“Every child deserves the best possible start in life and the support that enables them to fulfil their potential. Children learn and develop well in enabling environments with teaching and support from adults, who respond to their individual interests and needs.”
Statutory Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) Framework
At Cavendish Church of England Primary School, our Early Years curriculum is designed so that every child learns, loves and belongs from their very first day with us.
Reception is the beginning of a child's journey at Cavendish. We want children to feel safe, known and valued while developing the language, knowledge, skills, curiosity and independence that will enable them to flourish throughout school.
Our approach reflects our school vision: We Learn. We Love. We Belong. Children learn through carefully planned teaching, purposeful play and exploration; they experience warm, responsive relationships with adults and one another; and they become confident members of their class, school and wider community.
Our Reception Children in a Mixed-Age Class
Reception children are part of Robins, our mixed-age Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 class.
We see this as a strength. Children benefit from belonging to a wider class community, hearing rich language, learning alongside children at different stages, observing increasingly independent behaviours and sharing stories, experiences and celebrations together.
However, Reception remains distinctly Early Years.
Our Reception children are taught and assessed through the EYFS, not the Key Stage 1 National Curriculum. Shared class experiences are used where they enrich learning, but expectations remain developmentally appropriate.
A shared story, investigation or creative experience might unite the whole of Robins, while Reception children explore it through talk, play, role play, construction, practical investigation, mark-making and carefully planned continuous provision. Year 1 and Year 2 may move towards more formal National Curriculum outcomes.
In this way, mixed-age learning enhances Reception without turning Reception into Year 1 early.
Our EYFS Curriculum
Our curriculum meets the requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage statutory framework and is informed by Development Matters.
The EYFS statutory framework sets seven areas of learning and development: Communication and Language; Personal, Social and Emotional Development; Physical Development; Literacy; Mathematics; Understanding the World; and Expressive Arts and Design.
The first three are the prime areas, which are particularly important foundations for children's learning and development.
Our curriculum also supports children to become increasingly confident learners who play and explore, remain actively involved in their learning and begin to think creatively and critically.
The current statutory framework for group and school-based providers changes from 1 September 2026, and our policy has been written with that version in mind. Development Matters remains non-statutory guidance that supports curriculum design and professional judgement.
A Balance of Teaching and Play
Children in Reception need both expert teaching and rich opportunities to explore.
Adults explicitly teach new knowledge, vocabulary, phonics, mathematics, routines and skills. They model what to do and how to think, practise alongside children and support them towards increasing independence.
Alongside this, children need sustained opportunities to play, investigate, create, talk, rehearse and revisit their learning.
Our approach reflects the Tilian T(EACH) framework:
Teaching – adults model, explain and teach intentionally.
Every Child Included – barriers are anticipated and removed.
Active Engagement – children explore, practise, talk and persevere.
Classroom Environment – the environment encourages independence and deep thinking.
High Expectations – every child is challenged and supported to flourish.
This complements our Cavendish 5. Modelling, purposeful practice, retrieval, high-quality questioning and responsive feedback are all visible within Reception, but they are applied in ways that respect how young children learn. The Trust framework itself describes the EYFS learning rhythm as modelling, exploring, practising and reflecting.
Continuous Provision
Continuous provision is a fundamental part of our Reception curriculum.
Our indoor and outdoor environment is deliberately designed so that children can choose, explore, revisit, practise and apply learning independently.
Resources are familiar, accessible and purposeful. Children learn through construction, small-world play, role play, books, creative materials, investigation, mathematics, mark-making and physical experiences.
Adults do not simply supervise play. They observe, join, model language, introduce vocabulary, ask questions, notice misconceptions and extend children's thinking, before stepping back so that children can take increasing ownership of their learning.
Enhanced provision introduces new resources, problems or experiences linked to current teaching, children's interests or identified needs.
Our aim is for the environment itself to help children remember, practise and deepen what they have been taught.
Communication and Language
Language is the golden thread through our Early Years curriculum.
Children are surrounded by high-quality talk, stories, songs, rhyme and vocabulary. Adults listen carefully, extend children's language and model increasingly precise ways of explaining ideas.
Children have frequent opportunities to talk with adults and other children, ask questions, retell experiences, explain their thinking and develop the confidence to communicate.
The mixed-age environment can be particularly valuable here: Reception children hear and participate in rich conversations across Robins while adults ensure that every child has opportunities to contribute.
Early Reading and Writing
We teach phonics and early reading through Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised.
Children receive systematic daily phonics teaching and carefully matched decodable reading practice alongside a rich diet of stories, poetry, rhyme and books for pleasure.
Our aim is for children to develop both the ability to decode successfully and a genuine love of reading.
Writing begins through talk, storytelling, drawing, role play, fine-motor development, mark-making and phonics.
Reception children share the carefully chosen core texts used within Robins, but experience these through developmentally appropriate provision, oral retelling, vocabulary, shared writing and supported opportunities to write. This is exactly how our whole-school English plan distinguishes Reception from Year 1 and Year 2.
Mathematics
In Reception, NCETM Mastering Number provides our core number curriculum.
Children develop deep understanding of number through subitising, counting, comparison, composition and recognising patterns and relationships.
We deliberately do not use White Rose as the Reception mathematics scheme.
Because Mastering Number focuses on number, we plan wider mathematics carefully through continuous provision. Children explore pattern, shape, spatial reasoning, position, length, height, mass, capacity, time, sorting and mathematical recording through meaningful everyday experiences.
Children might compare quantities at snack time, measure during construction, investigate capacity outdoors, create repeating patterns, follow maps and routes or explain how they built a structure.
Mathematics is therefore both explicitly taught and encountered naturally throughout the environment.
Understanding the World
Children learn about people, communities, the past, places and the natural world through first-hand experiences, stories, visitors, investigation and exploration of our local environment.
Our mixed-age structure provides particularly valuable opportunities here.
Where Robins share a Science, History or Geography context, Reception children can participate in the rich experience while pursuing appropriate EYFS learning through Understanding the World.
They observe, notice, compare, ask questions, handle objects and artefacts, investigate the natural world and talk about what they discover.
Expressive Arts and Design
Children are encouraged to imagine, create and express themselves.
They explore drawing, painting, modelling, construction, music, movement, dance, storytelling and imaginative play.
Children may share artistic or musical experiences with older children in Robins, but their entitlement to open-ended experimentation and creative choice remains protected.
We value the creative process — exploring materials, trying an idea, changing it and trying again — as much as the finished outcome.
Outdoor Learning
Outdoor learning is an important part of our Reception curriculum.
Children need opportunities to move, investigate, build, observe, take appropriate risks and encounter the natural world directly.
Our outdoor environment and wider school grounds provide opportunities for physical development, mathematical exploration, scientific observation, imaginative play, language development and collaborative problem-solving.
Outdoor provision is part of the curriculum — not simply a break from it.
Inclusion and Belonging
Every child should be able to participate meaningfully in Reception.
Adults adapt teaching through modelling, visuals, gestures, communication support, sensory strategies, smaller steps, repetition, pre-teaching and carefully targeted adult support where appropriate.
We work closely with families, the SENCO and external professionals when children require additional support.
Our principle is to remove barriers while retaining ambition.
The mixed-age classroom can provide valuable models of communication, cooperation and independence, but children are grouped and supported according to their needs rather than simply their age.
Assessment
Assessment in Reception is ongoing, responsive and proportionate.
Adults develop a detailed professional understanding of children through observation, interaction, conversation, play and what children demonstrate independently during everyday learning.
Assessment helps us decide what needs to be taught next, rather than generating unnecessary paperwork. This closely reflects the Trust approach, which states that assessment should be rooted in observation, interaction and professional judgement while avoiding unnecessary workload.
Children complete the statutory Reception Baseline Assessment within their first six weeks of starting Reception.
At the end of Reception, teachers complete the statutory EYFS Profile, assessing children against the 17 Early Learning Goals. The Profile is intended particularly to support successful transition into Year 1.
Partnership with Parents and Carers
Parents and carers are children's first educators, and we value a close partnership with families.
We want communication to be warm, open and purposeful. Information from home helps us know children well, while we share children's progress, achievements and next steps with families.
We also provide guidance to help families support areas such as phonics, early reading and learning at home.
Preparing for Year 1
We want children to leave Reception confident, curious, independent and excited about what comes next.
Our mixed-age structure provides an unusually natural transition. Reception children already know Year 1 children, share aspects of their class community and become familiar with many of the people, places and routines around them.
We use that familiarity positively.
However, transition does not mean gradually removing play or turning the Summer term of Reception into Year 1.
Children continue to receive a developmentally appropriate EYFS curriculum throughout Reception, while adults increasingly encourage independence, sustained attention, communication and confidence.
The EYFS Profile and professional dialogue then enable Year 1 teaching to begin from what each child actually knows and can do.
EYFS and Our Christian Vision
Our Christian vision calls us to recognise the worth, uniqueness and potential of every child.
In Reception, this begins with belonging.
Children need to know that there is a place for them, that adults know them and that their ideas, questions and achievements matter.
Through warm relationships, shared experiences and high expectations, children learn to care for one another, persevere when something is difficult, celebrate difference and approach the world with curiosity and wonder.
We want every Reception child to finish their first year at Cavendish knowing:
I am known. I am valued. I can learn. I belong here.
We Learn. We Love. We Belong.