Early Years 2023-2024
Mrs Procter, Mrs Watkins, Mrs Frattaroli, Mrs Masters and Ms Baker would like to welcome you to the Early Years
Out Wonderfully Stimulating and Exceptional Learning Environment
Phonics and Reading Workshop 2024
Early Years Maths Meeting 2024
Westmeads Early Years - This is how we learn...
Compressed EY-Curriculum Workshop; This is how we learn. 2023-24.mp4
Term 5 - Everything Changes
Term 4 Going Places.
Term 4 Curriculum Letter.
Term 4 Learning Showcase
Exploring the woodwork bench
Some of our learning and discoveries in Term 4
Term 3 Be a Maker! An Engineer Like Me.
Term 3 Curriculum Letter
Reception children have continued to "Be An Engineer" by designing and creating their own mazes using Lego and Duplo. Then they challenged each other to navigate the ping pong balls around the mazes. Some children added extra obstacles in to make it even more of a challenge!
#STEAM #BeAMakerBeAnEngineer #UniquelyWestmeads
Term 3 Be a Maker Showcase We loved welcoming so many of our families to come and share the Reception children's learning for the topic 'Be a Maker, be an Engineer' at their showcase this week. They participated in a range of STEAM challenges, shared stories and information books and explored some of the gadgets and gizmos together. The children were very confident and independent sharing their work to their families and talk about what they had learnt.
With the arrival of the cooler weather this week, the Reception children came in one morning to discover that the water tray and tuff tray had iced over. This resulted in a morning of exploring ice; holding it with their hands, using different tools to crack it into pieces and then creating their own ice transporter machine to move the melting ice into the jug. Some of the children even created their own ice art with food dye!
#STEAM #AsColdAsIce #BeAMakerBeAnEngineer #UniquelyWestmeads
Term 3 Exploring and finding out about machines and objects from the past.
Exploring machines- Using tools to take the old appliances apart to find out how they work.
IMG_8176.mov
Term 3 Family learning workshops
Term 2 Celebrate!
The Reception children at Westmeads have been working very hard drawing upon their creative and writing skills for a top secret mission on the last day of term...I wonder what is could be? . . .
Enjoying a Love of Reading in our new library selecting great titles from range of genres and amazing authors!
Term 2 Learning - Making a post office
Term 2 Mighty Muscle progression
Through personalised activities such as our mighty muscle programme the children develop both fine and gross motor skills daily within the early year’s environment. as well as developing core strength we focus on shoulder, elbow and wrist pivots for our mark makers using brooms, brushes, sponges and sprayers. Research informs us that these stages of physical development are crucial for fine motor control and emergent writers.
Term 2 Leading our own learning
Term 2 - Coastal School at St Mildred’s Bay
What a fabulous adventure for our children to experience and compare the differences between our local Whitstable beach and a sandy one.
Term 1 - The Skin You Live In
Mighty Muscle Time- building our gross and fine motor skills
Mark Making patterns to support writing development
The Reception children have enjoyed exploring water in different areas of the environment. They created their own bubble mixtures, mixing it into water using different tools. They used the bubble machine or pipe cleaner to make the bubbles. Reception have continued to investigate and show curiosity with their water play and experimented with 'Rainbow Rain' in the water tray, mixing coloured water in the shaving foam 'clouds', as well as grating soap to create their own washing liquid to wash clothes! Fantastic clean fun!
Frontload experience- inspired by the artist Yayoi Kusama and the book the ‘The Dot’ the children displayed their ‘Individuality’ through dots and marks.
Our Showcase with Families: sharing our Term 1 learning about individuality, what makes a family? And expressing ourselves through dots!
Term 1 Curriculum Overview 23-24
Essential Letters and Sounds Phonics Learning
Outdoor Learning- Canopy, Coastal and Forest School
Forest and Coastal School Promote...
Confidence and independence grows in the natural environment giving a sense of success and self-esteem.
Development of relationships with other children and adults.
Adaptation to new situations, trying new activities and openness to experiences.
Children can become more motivated to use extensive language and vocabulary for different contexts and questions become more specific.
Physical development- enhanced stamina, gross and fine motor skills
6 key thinking and learning skills enquiry, hypothesis, information processing, decision making, communication and vocabulary, review and evaluation are experienced regularly.
Children’s attitudes to outdoors changes, respect for the environment begins to develop and they want to spend time in the great outdoors.
Wonderful Westmeads Early Years 2022-2023...a little taster !
