Bradley Nursery School

Our Recovery Curriculum

We are aware that children will have had a broad range of experiences during the Covid Pandemic and associated lockdowns. They will have directly and indirectly experienced loss in many different forms.

During lockdown many children lost routines, freedoms, relationships and social interactions. As a result they will have lived through and have a felt sense of collective trauma and uncertainty, which as a school community we need to support them with. Such young children are also soaking up a sea of adult anxiety, anxiety that they are unable to articulate and do not understand.

In addition many of our children have experienced a massive change in the way they accessed their learning.  Some have accessed learning in school in very small bubble groups, some have accessed our school’s home learning resources and many others have not been able to access this at all. Children’s experiences will vary from child to child, therefore we must have an approach that supports each individual and their needs.

We will focus on putting the children’s social, emotional development and wellbeing at the centre of our Recovery Curriculum. This will in turn support greater engagement and a readiness to learn.

The  5 Stages of Recovery  

(Barry Carpenter CBE – ‘A Recovery Curriculum –Loss and Life for our children and schools post pandemic’)

• Level 1: Relationships – We aim to compassionately rebuild positive trusted relationships with children that have not been in school and who may have had limited opportunities for social interaction.

• Level 2: Community – We recognise that the experiences of different families and different communities will be different. We will do our best to listen to, understand support all of our families back to school and rebuild our Bradley Nursery School family community.

• Level 3: Transparent Curriculum – We acknowledge that many families will feel that children have lost valuable Nursery time and associated learning experiences. We aim to continue to build on our family partnerships and strengthen communication between home and school.

• Level 4 Metacognition – Children will have been learning in different environments and in different ways. We have been and will continue to value and celebrate the learning children have done at home. We aim to rebuild children’s confidence in and joy of learning. We will ensure children have opportunities to develop their individual Characteristics of Effective Learning through our practical playful environments and associated experiences.

We will look at aspects of learning that children may have had fewer opportunities to explore, such as Early Maths, Mark Making and Writing. We will do this by talking with families as well as observing, assessing and noting what children can do and what their next steps might be.

• Level 5: Space – We will ensure that children have time and space to rediscover and reconnect with their learning. Children will be offered a wide variety of playful experiences as well as opportunities to spend extended periods time outside exploring the natural world       (nature play). Outdoor experience may have been limited or lost during periods of lockdown. 

Nevertheless our expectations will remain high and learning routines and structures will be consistently applied.

Kay Burke - Headteacher

Spring 2021