Tapestry - Online Learning Journal

 

Our pre-school is now using Tapestry.

This is an online journal recording all the learning and fun of children's early year's education. 

 

The following information is taken from the Foundation Stage Forum (fsf) website and gives parents and carers an overview of Tapestry.

 

"An easy-to-use online learning journal, Tapestry helps educators and parents to record, track and celebrate children's progress in early years education.

Nurseries, pre-schools and reception classes are fun-packed and busy. From messy play and first steps to learning phonics and new games, there's so much for children to do, learn and take in.

Tapestry enhances this special time, helping teachers and practitioners to capture children's experiences as well as monitor development and learning. This unique journal is shared online with parents, who are able to see special moments and view their child's progress.

Tapestry covers the Early Years Foundation Stage, KS1 and KS2 groups and is designed to simplify and improve recording within these curricula. Information can be filtered and displayed in different ways, and assessments and statements can be made for each entry.

Used by hundreds of nurseries, pre-schools and schools all over the country, each setting receives a complete, secure application with its own web address, as well as full viewing and editing controls.

Learning Journals and special books have grown in popularity over the last decade, offering early years settings a way to record the special moments of their children, and to keep parents involved in a partnership as their children blossom and grow. More recently they have been used in conjunction with the EYFS developmental stages to assess more formally how children are progressing. 
Traditionally these individual records have been collected in scrapbooks or binders, building up into a treasured memoir that children can take with them when they leave for the next stages of their journey through life - each entry forming a thread in the warp and weft of the tapestry that is their life. 
The cost, in both time and money, of providing these journals has often caused great problems for managers and staff in EYFS settings. The purchase of the scrapbooks alone can be significant, and printing photographs, and cutting, pasting and writing in the journals is a time-consuming affair. 
Additionally, managers experience the trauma of sending their journals home with parents, only to find they return them late or even lose them. In the event of parents who are separated, it can be difficult to make the journals available to both in a fair way; and if one parent is away for other reasons (for example a serving member of the armed forces who is on active duties) it is impossible to use the physical journal as a means of keeping up to date with a son or daughter."

 

We hope that all our parents and carers enjoy their child's online Learning Journal!