Children in the early years benefit from a rich and nurturing environment, supporting effective development from their starting points to meet the early learning goals.
ISI School Inspection Report 2026
Reception children at St Paul’s Cathedral School receive a broad and balanced curriculum, setting down firm foundations for a happy and successful learning career. Play is at the core of everything that happens in Reception. Expect to see Maths in action as we count down a rocket ship take-off, or share out play food between the animals. Imaginative play isn’t just great fun: it shapes your child’s understanding of narrative and gives them the chance to listen to, and understand, the perspective of others.
We follow the principles of the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) Framework, alongside learning themes from the International Early Years Curriculum (IEYC).
The EYFS Framework’s guiding principles are:
- Every child is unique — constantly learning, and capable of being resilient, confident and self-assured
- Children learn to be strong and independent through positive relationships
- Children learn and develop well in enabling environments, with teaching and support from adults who respond to their individual interests and needs, and help them build their learning over time. A strong partnership between practitioners and parents or carers makes a real difference
- Learning and development matter; and children develop and learn at different rates
The framework covers the education and care of all children, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
Seven areas of learning:
The EYFS framework covers seven areas of learning and development, all important and interconnected. Three prime areas matter most for early learning and forming relationships, building the foundation for everything that follows:
- Communication and language
- Physical development
- Personal, social and emotional development
These prime areas form the basis of learning in the first weeks of Reception, helping children build the confidence, and social and emotional skills, they need to settle into our busy school routine.
We then support four specific areas, which strengthen the prime areas and ignite children’s curiosity and enthusiasm:
- Literacy
- Mathematics
- Understanding the world
- Expressive art and design
As your child settles into Reception life, they build confidence in these specific areas too, always taught in line with the children’s own interests.
Alongside their dedicated class teacher, Reception pupils work each week with subject specialists in PE, ICT, Music, Dance, Drama, French and Art, benefiting from expert teaching from the very start of their education. Relationships Education is taught both as a specific subject and woven through all the other subjects and activities of Pre-prep life.
Reception pupils are introduced to mathematical language, concepts of shape, space and measurement, and problem-solving skills, all within meaningful, real contexts. Through our Read, Write, Inc phonics scheme, children learn individual sounds and how to blend and segment them, early reading and writing skills that carry across every area of learning.
Weekly outdoor learning sessions take your child into the beautiful Cathedral Gardens to discover nature and put practical numeracy and learning skills into action.
At SPCS, we stay in regular contact with you about your child’s interests and the events in their life. This lets us shape learning around what genuinely fascinates them, keeping them engaged. We don’t set fixed topics — instead, we stay flexible, building learning around children’s current interests. The children are in control of their own learning, helping them develop enquiry, engagement and resilience as learners.
