The Education Minister, Jeremy Miles, has praised the work of early years settings following a visit to Llandogo Early Years Nursery as the Welsh Government prepares to support the roll out of the new Curriculum for Wales.

At the Llandogo nursery, rated excellent by Estyn, he met early years practitioners who have worked with the government to develop an educational programme specifically for non-maintained settings.

A policy document was published earlier this year and has been developed to support the roll-out of the new Curriculum for Wales in September and ensure those children who receive early education in a non-maintained setting are given the best possible start.

Speaking to Rachel Davies of the nursery group, they discussed the challenges the pandemic had presented in that sector and the challenges of a packaway setting in delivering good quality education and how she had overcome them. “I talked about my work on the new curriculum and gave a practitioner’s insight into how I felt it would work for settings and ensuring it covered everything it needed to” Rachel told the Beacon.

“We discussed the importance of play in education and how it enables all children to succeed and discussed how the Early Years setting was set up from a work based project I undertook when at university as a mature student.

The curriculum has been co-constructed with a significant contribution from early years practitioners such as Rachel and has drawn on the experience of the sector as well as the views of experts in child development and early education.

Training for practitioners has been delivered and resources to support implementation of the curriculum are now being rolled out, with modules including outdoor learning, play and play-based learning, and child development.

The Minister said that it had been “a privilege to visit Llandogo Early Years nursery and to see the excellent work they are doing to support our youngest learners.

“Many children begin their learning journey in a non-maintained setting. Having access to high-quality early education provision is essential to children’s educational and social development, and our new curriculum for those aged 3-16 in a funded non-maintained nursery setting will ensure there is consistent delivery of this provision across Wales” he added.

“Early years settings will play a key role in the roll out. That’s why it has been important for those working in non-maintained settings to be involved in the development of a curriculum specific to them.

“At Llandogo Early Years, the Curriculum for Non Maintained settings follows our vision of child-led learning and meaningful interactions between the adult and the child” added Rachel.

“It will allow us more time to extend the child’s knowledge and learning through their interests. Staff are so pleased that it recognises the child at the centre of the curriculum

The nursery, established in 2007, is one of the few packaway settings left. It has 24 children on register and is open in the village hall Mon- Thurs 9-3 and Friday 9-12. “We are very passionate about the outdoors” added Rachel, “we have a beautiful garden in the school grounds and are helped by a local lady ‘Miss Daisy’, and involve the children in woodwork, cookery and problem solving. I was involved in workshops to develop the recently published document which puts the child at the heart of the learning process .