Three areas are particularly important for building a foundation for igniting children's curiosity and enthusiasm for learning, forming relationships and thriving.

Communication and Language

Speaking and listening are essential skills for children to be able to access in order to achieve their potential in all seven areas of learning and development. Through conversations, story timing and role play, children will share their ideas with their peers and develop their active listening skills. Children will learn the importance of expressing their opinions. The adults in school will help your child develop and widen their vocabulary and provide them with many opportunities to practise the new words in context.

Physical Development

Physical development is vital to a child’s holistic development. At The Academy, we focus on developing the children’s confidence to move in a variety of ways. Children need to negotiate space and obstacles safely. Developing fine motor skills is integral for early literacy development, where children will learn to hold a pencil effectively and use a range of small tools.

Personal, Social and Emotional Development 

The personal, social and emotional development is at the core of everything we do here at The Academy. The PSED skills that children learn enable them to be successful learners interacting positively with their friends and establishing strong relationships with both adults and children. Strong, warm and supportive relationships with adults help children to understand their own feelings and feelings of others.

Providers must also support children in four specific areas, through which the three prime areas are strengthened and applied. The specific areas are:

Literacy

Here at The Academy, we are passionate about developing a life-long love of reading. Reading consists of two dimensions: language comprehension and word reading. The children choose library books each week. The children’s pre-writing skills are encouraged daily and opportunities to mark make are available throughout the day

Phonics: At WEK, our teachers focus on teaching the pure phonemes (pure sound) of each letter.

Mathematics

Developing a strong sense of number is essential so that all children develop the necessary building blocks to excel mathematically. Mathematics is taught through a practical and hands-on approach. Play activities are planned to enable children to develop a secure base of knowledge and vocabulary of mathematics. The children will also have daily whole class maths sessions led by their teacher to develop number and calculating skills through fun, enriching and engaging strategies.

Understanding the World

Understanding the World involves getting the children to make sense of their physical world and their community. Children have opportunities to explore and investigate in order to discover more about the world around them, how things work and why they happen. Hands on activities encourage the children to speak about their observations and enable them to develop their questioning skills.

Expressive Arts and Design

At WEK, we take great pride in supporting the children’s imagination and creativity. The WEK children have opportunities to engage with the arts through the continuous provision where the children explore and play with a wide range of media and materials.

In our Foundation Stage, we offer a range of additional specialist lessons: Arabic, Music, Drama and Physical Education, including swimming. In addition to developing specific knowledge and skills, specialist lessons play an important part in personal, social and emotional development at this young age, as children respond to a range of adults across our specialist facilities.  

Arabic

Our specialist Arabic curriculum mirrors our English curriculum and from a young age children are exposed to stories, songs, rhymes, letters and sounds which form the basis of early Arabic literacy. Arabic lessons take place twice weekly, with additional sessions for Native Arabic Speakers in FS2. 

Music and Drama

Our specialist Music and Drama lessons enhance our Expressive Arts and Communication & Language curricula across the Foundation Stage. In addition to everyday in-class activities, children have additional opportunities to explore sounds including rhythm, pitch and melody. They learn to handle and play a range of instruments and explore their use of voice. Our Drama lessons encourage imaginative and creative role-play – invaluable to learning and development at this age. Our Drama curriculum supports oral and receptive language and provides additional opportunities for physical activity and movement. Our children also explore key social and emotional themes through stories and role-play. 

Physical Development

At the academy, we place high-emphasis on physical development. At this early stage, physical movement plays a key role in brain development and cognitive function. Our carefully designed outdoor and soft play areas provide daily opportunities for children to explore and develop gross-motor movements, including climbing, balancing, jumping, running and cycling. Our weekly PE lessons develop core movement skills and interest children in sports from an early age, including gymnastics and athletics.  

We have a school cafeteria where food can be pre-ordered online for our FS students. We offer a range of healthy foods across the week. Food from the cafeteria is delivered to FS department at lunchtime, and children eat with their friends in the FS lunch area. Alternatively, you may choose to provide a packed lunch for your child. Lunchtime is an important part of the day for our FS children, where positive social development is encouraged and valued.  

The school day begins at 7:50 am for all students. We offer a ‘soft start’ to the day with classes opening at 7:15am to welcome students before registration. 

For the academic year 2023/24, children in FS1 and FS2  finish at 1:30 pm from Monday to Thursday. On Fridays all students from FS1 through to Secondary finish at 12:00 pm.

We offer after school care (called 'Extended Care') for FS children until 3pm Monday to Thursday. This is charged at 250 AED per week.

We have one Teacher and one Teaching Assistant in every Foundation Stage classroom. Our Teaching Assistants accompany children to their specialist lessons with specialist Teachers. Our small class sizes ensure that all children experience personalised learning to enable them to quickly meet their next steps.  

Yes. All FS classrooms have an interactive whiteboard to support learning across the curriculum, including child-led technological play. Children have daily access to iPads, electronic toys and programmable toys. We value digital learning from a young age, but also closely monitor the time children spend on solitary technology-based activities to ensure that they are constantly learning from and with others.  

Students from FS1 have access to the School Transport Service. Foundation Stage bus services arrive in time for the start of the school day and leave campus at either 1:30pm or 3pm. On Fridays all bus services leave at 12pm. Our Teaching Assistants and Bus Conductors accompany children to and from the bus daily, ensuring there is always an adult-to-adult handover. CCTV, GPS tracking, live updates and ‘sleeping child’ checks are some of the key safety features on board our STS buses. For more information about our School Transport Service please click here.