Intent

EYFS-curriculum-Intent

 

At Great Rollright School, we believe in providing a secure foundation for our children’s future learning and development. We work hard to provide a stimulating environment that offers exciting opportunities and promotes challenge, exploration and a genuine love for learning. Our curriculum enables children to develop interpersonal skills, build resilience, and become creative thinkers in a fun, secure, challenging, and rich educational environment that fosters everyone’s growth and success. Our whole school’s Christian values of love, courage, truth, and respect, coupled with our Good Shepherd guiding principles, shape how we behave, what we say, how we build relationships and how we learn. They are incorporated into every aspect of life at Great Rollright. Every child is recognised as a unique individual. We celebrate and welcome the differences within our school community. We aim for all children to develop physically, verbally, cognitively, and emotionally in an environment that values all cultures, communities, and individuals. We aim for our children to be confident and independent, to believe in themselves and interact positively with others. We believe that the optimal balance of adult-directed and child-initiated play ensures the best outcomes for our pupils. Warm and positive relationships between staff and children, consistent routines and strong relationships with parents are essential.

Implementation

Our EYFS curriculum follows the statutory guidance EYFS Framework and is supported by the Development Matters guidance. The Characteristics of effective teaching and learning are also central to all planned learning experiences in our EYFS curriculum. Emphasis is on learning through play, direct practical experience and being led by the interests of our children. There is a combination of adult-led and teacher-led sessions, along with a wealth of stimulating, continuous provision opportunities that encourage children to develop their learning independently through discovery, exploration, curiosity, and challenge. The internal and external environments are designed to enable children to access resources and the curriculum independently, allowing them to make their own choices. All environments are regularly adapted to meet the evolving needs of the children, providing both support and challenge to all.

We begin each new year by getting to know all our new children. We consider their different starting points so we can carefully adapt our EYFS provision to ensure that it is suitable for their unique needs, interests, and stages of development. We recognise that the seven areas of learning cannot be delivered without using opportunities to make links between them. We aim to deliver the curriculum through planned, purposeful play, and adults help scaffold learning through skilful interactions and effective questioning. We present new concepts through meaningful contexts that enable the children to make connections and build upon what they already know, allowing each child to have ownership of their learning. At Great Rollright, we believe the role of the adults is to facilitate opportunities for pupils to learn through sensitive interactions. By responding in this way, pupils see their play as meaningful and valued by the adults. This empowers our early learners to develop by leading their play, and at our school, this will not be adult-led with limited predetermined outcomes.

We also prioritise creating a ‘language-rich’ environment through the use of songs, nursery rhymes, poems, and stories, and by providing time for quality interactions between adults and peers. Trained staff ensure that interactions are positive and progressive, allowing children to flourish and acquire words at a pace that fosters confidence in their communication. Children are encouraged to become early readers through the enjoyment of books and the systematic teaching of our Essential Letters and Sounds phonics. The children learn nursery rhymes, poems, and new vocabulary, and develop their mathematical thinking through direct instruction and hands-on exploration. We want our children to become confident mathematicians who can apply what they have learnt to real-life experiences.

We have designed our school environment to help our children strengthen their core muscles through physical play. Children spend time outdoors in the natural environment, regardless of the weather. They develop lovely, exploratory, sensory experiences through opportunities such as Forest school or our potion/mud station, water tray, sandpit, and garden. Skilled adult-facilitated play supports children in learning to work together, manage their feelings, and ask questions.

We understand the importance of parental engagement and believe that our parents have a crucial role in their children’s education. We work hard to create strong partnerships between home and school, helping our parents feel part of our school community. Parents are also encouraged to share their children’s achievements and learning outside of school through ‘WOW’ moments and their children’s online learning journeys (Tapestry).

The curriculum is taught through topics which are enriched with classroom enhancements, trips and visitors. Quality key texts support topics. These are carefully chosen to encourage children’s speech, language, and communication development. Focused child observations ensure that children’s individual needs and interests are developed alongside a strong progressive curriculum designed by the school based on Rosenshine’s principles of instruction. This is to develop their experience and knowledge across a range of themes that lay the foundations for the topics covered in KS1 and KS2.

As part of the teaching and learning process, children are assessed in relation to their progress towards the Early Learning Goals. These judgements are based on cumulative observations and in-depth knowledge of the children acquired through ongoing assessment. These ongoing assessments inform planning and the next steps in teaching and learning for all children throughout the year.

Impact

Our curriculum and its delivery aim for our children, from their own starting points, is to make good progress. During their time with us, children can make rapid progress toward the national expectation of a good level of development by the end of the year. Knowledge, understanding and skills will be promoted and eventually mastered to ensure children are ready to begin learning the National Curriculum Programme of study in Year 1.

The children will develop their learning characteristics and be able to apply their knowledge to a range of situations, making links and explaining their ideas and understanding. We want children to be confident in taking risks and discussing their successes and failures with peers and adults, drawing on their experiences to improve or adjust their actions. We believe our high standards are due to our carefully planned environment, enriched play-based curriculum, quality first teaching and the knowledge of the children.

Our young learners will:

  • Be able to appreciate and understand the world around them by experiencing and learning about different cultures, celebrations, music, dance, art and history
  • They will actively ask questions about their learning experiences
  • Take pride in all that they do for themselves, for others and for their community
  • Demonstrate self-regulation, emotional resilience, and the ability to persevere when they encounter challenges whilst managing risks
  • Develop a sense of self-awareness and become confident in their own abilities
  • Be kind, respectful and honest, demonstrating inclusive attitudes and have a sense of their role in wider society

http://great-rollright.oxon.sch.uk/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Welcome-to-The-Meadow-2026.pptx

Information for new starters

Welcome to The Meadow 2026

 

 

Please find below the links to the documents which have been provided for our new starters in September 2026.

Our Early Years Policy can be accessed here:

’50 Things to do before you’re five′

A new free parent/carer app has launched just in time for the summer and is now available to download. Parents and carers of under-5s in Oxfordshire can now access fifty low-cost or free local activities to help promote early language development.

 

With information, guidance and supporting resources, parents can build a memory bank of their child’s special moments – from playing in the rain (#29 Pitter Patter), building dens (#33 Home from Home), to making potions (#17 Hocus Pocus Potions).

Find out more by clicking on the logo below:

 

Children’s early interactions with adults, starting from birth, are vital. These simple ‘to and fro’ conversations form such important foundations and underpin later learning. In Oxfordshire, we recognise that being able to communicate effectively supports children’s mental health and wellbeing, their self-confidence and the forming of friendships in the early years. Additionally, early language skills can be viewed as the foundation of children’s later literacy development.

 

Advice on potty training ready for school can be found at –

https://eric.org.uk/all-aboard-the-toilet-train-get-ready-for-school/

Advice on safer sleep can be found at –

https://www.lullabytrust.org.uk/baby-safety/safer-sleep-information/safer-sleep-overview/