Lingfield Nursery School

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OUR CURRICULUM

At Lingfield Nursery, we use Development Matters to guide what and how we teach, helping us understand how children grow and learn at different stages of their development.

For each area of learning, we have identified curriculum goals for every room. These goals have been carefully sequenced using Development Matters to ensure children build on their prior learning, are well prepared for the next stage of their education and are ready to move confidently into the next room.

Our curriculum goals enable us to:

Ensure children are ready for the next stage of learning.

Support all areas of children’s development.

Plan meaningful activities and experiences that meet each child’s individual needs and promote continued progress.

Area of Development OWLS ROBINS PUFFINS KINGFISHERS
🤝 Personal, Social & Emotional Development (PSED)
    • Form a strong attachment to their key person.
    • Play with increasing confidence because their key person is nearby.
    • Engage with others through gestures, gaze and talk.
    • Grow in independence, rejecting help (“Me do it”).
    • Feel strong enough to express a range of emotions.
    • Form strong bonds with their key person and familiar adults.
    • Be increasingly able to talk about and manage their emotions.
    • Develop friendships with other children.
    • Begin to show effortful control, waiting for a turn and resisting the impulse to grab what they want.
    • Select and use activities and resources to achieve a goal.
    • Play with one or more children, extending and elaborating play ideas.
    • Increasingly follow rules, understanding why they are important.
🗣️ Communication & Language
    • Turn towards familiar sounds and voices.
    • Make sounds or use single words to gain attention.
    • Make eye contact and copy simple Makaton signs.
    • Understand simple instructions.
    • Begin to put two words together.
    • Focus on activities of their own choosing.
    • Start to say how they are feeling using words.
    • Start to develop conversations.
    • Understand and act on longer sentences.
    • Understand questions and instructions with two parts.
    • Use longer sentences of four to six words.
    • Start conversations and continue them for many turns.
🏃 Physical Development
    • Begin to walk independently.
    • Begin to confidently use a spoon.
    • Enjoy moving indoors and outdoors.
    • Walk, run, jump and climb with confidence.
    • Use large and small motor skills independently.
    • Begin to develop awareness of toileting routines.
    • Eat independently using a knife and fork.
    • Use a comfortable grip with good control when holding pencils.
    • Be increasingly independent getting dressed and communicate toileting needs.
    • Develop independence in toileting and self-care.
    • Continue developing balance, riding and ball skills.
    • Be increasingly independent dressing, including fastening zips.
🔤 Literacy
    • Enjoy sharing books with an adult.
    • Listen and begin to engage with songs and nursery rhymes.
    • Explore books through pictures and interaction.
    • Pay attention and respond to pictures and words.
    • Have favourite books and seek them out.
    • Enjoy sharing stories with adults.
    • Add meaningful marks to drawings.
    • Develop play around favourite stories using props.
    • Repeat words and phrases from familiar stories.
    • Engage in extended conversations about stories.
    • Develop phonological awareness by recognising initial sounds.
    • Write some letters accurately.
🔢 Mathematics
    • Take part in finger rhymes with numbers.
    • Build and stack using different resources.
    • Compare amounts using words such as “lots”, “more” and “same”.
    • Develop counting-like behaviour.
    • Compare amounts using mathematical language.
    • Complete inset puzzles.
    • Say one number for each object to five.
    • Show finger numbers to five.
    • Compare size, weight and height using mathematical language.
    • Compare quantities using “more than” and “fewer than”.
    • Link numerals with amounts to five.
    • Understand positional language such as “under” and “behind”.
🌏 Understanding the World
    • Explore materials with different properties.
    • Recognise family members in photographs.
    • Repeat actions that have an effect.
    • Explore natural materials indoors and outdoors.
    • Explore simple technology.
    • Show curiosity about animals, plants and outdoor spaces.
    • Notice differences between people.
    • Talk about what they see using a wide vocabulary.
    • Notice and talk about changes in the environment, such as weather and seasons.
    • Explore natural materials using all their senses.
    • Understand the importance of caring for living things and the environment.
    • Begin to make sense of their own life story and family history.
🖌️ Expressive Arts and Design
    • Explore their voices and make sounds.
    • Listen and dance to music.
    • Explore paint and messy play using hands and tools.
    • Join in with songs and rhymes.
    • Explore musical instruments in different ways.
    • Begin making marks intentionally and develop pretend play.
    • Use imagination with different materials.
    • Take part in simple pretend play using objects to represent something else.
    • Explore a range of creative materials to make pictures and models.
    • Develop complex stories through small world play.
    • Explore different materials to develop their own creative ideas.
    • Remember and sing entire songs.