British Nursery Schools in Dubai: 7 Areas of Development in EYFS
You often see British Nursery Schools in Dubai referring to the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) framework, but what exactly is it?
The EYFS is a set of standards for the learning and development of your child that is often taught through active games and play. Unlike the national curriculum, which is organised into subject areas, the EYFS framework spans across seven areas of learning. These areas of learning do feed into the traditional subjects taught in schools but focus on the cognitive, emotional, and communicative development of your child.
At Green Grass Nursery, one of the top British Nurseries in Dubai, we set learning goals based on the framework’s guidelines. These goals guide our learning and play activities as part of our overall teaching methodology. The philosophy behind the EYFS also acts as the starting point for teaching the Arabic language.
What are the 7 Areas of Development in the EYFS?
Communication and Language
The framework is aimed at children up to five years of age and these early years of life and learning are the most crucial for language development. Through storytelling, conversations and engaging activities, children at British nurseries in Dubai learn to communicate with each other, building the ability to express themselves confidently and listen attentively.
At Green Grass Nursery, we encourage your child to listen, respond, make conversations and express their ideas and feelings through full sentences. To achieve this, we create activities and learning experiences that stimulate, challenge and excite our little learners.
Personal, Social, and Educational Development
An overarching theme of the EYFS approach is recognising that every child is a unique individual with their own strengths, interests, and personalities. When a child feels safe and secure in their environment and in their own individuality, they are confident enough to push the boundaries of exploration and their own capabilities.
To achieve this at Green Grass Nursery, we help our students normalise their everyday feelings and learn to regulate their emotions and responses to feel positive about themselves. Another aspect of this is celebrating the cultural differences that make us who we are as a means to building a strong sense of self and belonging.
Physical Development
This area of the framework is not just about physical fitness and overlaps with several other areas of skills development and well-being. As your child grows, they need to build the strength, coordination and control required to interact with the world around them. Physical development goals are useful milestones for assessing where a child should be in their development and if any targeted intervention is needed.
We believe engaging in active play, both indoors and outdoors, helps with problem-solving and decision-making skills. To support this, we incorporate games and activities that boost posture, body awareness, visual motor skills, ball skills, and hand-eye coordination.
Literacy
The best nurseries in Dubai place a strong focus on the healthy development of reading and writing skills, another key aspect of the EYFS. While this will involve core texts as focal points to spark high-quality talk, literacy goals extend across subject areas and various activities and games.
Through engaging storytelling, teaching aids like puppets, and creative exploration of themes and characters, your child’s language and imagination can flourish at a British nursery in Dubai. By tracking reading progress and learning goals, it is also possible to identify areas of concern and share intervention strategies with parents.
Mathematics
Another core subject that extends far beyond simple number rhymes and is incorporated into everyday activities in the best nursery schools. The aim of the mathematics learning goals in EYFS is to create a deeper understanding of numbers. What this means in practice is learning to recognise numbers without counting and exploring numerical patterns, comparisons and subtraction facts through indoor and outdoor play.
At our nursery, we help our kids develop as creative, critical thinkers and problem solvers by encouraging them to compare and analyse quantities and capacities around them. This could mean deciding if there are enough chairs for everyone or as simple as deciding if a quarter of an orange is greater or smaller than a half.
Understanding the World
Feeding into several subject areas, particularly the sciences, this aspect of the framework guides your little one to understand the world around them. This requires first understanding what a world entails and can apply to anything from the natural world to their community or the world of technology.
The natural world is always an engaging topic for kids at British nurseries in Dubai to explore. We encourage our young scientists to compare and contrast natural processes like magnetism, sound, light and buoyancy through hands-on play. And build an early understanding of states of matter and the biology of plants through naming and describing games.
Expressive Art and Design
The seventh area of the EYFS framework promotes creative expression as a means to kickstart imagination and creativity, crucial elements of cognitive development. Under fives should be given the opportunity to explore different art forms through music, dance, and drama, while engaging with different media and materials as lifelong neural connections form.
At Green Grass Nursery, our classrooms are full of sensory-rich materials and our lessons packed with role-playing and storytelling. By creating a fun and active environment, British Nurseries in Dubai, like ours, allow your child to express themself creatively as they share their thoughts, feelings, and ideas.
Why Choose an EYFS British Nursery in Dubai?
The first five years of life set the foundation of how your little one engages with their world, their communication styles and their cognitive development. Reaching beyond the realms of education, British nurseries in Dubai adopt the EYFS framework to help provide a strong foundation for the youngest of learners to grow into well-rounded, happy individuals.
Building a healthy and enthusiastic relationship with learning environments and with others socially sets the stage for future success, both academically and in wider aspects of life as we grow. If you would like to know more about how we integrate the EYFS framework into our lessons at Green Grass Nursery, talk to our team today!
