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Vision and Literacy Statements

Vision Statement

We aim to create a safe, secure place where all children, families and staff feel valued, empowered, and happy to grow and learn together. At Hanslope Pre-school children actively learn through play and develop independence, confidence, and self-esteem, skilfully supported by qualified practitioners who seek to foster a lifelong love of learning. 

 

Our Values 

We believe that: 

  • Parents and families are the first and most enduring educators of their children. Parent's contributions are the foundations upon which we build and extend children's learning. 

  • All children are unique individuals who learn and develop in different ways, and at different rates. 

  • Every child has the right to have their individual needs recognised and fulfilled. 

  • Children's opinions and interests must be listened to, recognised, valued, and responded to. 

  • Children should know that their ideas and contributions are listened to and valued. 

  • Children are active learners who learn through playing and interacting with a wide variety of open-ended resources in an enabling and vibrant environment. 

  • All children should be able to choose whether to play inside or outside. 

  • All children should be encouraged to make independent choices. 

  • All children should be supported to manage their own self-care. 

  • All children should learn about and be encouraged to adopt active, healthy lifestyles. 

  • All children should be encouraged to experience risk and challenge in a safe and secure environment. 

  • Every member of staff is important, and their contribution is valued. 

  • The quality of the interaction between practitioners and children impacts upon the well-being and development of children. 

  • Children need and deserve practitioners who are professionally qualified and committed to providing highest quality Early Years care and education. Practitioners must understand how children learn and develop and how to support individual children's learning. 

  • Children thrive within the context of warm, caring relationships with trusted adults. 

  • Practitioners and volunteers working with children must be enthusiastic, committed, knowledgeable and empathetic team members. 

  • Children should learn about different people in their community and all around the world in a way that they can understand and relate to. 

  • Children need support to play and learn together, so that they learn to co-operate, resolve conflict and make friends. 

 

Our Actions 

Therefore we: 

  • Give every child a Key Person who will build a trusting, warm relationship with the child and family; and co-ordinate the child's care and learning. 

  • Listen to and observe children playing and learning to find out as much as possible about what each child: 

  • Knows; 

  • Can do; 

  • Is interested in. 

  • Plan activities and experiences to meet each child's individual needs and interests. 

  • Provide opportunities for a wide range of play activities, both indoor and outdoor, using a variety of open-ended resources. 

  • Ensure children have the opportunity to make independent choices about where they play and learn. 

  • Provide opportunities for children to progress in all aspects of their development including: 

  • Communication and Language; 

  • Physical Development; 

  • Personal, Social and Emotional Development; 

  • Literacy; 

  • Mathematics; 

  • Understanding the World; 

  • Expressive Arts and Design. 

  • Sensitively help children to become confident and independent in their personal care. 

  • Provide a range of activities and experiences that are risk assessed; and teach children to recognise and manage risk for themselves. 

We seek to develop genuine partnerships with parents, and work together to help their children to learn. 

Setting Literacy Statement

Our literacy mission statement - demonstrating our commitment to literacy and working in partnership. 

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Developing fundamental early literacy skills: 
Language and communication are vital in underpinning literacy skills and an indicator of future successes. 
Children make critical links between print, language, meaning and reading. 
 

Play: 
Play is fundamental, so children can make sense of the world, what they have seen, heard and felt… creating meaningful context and supporting children to establish the real purpose of reading and writing. 
NOTE: Try adding telephones (to role play areas) to encourage conversations, point out print around you, add purposeful writing equipment (paper/pens/pencils/notebooks/pads), let children look at magazines, receipts, recipes and your own writing (model writing – but remember not to take over – pressure can turn children off the learning process). 

  

Rhyme: 
Rhyme is key, it helps children hear patterns in language. Children will first notice that certain words sound the same and share a pattern in the way they are spelt. Understanding these links will make learning to read easier. 

 
Vocabulary: 
Talk, Chatter, Natter…. Building a large and varied vocabulary enables children to be prepared for the many words they will later find in print when learning to read. Point out print in the environment. 
An increased vocabulary enables children to gain more information and an increased understanding of the world which in turn makes it easier to learn new words. 

At Hanslope Pre-school we sensitively support our children to widen their vocabulary by: - 
- Involving the children in meaningful conversations. 
- Describing new words and language. 
- Relating language to a child’s knowledge and experiences. 
- Modelling new vocabulary ourselves. 
- Choosing stimulating and interactive core books and songs. 
- Creating a language and print rich environment. 

  

Fostering a love of stories: 
Sharing, valuing and enjoying books in our setting and at home together has a huge impact on the value children place on books. Seeing books as a source of pleasure is very important, this in turn will motivate children to value reading. If we foster a love of books and stories children learn to love language and reading, we can do this by: - 
- Creating an inviting area to share books. Creating small cosy spaces to read. 
- Developing key relationships (Parents/ family/ Key Person). 
- Implementing core reading times. 
- Placing books in all areas 
- Presenting stories in a fun, interactive and exciting way with tone of voice, sound, and props (such as puppets). 

  

Listening: 
Reading involves two skills, word recognition and comprehension. Word recognition involves phonic recognition and starts very early with a focus on sounds. Children need to have well developed listening skills to be able to differentiate between sounds in words when learning to read. You may find the ‘Phase One Letters and Sounds’ document useful. Try involving children in listening games such as sound lotto, musical games, Kims game, rhyming games – helping children to build these patterns and laying the foundations.

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