The Pre-school aims to:

• Provide high quality care and education primarily for children below statutory school age;
• work in partnership with parents to help children learn and develop;
• add to the life and well-being of its local community;
• offer children and their parents a service, which promotes equality and values diversity.

As a member of Wildern Opportunity Group Pre-school, your child:

• is in a safe and stimulating environment;
• is given generous care and attention, due to our high ratio of adults to children;
• has the chance to join with other children and adults to interact, play, work and learn together;
• is helped to take forward her/his learning and development by building on what she/he already knows and can do;
• has a personal ‘key person’ who ensures your child makes satisfying progress;
• is in a pre-school which sees you as a partner in helping your child to learn and develop;
• is in a pre-school in which parents help to shape the service it offers.

The Opportunity Group and the Pre-school are open 40 weeks of the year.

The Curriculum Provided

Children start to learn about the world around them from the moment they are born.   The care and education offered by the Opportunity Group and the Pre-school helps children to continue to do this by providing all of the children with interesting activities that are right for their age and stage of development.

We cover the Birth to 3 years Framework as recommended by the DES.  The framework is divided into separate areas:

A strong child

A skilful communicator

A competent learner

A healthy child

For children between the ages of 3 and 5 years, the pre-school provides a curriculum for the foundation stage of education.   This curriculum is set out in a document, published by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and the Department for Education and Skills, and called the Curriculum guidance for the foundation stage.  The Pre-school follows this guidance, which is divided into 6 areas.

• Personal, social and emotional development.
• Communication, language and literacy development.
• Mathematical development.
• Knowledge and understanding of the world.
• Physical development.
• Creative development.

Play helps young children to learn and develop through doing and talking, which research has shown to be the means by which young children think.   The Opportunity Group and the Pre-school use the early goals and their stepping stones to plan and provide a range of play activities which help children to make progress in each of the areas of learning and development.   In some of these activities, children decide how they will use the activity and, in others, an adult takes the lead in helping the children to take part in the activity.   In all activities, information from the early learning goals and stepping-stone is used to decide what equipment to provide and how to provide it.