Tall Trees
Nature School was created by Emma Comer, manager and proprietor of Tall Trees Kindergarten, to give all the children at her setting the opportunity to explore the outdoor area.
The outstanding Montessori nursery runs Forest School sessions for the three-plus age group. Over time, Nature School has developed into a fully functional outdoor classroom where the children are free to explore and learn in an exciting and stimulating way. It is situated in a specially-designed covered area of the garden and has eight fully operational learning areas for children to explore and investigate.
All areas within Nature School are planned according to the Early Years Foundation Stage and cover each principle. The activities are planned weekly and are mainly children-led.
This provides them with the chance to get messy and experience natural outdoor play opportunities that they may not be able to experience outside the setting - such as making mud pies, painting and decorating rocks and using water in different ways.
The Nature School set-up includes a mud trough set at floor level for the children to explore, using different implements, from paint brushes and sponges to kitchen utensils and twigs. The children also have free play with water. There are bamboo shoots and channels where they can investigate whether spheres can roll fast or slow and whether the size can affect the speed. There are also weaving frames, a large chalkboard and large hollow wooden building blocks.
Nature School provides opportunities for the children to develop self-esteem and confidence in themselves and their abilities. This is because children can use Nature School as a tool for their individual learning, where they can try new and exciting things as part of an open-ended process.
Norland Nursery
The whole community around Norland Nursery in Bath is used as an enabling environment to benefit the children's learning.
One example of this is the way a conversation about the journey to nursery led to the making of maps and an open-top bus tour of the city. This outing led to an interest in the city's architecture, a trip to Bristol to compare it with Bath, a visit to a building site and finally the creation of a builder's yard at the setting.
Since opening in 2009, the pedagogical confidence of staff has grown, so they have moved from delivering a curriculum to planning for learning opportunities that spark and ignite enthusiasm for knowledge and skills. Children are recognised as 'active social agents' and 'meaning makers' and subsequently the nursery is free flow and workshop based.
Each of the five interconnected learning areas are subtly themed as discovery, creation, reflection, technology and the baby nest, seamlessly interweaving the areas of learning while facilitating opportunity for children's schematic development. Resources are carefully selected to offer open-ended learning opportunities so creativity flows and critical thinking develops.
A large indoor beach with guttering and a pulley system joins the water space. Children make the cement needed to hold constructions designed in the technology room and are supported to engage with real tools - hammering nails on the woodwork bench and even investigating the mechanics of car parts.
One room, aimed at increasing language and problem solving, is dedicated to design and construction, while a large double-height 'loft' captures the imagination of children. This is currently designed as a 'once upon a time' creative writing space with role play clothes, small world resources such as a castle and knights, a laptop and story boards to help support storytellers and emergent writers. In the reflection room, the use of kaleidoscope mirrors, light tables and infinity cubes aid self discovery.
Highly commended
It's the Little Things Children's Day Nursery, Maghull, Merseyside
Located a couple of miles from three motorways in a town where few walk and the car rules, the staff team have established a nursery where every day is an outdoor adventure. They are firm believers that children need to get back to nature to boost imagination, concentration, physicality and - most importantly - happiness. They have not only developed the setting's own outdoor area but now also leave the nursery behind to explore the grounds and woods on their doorstep.
The Cottage Kindergarten, Helensburgh
The entrance to the nursery is through a walled nature garden. Much thought and planning has gone into the outdoor space, with the aim that the children should be able to access all areas of the curriculum inside and outside, depending on their preferred style of learning. The outdoor area is used every day and there are three summer houses - the Beach Hut, the Workshop and the Pottery - equipped with exciting resources such as wood, hammers and clay.
Finalists
Footsteps Nursery and Pre-school, Canwell, Sutton Coldfield
Ladybird Pre-school, Cottenham, Cambridgeshire
Rachel Keeling Nursery School, Tower Hamlets, London
Treetops Nurseries, Castle Garden Day Nursery, Duffield, Derbyshire
Criterion
Open to early years settings that have developed elements of their provision to create stimulating, child-centred learning environments in line with the principles of the EYFS.