Nursery Life

We know leaving your baby in the care of someone else can be nerve racking, that’s why we have created a space that offers a home-from-home experience. Our babies 0 to 24 months will be cared for in a beautiful open-plan room.

Little limes is a large, bright and airy environment which feel both spacious and cozy at the same time. Perfect for our little ones!

Individual routines, and care needs are discussed and agreed in partnership with you to ensure that their care at nursery is consistent with their care at home and meets their unique patterns and routines. The babies have a wide range of exciting activities available as they grow and develop. Activities will include treasure baskets, sensory fun, creative, construction, music/singing, physical, outdoor play and many more.

The ratio is 1 adult to 3 children, which allows for more group activities while still ensuring the highest standard of care for your child.

 In stimulating surroundings, all of the children will be exposed to a variety of tactile and hands on activities that encourage all areas of development, including physical and communication. The babies also have the opportunity for cuddles and quiet time with an cots and sleeping areas available. All of our children go outside on a daily basis.

Your child continues to develop at an amazing rate, toddling, exploring, investigating and absorbing everything around them.  As their independence and growing personalities build them into curious individuals, little limes offers space for them to practice and fine tune their recently found gross motor skills from crawling to walking, climbing, running, dancing and jumping, all within a safe and secure environment. Through this crucial time for language and communication development we have plenty of resources such as books, puppets and instruments that will inspire and encourage your little ones to flourish.

As our ‘babies’ become independent ‘little people’ we aim to nurture their development while still offering a relaxed homely atmosphere. As they begin to grow and develop, eating and sleeping patterns begin to change. While nap times usually fluctuate there is still plenty of opportunity to sleep and for quiet times within the nursery day when needed. Play at this age begins to change and the children start to reflect on daily routines and discover their imaginations. Initiating games such as mimicking everyday routines for example, cooking dinner or dusting, feeding babies or putting them to bed, driving cars or flying airplanes making the engine noises or roaring like dinosaurs and stamping their feet as they trudge through the jungle.

This is an amazing age where children rely so much on their carers to be role models but are also becoming self-sufficient. By giving them the freedom to explore and investigate, and providing inspirational equipment and activities as well as the love and personal care they need, we allow our children to learn, grow and develop as individuals.

Here at each peach forest school we pride ourselves on a home from home environment and the little limes are able to mix in with our oranges and lemons as well as visa versa. This provides the most amazing peer on peer learning as they scaffold each others play, communication and development. This also supports sibling relationships as well as giving those who don’t the same real experiences.

At two years old your child will be getting more and more independent with their own mind and ideas. That give children the freedom to explore, investigate and experiment within a safe and secure environment. Supporting the children with their new found (and still developing) language skills, imaginative play, co-ordination and physical skills, as well as toilet training and dressing skills.

Recognizing that this age group learns so much from their peers as role models, we have mixed age family room, these are for our children aged 2-5 years. As your child turns three the changes in them are immense. In a fun and informal way, we nurture each individual child whilst developing their confidence and all round skills.

Our family room has a huge variety of equipment and activities With our exceptional outdoor space children thrive from accessing the outdoors for the most part of their day and our free flow ethos allows this to happen with ease, this gives the children clear boundaries to keep them safe allows them the freedom to grow independently.

Our enabling environment has been set up to allow the children freedom of choice and independence, to ignite imagination and focus on all areas of development; learning through play. The children have access to a huge assortment of different equipment and experiences to help them develop the skills they need for later in life. We love to bring the outdoors and natural resources throughout our insides spaces and reflect our outdoor learning inside.

Evidence has shown how much children learn from each other and it is imperative for them to become confident in groups with their peers. It is also important that they spend time outdoors. This can allow siblings to mix within a day but also equips the older children with a vast understanding of empathy and spacial awareness as their play changes while they interact with each other.

We work towards ensuring the transition is as smooth as possible. We have a library scheme where the children can take nursery books to share with you at home and we will encourage the children to talk about big school in fun projects and activities including a uniform day. This period of time is often as hard on parents than it is for the children, so our strong links with the local schools, including visits throughout the year will help put minds at ease.

Here at each peach forest school we have a strong ethos around the importance of outdoor learning.

We believe children should be free to explore natures riches, when engaged in outdoor experiences children’s senses are heightened which sparks their creative and imaginative play. We embrace the outdoors as an inspirational learning environment focused on each individual child’s learning.

We are based on the processes of learning and their content rather than the end result. This allows children to really access the core of learning, asking those ‘how’ or ‘what if’ questions. Building curious and inquisitive minds.

There are many amazing benefits from forest school these include

• Personal and social development
• Close clear links to the EYFS
• Increase in self belief and boosts self confidence
• Hands on experiences which provide effective learning opportunities
• Encourages resilience and self control 
• Encourages informs decision making and problem solving from an early age.
• Fantastic opportunities to build collaboratives skills
• Naturally learn to risk asses
• Using children’s preferred learning styles, being active and learning through practical skills

The experiences are totally child led and although staff may provide added resources to stimulate and inspire them untimetly the children’s imaginations will take them to magical places.

At forest school we love to explore and go on adventures, we especially love our outdoor mud kitchen which provides hours of imaginative play with our friends.

Den building is a skill we all love to learn and builds our team work skills into something extraordinary!

As a nursery setting we have been inspired by a project called ‘The Dusty Bluebells’. This project has motivated us to push forward with our plans for our children to have fantastic learning opportunities within the local community and to build links with the older generation. We have a close link with a local care home in Peacehaven (The Maples) whole visit on a regular basis for storytelling and songs.

We’re trying to reduce the social isolation that older people often feel when living in a care home, due to illness and physical separation from loved ones. When the generations spend time together it can take the focus away from problems and draw us towards the positive aspects of life such as friendship and creativity. Traditional stories, songs and musical improvisation offer opportunities for memories, feelings and ideas to be shared even if verbal communication is limited – bringing a sense of personal value and emotional wellbeing to all involved.

Traditional stories and songs provide common ground for the old and the young to be together; they stimulate the imagination and trigger memories. We make the sessions as interactive as possible so that the children and older people can get to know each other. In our project we have really noticed the friendships grow as everyone has become more relaxed in each other’s company. The older people also form closer relationships with one another, which will have lasting benefits beyond the end of the sessions. The songs and stories live on in the wider community, as the children share them with family members.