Tag: child development

Supporting your child’s learning at home: Ideas for developing early science skills

Post author By Alphablocks Nursery School
Post date January 3, 2023

Young children begin to develop a sense of curiosity and start asking questions about the world around them at an early age. In fact, infants and toddlers are naturally curious and are constantly exploring their environment through their senses. As children grow and develop, they become more and more curious about the world around them and will often ask questions about how things work or why things happen. The first steps in scientific enquiry can be taken by fostering this natural curiosity and “systematic” investigation, that is, repeated and consistent exploration of a child’s environment.

There are many ways you can support and encourage your child’s journey in exploration. In general, it is important to provide your child with age-appropriate materials and activities, answer their questions no matter how basic or strange they may seem at first, and encourage them to make observations and ask more questions.

Open-ended resources are essential for nurturing children’s pre-science skills.

Tags child development, Cockfosters Nursery School, early years, early years STEM, Hadley Wood Montessori Nursery School, pre-school education, Reggio Emilia

Cockfosters Nursery Early Years Education Early Years Foundation Stage Early Years STEM Science Technology Engineering & Mathematics Enfield Nursery Hadley Wood Nursery High Scope early years approach Ofsted outstanding Pre-School Learning Research on Early Years Development

Colour & Light: The Lightbox Project

Post author By Alphablocks Nursery School
Post date February 26, 2022

During the previous term, we noticed that our children were showing a strong interest in light and shadows, as well as colours and space. As usual, we followed the children’s interests and ideas, and we decided to have a whole half term dedicated to the theme “Colour and Light”.

Tags child development, Cockfosters Nursery School, early learning, early years, Hadley Wood Montessori Nursery School, Reggio Emilia

Cockfosters Nursery Early Mathematics Early Years Education Early Years STEM Science Technology Engineering & Mathematics Enfield Nursery Hadley Wood Nursery High Scope early years approach Montessori Ofsted outstanding Reggio Emilia Research on Early Years Development

Maths in Early Years: building children’s confidence from an early age

Post author By Alphablocks Nursery School
Post date February 5, 2020

The older a child gets the harder it is to get them to engage with and truly appreciate mathematics and the powerful reasoning behind it. Therefore, introducing maths at an early age is of crucial importance: not only does it help them understand how to deal with abstract symbols, like numbers, but more importantly it helps them develop problem solving and reasoning skills.

Children need to be given an opportunity to practice their skills with numbers, linking them to concrete quantities, which are out there in the physical world, their sensory world. Knowledge of shapes and patterns also improves their competence and confidence in using mathematical concepts and language.

However, shapes, space, and measures is a key area that the Government is considering to remove from the Early Years curriculum from next year. As an outstanding nursery school, we place a lot of value on this area and we will certainly continue teaching and developing it. In this post, we summarise some of the things you can do at home to support your child’s learning in this area, which is so beneficial to children.

Tags child development, early years, Forest School, mathematics, Montessori School, pre-school

Early Years Education Early Years Foundation Stage Enfield Nursery Forest Schools Montessori Ofsted outstanding Reggio Emilia Research on Early Years Development

‘Focused Weeks’ at Alphablocks Nursery School

Post author By Alphablocks Nursery School
Post date March 13, 2019

Our hybrid educational approach at Alphablocks Nursery School has been recognised for its beneficial mix of pedagogical methods, which are naturally incorporated in our everyday practice and guide our children’s learning journeys. During this Spring Term we are focusing on a different approach every two-week ‘cycle’ (we call these ‘focused weeks’). Regular updates will be published in our blog.

Continue reading “‘Focused Weeks’ at Alphablocks Nursery School”

Tags child development, early learning, early years, Maria Montessori, Montessori School, nursery school, Outdoor Play, pre-school, research

Cockfosters Nursery Early Years Education Enfield Nursery Forest Schools Hadley Wood Nursery Montessori Ofsted outstanding Reggio Emilia

Rated Outstanding by Ofsted

Post author By Alphablocks Nursery School
Post date June 18, 2018

Alphablocks Nursery School & Pre-Prep in Hadley Wood provides outstanding early education to children aged two to five years old. We empower children to become confident learners in a safe and stimulating environment, which adapts according to the skills that we want our children to develop.

This school year is coming to a close with an outstanding Ofsted rating, which validates the efforts of our children, parents or carers, and brilliant teachers.

Tags boutique nursery, child development, early years, literacy, Montessori School, nursery school, Outdoor Play, pre-school education, Reading and writing, Reggio Emilia