Starting and Settling into Nursery

Start­ing and Set­tling into Nursery

Going to nurs­ery for the first time is one of the most impor­tant expe­ri­ences in a child’s life. Young chil­dren are at a ten­der age and we would like to make the expe­ri­ence as plea­sur­able as pos­si­ble so that they feel happy and com­fort­able in their new envi­ron­ment and are eager to enjoy learning.

Offi­cial Visits

The set­tling in process begins with an offi­cial visit where parents/​carers are shown around the cen­tre and can see how learn­ing takes place.

Super­vised Visits

You can then attend once a week with your child at an arranged time so that your child can become famil­iar with the nurs­ery sur­round­ings before they start.

Home Vis­its

To enable the chil­dren to set­tle into their new envi­ron­ment we arrange with par­ents to have a home visit. This estab­lishes the begin­ning of a pos­i­tive rela­tion­ship with parents.

Two mem­bers of staff visit the home. It is an oppor­tu­nity to explain the aims of the cen­tre, our pro­vi­sion and the impor­tance and value we place on Early Years Edu­ca­tion and Care and to find out about the par­tic­u­lar needs of all children.

The home visit will include an activ­ity such as mak­ing play­dough, read­ing a story with props or plant­ing. We use a dig­i­tal cam­era to record the event so when chil­dren begin nurs­ery they can make a con­nec­tion with the expe­ri­ence and recog­nise famil­iar adults.

Your child’s first weeks at nursery

Par­ents are asked to stay with their child for the first few days so that they become famil­iar with their sur­round­ings and rou­tines. Staff work closely with par­ents to sup­port this tran­si­tion and they will make every effort to ensure chil­dren are emo­tion­ally and phys­i­cally secure.

The nurs­ery is a new envi­ron­ment with many dif­fer­ent peo­ple to get to know and new friend­ships to develop with other chil­dren. This takes time and for some indi­vid­ual chil­dren it may take a lit­tle longer than oth­ers. Please be patient and keep com­mu­ni­cat­ing with your child’s key­worker in order to ensure the best pos­si­ble start for your child.