In my garden I have a playroom where the children take part in arts and craft activities, create noises when exploring the varity of small world toys, completing puzzles, looking and reading their favourtie books and many more. 

The playroom is able to be used all year round due to having an air conditioning unit which provides cooling and heating. 

The children enjoy going on outings as they call them adventures. We visit local parks, National Trust places, garden centres, play dates with other childminders, visits museums and go on woodland walks where we explore natural objects, jump in puddles or even collect falling natural objects to take part in arts and craft activities later in the day.

 

I and the children I care for attend a playgroups. This promotes the children’s social skills, develops their thoughts and ideas, encourages sharing and turn taking when exploring the variety of toys. 

I have a secure garden where the children can explore a variety of toys, whether it is in the wendy house which contains babies and accessories and a home corner with toy food, plates, jugs and other accessories. This encourages the children to extend their imagination skills. 

There is also swings, a little climbing wall, a mud kitchen, see-saw, sand pit, a variety of slides and a little grass area for the children to play and look at the different insects within the fairy garden;  some of my children enjoy having picnics and taking their babies for a walk in their prams or even having a go on the ride on and coupe cars.

When I worked in a nursery we had to gather evidence of each childs progress. This was done through a tracker and learning journey. Childminders do not need to provide this information but I wanted to carry on this through my childminding experience. 

Every week an child will get a learning journey which will contain some photos, a little description of what the child is doing in the photo, a next step and the criterias it meets within the Early Years Foundations Curriculmn. 

Every term parents will receive a tracker, this has information which is displayed in a table. This information informs the parents where their child is with their learning and what needs a little encouragement. 

Each child is given a daily communication book. 

This book presents information of the childs day.

The information includes:

- The quanity of food they have eaten during meal times.

- Times of their changes or any changes

- Their sleeps and durations.

- A little description of the activities the individual has taken part throughout the day.

- Any other information such as a message to the parents or information encouraging the parents to leave me a message which is relevant.

I provide a variety of toys which meet the requirements of the seven key effective practices. These include: Communication & Language, Expressive Arts and Design, Physical development, Mathematics, Literacy, Understanding the World and Expressive Arts and Designs. 

For example: The children enjoy looking at the fish tank which encourages them to identify the colours, shape, amount of fish and how to care for the fish.