Our exciting environment both indoors and outdoors enables child initiated play, exploration and adventures. This is a key way in which young children learn and thrive. We want to help nurture a love of learning, and when our Little Birds leave us we want them to be ready for their next adventures because they are confident learners and love to find out about the world around them. We instil in the Little Birds that they can be anything that they want to be – Scientists, artists, explorers, the world awaits them!
Playing
Our role at Little Birds is to:
- Plan and resource a challenging, welcoming and enabling environment
- Support children’s learning through an exciting environment and experienced Early years practitioners, and a holistic family approach
- Extend and support children’s spontaneous play through teachable moments, therefore deepening the child’s knowledge and understanding
- Extend and develop children’s language and communication in their play
- Foster a love of learning and trying
- Support the Little Birds to achieve their full potential
Through play, in the secure environment of Little Birds and with effective adult support the children are able to:
- Explore, develop and represent learning experiences that help them make sense of the world
- Practice and build up ideas, concepts and skills
- Learn how to control impulses and understand the need for boundaries
- Risk assess, take risks and make mistakes
- Think creatively and imaginatively
- Communicate with others as they investigate or solve problems
Our environment nurtures your child’s interests. We have a garden area where the children grow their own fruit and vegetables, herbs and flowers. Children love using this area for bug hunts and discussing the things they have found and seen growing in the area. Bird feeders and a butterfly house encourage local wildlife to reside in our garden. We have lots of loose parts to encourage imaginative and independent play. We encourage free thinkers. Our preschool pet Tortoise, Gary, is a very popular resident especially when discussing life cycles and how to be well camouflaged especially during tidy up time! We favour natural resources and items from the real world, our children love their snack from china cups and plates and spreading their own toast with butter and jam. The children are engaged daily in real life activities such as woodwork and cookery. We encourage visitors into preschool, and we have a weekly yoga session with a yoga teacher, a football coach who visits, and a Tai-Chi teacher to name a few! One of parents is a professional artist and recently delivered a lovely art lesson. The world really is our oyster!
We often take the children out of the preschool for fun learning experiences.
We have strong community links and often visit an local elderly residential home.
We visit areas of local interest and being a seaside town sometimes take them to the beach.
Recent trips have included bus rides, library visits, trips to the market to purchase preschool snack, Corfe model village, the Swanage lifeboat house, the firestation, the local industrial estate, the St Mark’s church, the Christmas tree festival, nature walks, Putlake Farm, Farmer Palmers, walks through Swanage town centre, the local parks, on the steam train to name but a few!!!
