--- title: Our EYFS Approach — Nature-Led Nursery Near Shrewsbury description: How Bojangles follows the EYFS framework with a nature-led approach. Seven areas of learning, four guiding principles, play-based and outdoor-rich. url: https://www.bojanglesnursery.co.uk/our-approach nursery: Bojangles Day Nursery location: Baschurch, Shrewsbury, Shropshire, SY4 2HL ofsted_urn: EY370743 ofsted_rating: Good --- # Our Approach Guided by EYFS, inspired by nature. ## The Early Years Foundation Stage The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) is the statutory framework that sets the standards for learning, development and care for all children in England from birth to five years old. It ensures every child receives a broad, balanced education through purposeful play, strong relationships, and rich experiences. At Bojangles, we follow the EYFS wholeheartedly — but our rural setting in the heart of the Shropshire countryside allows us to bring it to life in a truly special way. Our spacious grounds, gardens and surrounding natural landscape become our greatest teaching resource. Children don't just learn *about* nature — they learn *through* it, every day. That's what makes Bojangles distinctive among nurseries near Shrewsbury. ## The Four Guiding Principles - **A Unique Child** — every child is a competent learner from birth, developing at their own pace and in their own way. We celebrate each child's individuality and use a key person approach so every child feels known, valued and supported. - **Positive Relationships** — children thrive when they feel safe and secure with the adults around them. Our warm, consistent team builds strong bonds with every child and family, and we share progress through Tapestry and daily conversations. - **Enabling Environments** — the EYFS recognises the outdoor environment as one of three core components of effective provision, and this is where Bojangles truly shines. Our rural setting, spacious grounds and gardens provide a rich landscape where children explore, take managed risks and connect with the natural world every single day. - **Learning & Development** — children develop and learn in different ways and at different rates. We provide a broad, balanced curriculum across all seven areas of learning, delivered through purposeful play and adult-guided activities. ## Seven Areas of Learning The EYFS curriculum is organised into three **prime areas** — the essential foundations — and four **specific areas** that build on them. **Prime areas:** - **Communication and Language** — storytelling around our outdoor campfire circle, singing songs on nature walks, and describing the creatures and plants they discover in the garden. - **Physical Development** — climbing over adventure equipment, balancing on logs, digging in the garden, and navigating the uneven terrain of our grounds, building strength, coordination and confidence naturally. - **Personal, Social & Emotional Development** — working together to build dens, taking turns on outdoor equipment, caring for plants in the garden, and learning to assess and manage risks during adventurous outdoor play. **Specific areas:** - **Literacy** — mark-making with sticks in mud, reading stories in our cosy outdoor den, writing letters in sand trays, and exploring books about nature, animals and the seasons. - **Mathematics** — counting conkers and pinecones, sorting leaves by shape and size, measuring how tall the sunflowers have grown, and exploring capacity with water and sand play outdoors. - **Understanding the World** — watching tadpoles grow, observing the changing seasons first-hand, planting seeds and watching them sprout, exploring mini-beasts in the garden, and talking about the weather. - **Expressive Arts & Design** — creating nature collages with leaves and petals, painting with mud, building imaginative worlds in our outdoor play area, and making music with natural instruments. ## Learning Through Play Play is at the heart of the EYFS. Children learn best when they are actively engaged, following their own interests, and having fun. At Bojangles, we provide a balance of child-initiated play and adult-guided activities that introduce and extend learning within a playful context. Our outdoor environment offers uniquely rich play opportunities that simply can't be replicated indoors. Children build dens from branches and blankets, experiment in our mud kitchen, splash through puddles in their wellies, dig for treasure in the sand, race across the grass, and let their imaginations run wild in our open-air play spaces. Nature itself is the ultimate open-ended resource. A stick can be a magic wand, a fishing rod, or a paintbrush. A pile of leaves can be a bed for a teddy bear, a counting activity, or the raw material for a collage. ## How Children Learn The EYFS identifies three characteristics of effective learning: - **Playing and Exploring (Engagement)** — children investigate, "have a go", poke at frost on winter mornings, splash through puddles, turn over logs to find woodlice, and climb that little bit higher. - **Active Learning (Motivation)** — children concentrate, persist, and enjoy their achievements. Nature provides endless opportunities for persistence, from balancing along wobbly logs to waiting for a seed to sprout. - **Creating and Thinking Critically (Thinking)** — children develop their own ideas, make connections, figure out how to build a den that stays up, and work out which materials float in the water tray. ## Tracking Your Child's Progress Our practitioners observe children during play and build a rich picture of each child's development over time. Observations are shared with you through Tapestry, our secure online learning journal, so you can follow your child's journey in real time. Between the ages of two and three, we carry out a formal **Progress Check at Age 2** as required by the EYFS. This is a short written summary focusing on the three prime areas, celebrating strengths and identifying any areas where extra support might be helpful. ## Related pages - [Our Rooms](/our-rooms.md) - [About Us](/about.md) - [Book a Visit](/book-a-visit.md)