Our School
Our nursery is located in the attractive Church Centre attached to St Michael's Church, Elmwood Road on a quiet residential road in Grove Park, W4. The building offers clean, bright and versatile spaces for the nursery to use during session times, and for community groups to use outside our school hours. The school is set up and packed away each day, and all the rooms are cleaned at the end of the day. We have secure spaces for all of our indoor and outdoor equipment when not being used. Children's buggies, bikes and scooters can be left in the lobby during the session and there is space to park outside during drop-off and pick up times. The front door is always manned by a member of staff when open, and securely locked at other times. .
The main classroom
The main classroom is bright and welcoming, and is arranged into several smaller work and play stations with materials and activities to reflect the whole curriculum. (During the pandemic, we subdivided the room and grouped the children and teachers in "bubbles" to maintain safety and distancing.) Children can move freely during free choice time and have dedicated group spaces for group sessions and break time. Activity tables and imaginative play areas are set up to complement the curriculum at the time, and reflect the children's interests.The tall ceiling brings in lots of natural light and there is space for movement, independence and to allow for creativity to flow! We typically have between 10 and 26 children in this space at one time, looked after by five early years teachers.
The small classroom
We have a smaller room which we can either set up as a classroom, or we use for individual or small group activities. This room backs on to our outdoor play area and has lots of natural light. If used as a classroom, it is set up similarly to the main classroom, with furniture, units and a wide range of resources arranged around the room, and activities to reflect the current theme. It allows space for individual learning as well as 1:1 focus time and group sessions.
The outside play area
Our outdoor space consists of a paved courtyard, astroturf and a grassy play area. These are accessed from both classrooms and back on to the Church. Our play areas are securely fenced and gates are locked. While outside, children have space to run, skip, slide, draw, dig, climb, explore, learn and play lots of imaginative games. We also have a sandpit and a planting bed and mini greenhouse for children to flex their green fingers! Our adult:child ratios are the same outside as they are inside to ensure safety and close supervision as the children play and learn.
Forest School area
We believe it is important for children to explore their natural surroundings and learn through interacting with nature around them! We have dedicated sessions with our two Forest School leaders in our grassy Forest School area, where children are encouraged to examine the plants and mini-beasts in our outside areas, explore, discover and be creative, and build skills that develop confidence and self-esteem and will help them co-habit happily with nature 🍃