Our nursery environment and facilities enable your child to explore, develop and learn. Our Baby, Toddler and Preschool spaces are specially designed and equipped especially with them in mind. You’ll see many familiar homely items such as bookcases, tables, chairs, and sofas just much smaller than you are used to!
We consider the spaces around your child to be like their third teacher, joining you as parents and us as educators in guiding them through their learning. And you’ll notice how we use our garden area as an outdoor classroom too, full of features to support their play and learning. Our Baby, Toddler and Preschool rooms are perfect for the ages of children that spend their time in them.
We keep many aspects of our nursery environments consistent as we know your child will benefit greatly from this. With core resources, enriching toys, games and creative materials, that are always at hand for your child to play with. However, it is not unusual for parts of our nurseries to become unique adventure places where your child’s imagination can run free!
“Friendly staff who have the children’s best interests at heart. Great facilities and grounds which enable learning and play. I like the informal feel of the nursery and the fact that everything is provided from food to nappies and sun cream.”
Sparrows Room
This is the main room for our babies and toddlers. The room focuses on the primary area’s of the ‘Early Years Foundation Stage’ framework and encourages learning through play. As babies spend a lot of time sleeping at this early age, we also provide a dedicated sleep room. We check the room temperature to ensure the babies are comfortable and we monitor sleeping babies through our CCTV, audio monitor and by physically checking every 10 minutes.
Robins Room and Blackbirds Room
This large open plan space is separated into two areas for our over 2 year old children. The room has a number of dedicated provisions including a creative area, a reading corner, circle time and a home corner for lots of role play. As this is the time when the majority of children start ‘toilet training’, these rooms are equipped with brightly decorated children’s toilets, encouraging independence. Following the ‘Early Years Foundation Stage’ we support the children and prepare them for their eventual move to school. Through our observations of children learning through play, we are able to introduce adult led activities that follow the interest of individual children, linking them to the seven areas of learning:
- personal social and emotional development
- communication and language
- physical development
- literacy
- mathematics
- understanding of the world
- expressive arts and design
The children move up to Preschool when they turn 3 and will stay in this room until they transition to school. As well as learning skills to recognise numbers and start forming letters, Preschool regularly engage in mindfulness and yoga and the children will lead these sessions, demonstrating a huge understanding of self regulation. We strive to provide children with the tools they need to manage their emotions – now and in future. We have a forest school leader, who leads exciting outdoor sessions including cooking round the campfire!
We build strong relationships with the local schools to ensure the smoothest transition possible when the children make that important move to big school!
Our Unique Preschool Garden
What started as an empty, unused outdoor space has now blossomed into a vibrant, child-designed garden, brimming with creativity, learning, and growth. This special project began when our dedicated staff turned to the true experts—the children—and asked them what they would like the space to become. The response was full of excitement and imagination: they wanted their very own garden!
Empowering the children to take charge, our staff guided them through the process of planning and designing the space. The result is a garden unlike any other, tailored to their interests and bursting with personality. The area is divided into delightful zones that reflect the children’s vision, which includes a fairy garden, dinosaur world, planting area and a mud kitchen.
Our garden is more than just a playful retreat; it is a hub of hands-on learning. We place a big emphasis on planting and growing. Children are actively involved in planting a variety of fruits and vegetables. They nurture their crops by watering them regularly and observing their progress. When the plants reach full maturity, the children harvest their produce and proudly take it to our chef. The freshly picked fruits and vegetables are then cooked into delicious meals that the children enjoy together. This farm-to-table experience allows them to witness and appreciate the full cycle of food growth—from soil to plate.
We encourage the children to take and manage their own risks and support and supervise when needed to enhance their learning experience and build their resilience.
Garden
All our children have access to our wonderful gardens on a daily basis. Monkey Puzzle Tatsfield has two garden spaces for our children. Our unique garden is fully equipped with an impact absorbing surface and lots of outside equipment designed to encourage coordination and balance. The outside world also has a lot of experiences and opportunities for learning that you just can’t get in the classroom and children love having time to run around and play outside! Our garden is fully enclosed and has CCTV linked to the Manager’s office for security. We also have a qualified Forest School Teacher who runs regular sessions in the nursery, allowing our children to learn even more outside of the classroom.
