Curriculum and Assessment

Play is a vital part of young children’s learning. At Lavender Farm we provide children with the opportunity to explore a wide variety of play based activities within the indoor and outdoor environment. Children explore idea’s, feelings and relationships with others in a safe and secure provision. At Lavender Farm we provide experiences and quality play for all children that are active, exciting, fun and imaginative and support every child’s learning and developmental needs. Staff at Lavender Farm carry out regular observations to ensure planned activities are in place to support your child’s learning, using their current interests. We encourage you as parents to assist us during this process by informing us of your child’s achievements and interests.

At Lavender Farm we carry out various assessments starting in the Autumn term through to the Summer Term. We use a program called Progress Matters to monitor the children’s development as well as providing next steps for each child in all 7 areas of learning which are…

• Personal, Social and Emotional Development
• Communication and Language
• Physical Development
• Literacy
• Mathematics
• Understanding the World
• Express Arts and Design

Progress Matters is carried out by the child’s key carer during each term and through parent reviews and our online Tapestry App parents are able to read these assessments and be made aware of different next steps that we can then all work towards. Next steps from Progress Matters are then planned for through Adult Led activities, Group times and through an enhanced provision supporting children’s needs and interests.

Parents during the induction process will be set up with the App ‘Tapestry’. At Lavender Farm the staff use Tapestry to create each child a personal learning Journal of their time at Lavender Farm. Tapestry is a safe, secure and password protected Early Years app where both staff and parents can contribute to their child’s learning and upload ‘Wow’ moments and memorable photographs. Staff at Nursery will also add written observations of children during their play and during adult led activities, linking play to development milestones within the Early Years Foundation Stage that are being achieved. To support this photographs will also be taken to capture your child’s play at Nursery also adding to their Journal.

WellComm is an Early Intervention tool kit designed to help practitioners across Sandwell working with children in the Early Years aged between 6 months and 6 years. WellComm is a screening toolkit that is used by childcare practitioners to identify children who made need additional support with their Speech and Language development. WellComm is organised into different age bands and children through play based activities will be scored on a traffic light system; red, amber and green. Children at Lavender Farm are screened by their key carer on entry to the Nursery in a play environment that is promoting the use and understanding of language. If a child scores red or amber then an activity pack will be sent home for parents to work through with their children over 12 weeks. Staff will also be working with children at Nursery on the same or similar activities to aid their speech and language development. Children who scored red or amber will then be rescreened after 12 weeks of intervention. The WellComm is carried out to provide a pathway of support for children who may need additional help through a fun and friendly program.

At Lavender Farm we promote the targeted Early Intervention Program ‘Early Talk Boost’. This program supports 3-4 year olds within small groups focusing on different areas of Communication and Language through planned play based activities, stories and songs. We have two trained practitioners at Lavender Farm who work daily with different groups of children 3 times a week for 20minutes within both of the three to five rooms. Parents are encouraged to become involved within this program and are asked to share different stories with their child daily that are provided by the Nursery. Early Talk Boost focuses on different developmental milestones and has many aims including: