The Nursery class is part of Brookland Infant school, located in a separate building behind the main school. It is a well equipped and bright setting, with its own children’s toilets. The Nursery shares the purpose built outside garden with the Reception classes. The garden was partly refurbished a few years ago with new equipment and artificial surfaces with further refurbishment planned in the near future. The garden is in regular use for outside play. Staffing ratios follow the recommended guideline of 1 adult to 13 children.
As a local authority funded nursery class admission is decided by Hertfordshire County Council’s admission rules. A copy of the school’s Nursery Admissions Policy can be found on the school’s website.
Our nursery class provides the full 15 hours free provision entitlement with parents being offered 5 morning or 5 afternoons. We are also able to offer the 30 hours free childcare to some children. We have a partnership with Lulu’s PreSchool who offer wrap-around care to some of our nursery children.
Children are eligible to attend our nursery the term after their 3rd birthday. We have one main intake in September of each year as per our admissions criteria and children admitted after this time will be where spaces are available and where the child meets the age requirements. For example, if your child does not turn 3 until October/November, they could be admitted the following January if the nursery had spaces available and you meet the criteria.
We offer a wide and varied curriculum for the children in our nursery class which is guided by the Early Years Foundation Stage Framework. In 2017 our nursery introduced the integrated Montessori approach. We have invested in a good range of Montessori materials to support children’s learning. Children are encouraged to develop lively and inquiring minds. We aim to develop confidence, independence and self-discipline and to help the children to reach their full potential. We encourage mutual respect between adults and children in our community.
Reception Applications
Not all of our nursery children transfer to our Infant school and parents should be aware that transfer to Brookland Infant School’s reception class is not automatic. At the appropriate time Hertfordshire County Council will send parents a letter explaining how to apply for a place in an infant/primary school. We welcome enquiries and appointments can be arranged if parents would like to look around the rest of our Infant school. Some of our nursery children transfer to other local schools and their nursery records are passed on to their new schools.
Transition into Reception
The children attending our Nursery Class share an outdoor learning environment with our reception children and so get to know the staff and children before going into the Reception classes. In addition to this, for children moving into our Reception classes, towards the end of your child’s time in Nursery, we organise informal visits internally when the nursery children visit their new teacher in Reception during one of their nursery sessions.
For children not attending our Nursery, we organise a formal visit when they can come to visit their new class and meet some of the other children. As well as this our staff visit children in their settings and carry out a ‘Home Visit’ for some children.
Invitations to ‘Stay & Play’ sessions are offered to all reception new entrants.