Prospectus
| A child's experience in the early years has a major impact on their future life chances. When parents choose to use early years services they want to know that provision will keep their children safe and help them to thrive. The Early Years Foundation Stage is the framework that provides that assurance." DFES, 2007 |
The Early Years Foundation Stage is the curriculum for all nurseries and pre-schools registered with Ofsted.
This curriculum not only sets the educational criteria for the learning and development of babies and children up to the age of five years but also shapes the high standards of practice. Its central aim is to help young people achieve the ‘Every Child Matters' outcomes:
• Being healthy
• Enjoying and achieving
• Making positive contributions
• Staying safe
• Achieving economic well-being
It is a framework which we at Castle Nursery embrace wholeheartedly, from activities, resource and staff training through to policies, practices and leadership.
Ofsted (Offices for Standards in Education)
Here at Castle we aim to far exceed the minimum National Standards set by Ofsted to ensure that we provide the highest quality care and education in early years.
Some quotes taken from recent OFSTED inspections:
"The quality and standards of the care are outstanding. The nursery provides an extremely child-orientated, safe, secure and stimulating environment."
"Staff and children enjoy extremely happy and warm relationships. Children approach staff happily and confidently and receive plenty of praise and positive reassurance."
"The quality of teaching and learning is outstanding; staff are extremely experienced, well qualified and dedicated early years practitioners. They have an excellent understanding of the Foundation Stage curriculum, enabling them to deliver an extremely stimulating, creative and fun range of play and learning activities."
"The partnership with parents is outstanding. Parents and staff work together which results in an extremely positive effect on the children's learning and development."
Ofsted is a non-ministerial government department established under the Education (Schools) Act 1992. Ofsted are well known for their relation to school inspections, however they also inspect childcare facilities.
Ofsted's role is to ensure that we provide the highest standards of childcare possible. The inspectors examine the nursery, its facilities and the childcare provided by our staff.
Ofsted come to our nurseries giving us very little or no notice at all. The reasoning behind this is that Ofsted want to see our nurseries as they actually are and not as they ‘want' to be seen. This ensures the feedback we receive and the feedback you receive is as honest as possible.
Our nurseries welcome OFSTED inspections. These inspections not only help identify our strengths and development areas, but also give us the opportunity to shine.
To view our Ofsted reports please go to the 'Settings Locations' page where each nursery has a downloadable link.
Click here to download our Prospectus 
or if you prefer we can send you one.
Please go to the 'Settings Locations' page and email us with your Name and Address and add the words 'Prospectus Request' as the subject title.