• Respond in a variety of ways to what they see, hear, smell, touch and feel.
• Express and communicate their ideas, thoughts and feelings by using a widening range of materials, suitable tools, imaginative and specific role-play, movement, designing and making, and a variety of songs and musical instruments.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

• Continue to be interested, excited and motivated to learn.
• Be confident to try new activities, initiate ideas and speak in a familiar group.
• Maintain attention, concentrate, and sit quietly when appropriate.
• Respond to significant experiences, showing a range of feelings when appropriate.
• Have a developing awareness of their own needs, views and feelings and be sensitive to the needs, views and feelings of others.
• Have a developing respect for their own cultures and beliefs and those of other people.
• Form good relationships with adults and peers.
• Work as part of a group or class, taking turns and sharing fairly, understanding that there need to be agreed values and codes of behaviour for groups of people, including adults and children, to work together harmoniously.
• Understand what is right, what is wrong and why.
• Consider the consequences of their words and actions for themselves and others.
• Dress and undress independently and manage their own personal hygiene.
• Select and use activities and resources independently.
• Understand that people have different needs, views, cultures and beliefs that need to be treated with respect.
• Understand that they can expect others to treat their needs, views, cultures and beliefs with respect.