Provision

Hampsthwaite CE Primary School Nursery provides high-quality Early Years Education for children from the age of 3. Set in a spacious, purpose-built indoor and outdoor environment, the Nursery is also fully integrated into our school. Our excellent Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) provision was recognised in our school inspection, with the award of Ofsted Outstanding in 2014 and since then, has also been regularly been graded ‘outstanding’ by school improvement advisors.

Our aim in Nursery is to engage children in exciting and purposeful activities, with plenty of opportunity for learning through play. We believe that by doing this, the children gain a thirst for exploration and discovery and develop a love of learning. We also aim to create a happy atmosphere, where children can build their relationships and social skills as they work and play.

Interaction between staff and children is crucial to the success of our Nursery. All staff develop excellent relationships with the children, and staff are constantly engaged in playing and working with them. As well as encouraging children to take part in adult-led activities to develop specific areas of learning linked to the Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum, our staff join in with the children’s free play and help shape and develop opportunities for learning and imagination within this.

Learning

Our Nursery curriculum is built around a combination of child-led, independent play and adult- directed activities. Our staff mould the curriculum to follow the children’s skills and interests, and every child’s progress is carefully tracked in all curriculum areas to ensure that appropriate provision is made for them to make good progress. The children cover the full breadth of the EYFS curriculum and this is enriched in many ways.

By using the online learning journal Tapestry throughout Nursery, parents have daily access and updates to their child’s learning and interests which really enhances strong, positive relationships between school and home.

Themes are developed according to the children’s interests and their input is vital to ensure that they are a success. These themes are used to create a wide range of exciting and varied learning activities which invariably engage the children and encourage an eagerness to explore and learn. We always ensure that all provision areas are available to all children; these include role play, art, creative play, construction, pre-writing activities, shape and number maths challenges, physical activities, outdoor learning, reading, scientific exploration and use of technology. Language development is a key area which underpins all the children’s learning, as staff constantly encourage interaction to develop children’s speaking and listening skills. We find that children enjoy their learning and achieve well, developing a good foundation of skills across all areas and being very well prepared for starting school in Reception.

Nursery session structure and availability

Our Nursery is open every weekday during term time from 8:45am until 3:30pm. In order to support the varying needs of different families and working parents, we aim to offer as much flexibility as we can in our session arrangements. The sessions are structured as follows:

8:45am to 11:45am - Morning session 

11:45am to 12:30pm - Lunchtime session

12:30pm to 3:30pm - Afternoon session 

For those entitled to 15 or 30 funded hours, these may be taken in combinations of whole days, morning or afternoon sessions. We do not offer the option of part sessions. Our advice would be that where possible, children attend a minimum of 4 sessions, so that they can gain sufficient benefit educationally from being in our Nursery.

Session Fees

Our Nursery sessions are charged at £17.50 per session. Each session is 3 hours in length and can be paid for using funded 15 or 30-hour entitlements. Supervision at lunchtime is payable at £4.25, with an additional charge of £2.00 for a freshly cooked, hot lunch. Our morning session finishes at 11:45am, and our afternoon session finishes at 3:30pm, although children can be collected any time from 3.15pm.

Commitment from parents

In order to be able to organise our provision and staffing arrangements, we need a definite commitment from parents as to their requirements. This can only be done using our Nursery Parental Agreement Form, which is a legal requirement. Parents will be invoiced termly, in advance. By agreeing to care for your child we are undertaking a financial commitment and if your child does not attend the session we may still charge e.g. holidays taken in term time or absence due to short term illness.  In exceptional circumstances, such as bereavement or long term illness extending beyond a week, Hampsthwaite may exercise its discretion as to whether a charge will be made.  Once a booking is made for a term, this commitment must be honoured and any cancellation will be subject to payment of fees for that half term.  If parents continue to use the service after the period covered by their signed Nursery Agreement Form, they will be taken to have accepted that the same conditions still apply for each subsequent term unless a change is agreed in writing.