| Opening Hours |
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| Opening hours are 7.30am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, all year round, excluding all public holidays, and a Christmas closure. |
A Home-From-Home
Rocking Horse Nursery is a converted farm house and stable block within the grounds of Saint Nicholas School. It offers a wonderful home-from-home environment as well as plenty of green space, including a large designated play area and acres of grounds for children to explore with our highly trained and dedicated team of nursery staff. We are located just outside the pretty village of Churchgate Street, Old Harlow and there is designated on site parking for customers.
Key Persons | Building Relationships
Every child at Rocking Horse will have a key person, their role is to help ensure that every child's care is tailored to meet their individual needs. We offer a settling in programme prior to starting to help the child become familiar with the setting and allow time to build up a relationship with their parents. During their pre-visits if the child demonstrates a particular bond with a practitioner that person will be their Key Person. The nursery also has a buddy system for when a key person is absent. A child's Key Person will change as they progress through the nursery.
Our Rocking Horse Team
All staff are qualified or working towards a childcare approved qualification.
All our staff are Paediatric First Aid Trained.
Staff receive an extensive induction programme which includes Safeguarding, Food hygiene, allergy and intolerance training and many more.
All staff hold an Enhanced DBS and are required to meet all safe recruitment checks prior to enrolment.
Keep Up To Date with Blossom
We use Blossom in the nursery, which is an app that allows parents to see and celebrate your child’s achievements, developmental progress and milestones, including new skills they’ve learned, special projects they’ve completed, and social interactions they’ve had with their peers. The app also allows you to take photos and feed back to the nursery about progress achieved at home, which is a great way to keep us up-to-date too. We use the diary feature for the children in Foals, and ad-hoc sessions can be booked via the app when we have the availability.
There is also an instant message feature which can be useful if you need to let the nursery know something about your child, or find out how they have settled.
The app also allows you to view and pay invoices from within the app and keep track of your payment receipts. This makes it easy to manage your childcare payments and keep track of your finances.
Rooms At Rocking Horse Nursery
Rocking Horse Nursery is comprised of three rooms and our outdoor and garden areas.
Moving rooms
As your child approaches a milestone where they will be looking to moving up to the next age group your child's Key Person will speak to you about your child’s pending move. You will be given a small document explaining a few things and a guide to what to expect, all transitions will be arranged within their nursery hours.
Curriculum
We use the Development Matters guidance to plan age and developmentally appropriate activities and to help ensure all children are making progress from their starting point. This is a non-statutory curriculum guidance for the early years foundation stage.
We will identify children's starting points through conversations with parents at the initial personal documentation meeting, during pre-visits and settling sessions and by planning individual next steps of learning.
To ensure we meet the needs of all children in our care, we ask parents at the personal documentation if they child has a SEND, and if so a health care plan, one page profile and/or one plan can be completed if needed. The nursery has a SENCo and we also have links with the SENCo in the pre-school and school.
We work closely with the SEND inclusion partner for Essex when needed.
Session Times
| All Full Day | 8.30am-5.30pm |
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| Half Day | 8.30am-1.00pm or 1.00pm to 5.30pm |
| School Day | 9am-3pm |
| Breakfast Club | 7.30am - 8.30am |
| Late Stay | 5.30-6pm |
Nursery Fees
Fees are inclusive of the following:
- Bio-degradable nappies and reusable wipes
- Snacks and cow’s milk/or milk alternative
- Lunch and tea
- Suncream
- Nursery bag
- All-in-one waterproof
The websites below gives parents information on the types of funding they may be eligible to claim.
What are fundamental British values EYFS?
Fundamental British values are a statutory requirement of the EYFS curriculum. Fundamental British values help children to positively contribute to the local and national multi-diverse community of Great Britain. EYFS activities should celebrate and value the modern diversity of the UK.
The five fundamental British values are:-
Democracy
Rule of law
Individual liberty
Mutual respect
Tolerance of different faiths and beliefs
British values EYFS were introduced in 2015 within the Prevent Duty guidance for schools. Prevent duty was brought in through increasing concerns surrounding extremist views and the influence these have on children. The duty for schools and EYFS settings is underpinned by safeguarding responsibilities for the child’s welfare and understanding of the world around them. This duty combines safeguarding and equality. EYFS settings are not expected to undertake British values activities in isolation. Nurseries should underpin the British values necessary for the children, families and communities they serve. Promoting British values in the early years should go hand in hand with the EYFS current curriculum. British values celebrate difference and diversity and encourage how best to work together, even with differing beliefs and views. Promoting language and communication skills with toddlers is a huge step towards recognising and celebrating diversity.
Democracy
Democracy is the first of the EYFS British values. As Great Britain is run under a democratic government, citizens of the UK can have a say about how the country is run. Democracy in the early years can be demonstrated in lots of different ways. Any activities that promote the following skills are developing British values of democracy understanding:
Making decisions as a small group or in pairs.
Negotiating which game to play.
Listening to others opinions and thoughts.
Playing a game within fair rules.
Sticking to the plan decided (without putting a ceiling on creativity, of course).
Deciding to play a game that all participants will enjoy.
Rule of law
British values rule of law is the second of the five values children will learn throughout their EYFS and school journey. Rule of law is easily linked to PSED EYFS objectives. It covers understanding right and wrong and how to manage their actions in line with the boundaries set by society and the nursery. Rule of law British values aim for children to recognise the boundaries and consequences they have in place for safety, wellbeing and effective learning. Activities that encourage the development of the following skills help to promote British values rule of law:
Recognising and naming feelings and emotions.
Managing feelings and experimenting with emotional regulation strategies.
Discussing and reflecting on right and wrong in different situations.
Setting personal boundaries with other children.
Talking about nursery golden rules and why they are important.
Staying consistent with consequences (including positive consequences) linked to actions.
Individual liberty
All of the fundamental British values are interlinked, and there are clear connections between democracy and individual liberty in EYFS. Individual liberty covers children’s understanding of themselves and others, exploring where they fit within communities. Children should be taught their fundamental rights and how to develop a positive sense of self. Activities that promote individual liberty British values will focus on:
Understanding the world around them.
Boosting confidence to share their views and opinions.
Increasing understanding of different relationships around them.
Developing awareness of other communities and roles within them.
Encouraging a positive sense of self.
Mutual respect
Mutual respect is one of the five British values; it is important to be developed from the start of EYFS. Mutual respect British values activities can help children to work alongside different personalities, developing life-long social skills. Mutual respect in EYFS is a skill that the nursery practitioners will regularly demonstrate to parents, other team members and the children themselves. Mutual respect British values activities might look at developing:
Personal, social, and emotional development.
Language and communications skills
Listening to others opinions.
Joining in with new interests and games.
Trying new activities.
Showing empathy for others.
Celebrating different strengths in others.
Tolerance of others
Building tolerance for other faiths and beliefs helps to widen children’s understanding of the world around them. Combining several of the seven areas for learning and development EYFS, nursery children can discover different cultures, traditions and beliefs through Art, early reading opportunities and technology. British values EYFS activities that are aiming to increase tolerance of others should cover:
Exploring different faiths, traditions and cultures.
Using early reading activities as an opportunity to learn about diversity.
Understanding and accepting others boundaries when playing.
Committed to Sustainability
The nursery is committed to supporting the school in their drive to be as environmentally friendly as possible and some of the ways we do this is by providing Kit and Kin nappies and by using Cheeky Wipes.
Setting Name - Rocking Horse Nursery
Postal address - Rocking Horse Nursery, Hobbs Cross Road, Harlow, Essex, CM17 0NJ
Contact Number - 01279 215965
Head of Nursery and Pre-school - Sophie Jackson
Nursery Manager - Corinna Cobb
3rd in Charge - Leanne Smith
SENCo - Roxanne Leather and Carla Scott
Misson Statement
Ofsted Reg Number - 2714760
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