To meet the Early Learning Goals we provide a range of stimulating and enjoyable activities and resources. Sometimes the children decide independently how they will use the activity or resource and at other times an adult may take the lead. Activities and resources include:

• Messy activities – sand, water, painting, crafts, print and collage. We give the children a chance to experiment and make their own “creations” using various materials. It is the “doing” of the activities rather than a recognisable end product which is important for the children.
• Table toys – jigsaws, games, threading, and drawing. All these activities help with colour and number recognition, hand-eye co-ordination and muscle control. They also teach children the concepts of sharing and taking turns.
• Imaginative play – train track, farm and other toy animals, cars, and dolls
• Building and construction toys
• Music, sound and singing – in each session we all join in a singing session in which children sing songs, learn finger rhymes, number songs and play with musical instruments.
• Book corner – Children can look at our books by themselves or with an adult. We always end our sessions with a quiet time where all the children listen to stories read by an adult.
• Physical/adventure play – outside we have bikes, scooters, balls and hoops. Apart from helping co-ordination, these activities encourage children to share and make friends. Indoors we have a climbing frame on which they can share the joys of climbing and sliding plus other equipment to crawl through and balance on.
• Role play – a home corner, dressing-up rail, fire engine, shop and more are there for the children to act our their imaginative ideas so important for their creative and emotional development.
• Cooking and making things to eat
• Our various activities are loosely based around a ‘thread’ or topic, which links them together. Our interest table displays books and other activities connected to the ‘thread’; children are encourages to contribute items for this interest table.
• Living and growing things – often as part of the weekly topic we look at the living world around us. Tadpoles, caterpillars, courgette plants, sunflower seeds, wood pile full of minibeasts – they have all formed part of a session!
• IT – we have a computer and a range of software suitable for this age group giving children an opportunity to learn about numbers and colours etc using an electronic medium. It also gives children a chance to practice keyboard and mouse skills.

Events and outings

We organise a range of events during the year – some for fundraising purposes, some simply for the enjoyment of the children and parents/carers. We hope you will support and enjoy them with your family and friends. Every year there is a Christmas Sing-a-long and a Christmas Party. We have also held Easter Fairs, Teddy Bear Picnics and Obstacle course days.

Occasionally we arrange for visits within our village as part of linking the life of the children with their wider community. There have been visits to the library, Copper Beeches Residential Home and the fire station.

In previous years we have had a highly enjoyable and rewarding visit to White Post Farm. We try and keep the additional costs of these trips to parents as low as possible.