Alphablocks Nursery School | Ofsted Outstanding | Hadley WoodAs an outstanding Nursery School & Pre-prep, we support our older children’s transition to primary school in consistent, effective ways. However, there are always things that parents and carers can also do to support this important process.
Here are some tips on how you can your child for the transition to primary school:
We were so happy to return to our home as a nursery school last Monday, 1st of June. During the weeks of lockdown due to Covid-19 we found many innovative ways of staying connected with our children and their families, and continuing their learning journeys remotely. Unfortunately it has not been possible for all of our children to come back to the classroom in our Hadley Wood site in this half-term. We saw this as a challenge to overcome, so we have opted for a “blended learning” model, which allows us to expand on and complement our nursery-based offering with a remote learning curriculum.
Children need to be able to experiment with making marks from an early age using a range of resources as well as their sense and their bodies. There is a wide set of skills that children need to master in order to be able to use mark-making tools effectively, such as dexterity and coordination, and purely cognitive skills like dealing with symbols. Parents, carers and teachers all need to get on board and become more fascinated by children’s mark-making journeys and provide a wealth of opportunities to celebrate achievements and development of these skills.
“What did I do today? Let me think”
Eloise, age 4
During our “focused weeks” this Summer Term we explored in detail a specific educational approach every time. As part of this process, we made a lot of progress in implementing more elements of the High Scope approach. This is one of the four core early years educational methodologies that we follow as part of our overall hybrid philosophy.
We continued this Term with our “Bringing Stories to Life” project, in which children come up with various props to support story-telling, assume responsibilities and become immersed in stories that energise and fascinate them. This is what “active learning” is all about, and it is learning at its best.
Previous instances have included, for example: