Assessment

Within our OUTSTANDING EYFS Unit our staff are highly skilled in Early Years Education. We provide high quality assessment and interventions for all children in our care.

To help us effectively meet their individual care and learning needs, each child in our Little Wizards and Nursery provision is assigned to a named person (key worker) for the whole school year. The named person will work closely with you to identify your child’s next developmental milestones such as potty training or preparing for transition to Reception. They provide a first point of contact for you and your child and are responsible for maintaining your child’s Learning Journey and keeping his/her assessments up to date.

When appropriate, the named person will liaise and work in partnership with other child care services to ensure consistency of care and provision.

On entry to Little Wizards and Nursery provision our children receive an intervention called Welcomm which enhances Communication, Language and Understanding skills. Our experienced practitioners spend time with each child building positive relationships and getting to know their likes and dislikes. In Reception our highly  trained Communication Champion targets children who need interventions based on evidence collected from previous education sessions and on the government approved baseline and in house baseline at the beginning of the year.

The staff are constantly assessing the children in their everyday activities, play and through more focussed adult-led interactions and sessions. We use observations of the children, photos, the work that they do, feedback from parents and comments made by the children to assess where the pupils are working.  Evidence of WOW moments are placed on Tapestry to create a journey of learning for each individual child across the year.

The new EYFS Framework and Development Matters documents are used to inform the curriculum, the enhancements in the provision and next steps for pupils.  The new Development Matters gives statements for the ages of the children. We share this with parents and base the next steps for the children on this.

The planning focus for each term and each week is taken from the Long Term Plan, the agreed focus, the previous week’s findings, the interests of the children and the next steps.

During the children’s first half-term in Reception class, the teacher must conduct the DfE Reception Baseline. This is a short, interactive and practical assessment of your child’s early literacy, communication, language and mathematics skills when they begin school, using materials that most children of your child’s age will be familiar with.

Teachers will then use this assessment, alongside a three week transition period of getting to know the children and conducting observations, to inform their learning priorities and know how best to support the every individual child.

Our experienced staff team ensure that continuous provision is targeted to your child’s individual needs. The purpose of an effective continuous provision is to offer children a constant environment that is safe for them to explore whilst challenging their learning. It should allow children the freedom to explore and become independent in making choices.

As your child progresses throughout the year our staff will target children with specific tailored interventions to help them develop to the best of their abilities

The interventions include:

• ELKLAN (Speech and Language)
• WELCOMM
• BLAST 1
• BLAST 2
• SEAL PUPS

Parents receive an annual report that offers brief comments on each child’s progress in each area of learning. It highlights the child’s strengths and development needs and gives details of the child’s general progress. We complete these in June and send them to parents in early July each year.