As the largest childcare provider in the area, Ferry Road Nursery is breaking ground with open-ended learning and bridging the gap between learning at nursery and at home.
The nursery has created a series of Home Learning bags filled with various activities including everything from number games, books, cooking, and physical activities. Parents and carers are encouraged to take these home and enjoy the continued learning experience with their children. The nursery staff track the children’s development in the early years areas using an online journal system called ‘Tapestry’. The parents have access to this and are asked to share photographs or videos of the children participating in the activities at home for the staff to extend the learning evaluations.
The nursery currently has 6 bags available and are looking at developing more after a positive response from the families in the nursery.
In addition to this, the nursery has purchased a couple of balance bikes to add to the home learning resources.
Manager Sharron Haddock says, “Ensuring access for the children to these activities is so important to their ongoing development and a great way for families to enjoy the learning process out of the nursery environment. We are proud to have a good partnership with our nursery parents and will continue to press forward in creating the most positive learning experiences for our children here and at home”.
In addition to this, the nursery recently received a HEPA (Healthy Eating Physical Activity) grant, which was creatively used to commission local talented carpenter David Adams to build an indoor tree house for the children. The bespoke creation has been secured into the first floor of the nursery and offers play spaces and a super slide for all the children to enjoy. This project is one of a kind and a long term investment for the nursery who offer a public thanks and appreciation to Mr. Adams, who donated his time for free to reduce the expenditure for the nursery, allowing them to make the best use of the HEPA funding.
In recent months Rye Town Council purchased the land and building used by Ferry Road Nursery and has issued a public declaration to continue to support its future and the much needed service it provides to the local community. The busy nursery has recently been granted planning permission for a second storey extension to not only increase the number of spaces available but more importantly provide more useful space for the existing users.
The nursery is a charity relying on fundraising and donations to top up the fees and will be pushing forward looking for financial support to cover the costs of the building project. This will be kick started with a Black Tie Charity Dinner at the prestigious Mermaid Inn on Saturday April. 21. The evening will offer a complimentary glass of fizz on arrival, dinner, fantastic music and an auction not to be missed!
Tickets are £50 per person and available from Rebekah Gilbert, info@vivawellbeing.com or from the nursery.
The staff and trustees of the nursery are keen to hear from any local trades that would be interested in working with us on the new build project or in the general future development of the nursery.
Photo: P.Byrne