Early Years

Choosing where your child begins their education is crucial. At All Hallows School, we offer a dedicated, high-quality Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) that provides local families in Somerset, near Frome and Bath, with the perfect start.

Our approach is validated by external review, with the ISI (Independent School Inspectorate) reporting that:

Our Nursery and Reception classes occupy a central, safe position in the heart of the school, with dedicated, stimulating indoor and outdoor space. This happy, calm, and secure environment filled with opportunity, routine and structure. It is perfectly designed for early learning.

We take great pride in offering a warm and welcoming environment where the happiness and wellbeing of your child underpins everything we do.

Our dedicated team is passionate about providing a safe and inviting space where your child can play, explore, and develop at their own pace. We provide a rich curriculum that encourages curiosity, creativity and independence, while also promoting the development of essential life skills such as collaboration and resilience.

Crucially, our children benefit significantly from being an integral part of a wider Preparatory School. This ensures access to resources and expertise far beyond a standalone nursery setting:

• Specialist Teaching: Children benefit from expert teaching staff in subjects often reserved for older pupils, including Music, Art, Creative Design, Languages, Forest School, Swimming, Dance, Gymnastics and Sport, helping children to develop new skills and be physically active.

• Exceptional Facilities: Our pupils regularly use the School's outstanding facilities, including our extensive nine-acre on-site woodland for Forest School, our, our Creative Design Centre, and our Swimming Pool.

With small class sizes, we ensure personalised attention that supports each child's early learning and unique needs, allowing them to confidently take their first steps into education.

Our curriculum is centred on the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) framework, prioritising your child’s holistic development across seven key areas:

• Prime Areas: Personal, Social and Emotional Development; Physical Development; and Communication and Language.

• Specific Areas: Literacy, Mathematics, Understanding the World, and Expressive Arts and Design.

Our Early Years children have many opportunities to play and learn effectively, both indoors and outdoors, through a mixture of self-initiated experiences and adult-planned activities. Our curriculum is designed to be engaging, challenging and flexible, allowing children to follow their interests and explore their own ideas and discoveries.

As part of our curriculum, we place a strong emphasis on developing children's social skills and emotional intelligence. Our goal is to help the children become confident, responsible, and respectful members of society.

Planning within the Early Years Foundation Stage is based around half-termly themes and are used by the Early Years staff as a guide for weekly planning; however the teacher/room leader may alter these plans in response to the interests, needs, and achievements of the children.

Below is a list of Topics and Focus Areas you can expect:

We understand the importance of strong partnerships between school and home. Children develop best when their teachers, parents and caregivers work together to help them learn and be happy.

In Early Years at All Hallows, each child has their own online personal learning journal using the online platform ‘Tapestry’ which builds a very special record of your child’s experiences, development and learning journey with us, through comments, photos and videos.

This is a wonderful way for you to see and follow your child’s learning and accomplishments in school and parents are able to comment on observations as well as share achievements, photos and videos from home.

We make regular assessments of children’s learning and use this information to ensure that future planning reflects identified needs.

Assessment in the Early Years Foundation Stage takes the form of observation, and this involves the teacher and other adults as appropriate. Observations are uploaded to our online learning journal Tapestry (see above)which are shared with parents.

Our 'open-door policy' and regular communications ensure we always keep you well-informed about your child’s progress and we work in partnership with you to support your child so they develop, learn and thrive.

We welcome children into the Nursery from the age of three and into the Reception class in the September when they are four years old. To learn more about our admissions process, take a look at our admissions page.

Children in Nursery may be dropped off from 8.20 with the school day finishing at 16.05. A late pick-up is offered up to 17.00 for an additional cost.

For our Reception Class pupils, the day runs from 8.25 to 16.05, with early drop off from 8.00 and late pick up at 16.30 available at no extra cost.

One of the greatest advantages of choosing All Hallows EYFS is the seamless transition we provide.

From their very first day in Nursery, children are familiarised with the wider school environment, specialist teachers, and older pupils.

This integrated experience means that the move from Reception into Year 1 and the All Hallows Junior School is calm, confident, and natural, ensuring continuous educational and emotional stability for your child.