Tips For Finding The Right Nursery/Pre-School

So this week Oliver started pre-school and he's absolutely loving it. So I thought I'd do a little post on my top tips on choosing the right place for you and most importantly your child. 

Allergy Policy 
I'm going to start with a big one for us as Oliver is Lactose Intolerant and this was one of our biggest fears was that he was going to end up eating something that he wasn't meant to. One our first questions we asked was how they dealt with Children with allergies. The particular pre-school we've chosen for him will make sure that he's supervised during lunch and snack times so as not to have anything that is not appropriate for him to have which ticked all the boxes from us. When I actually picked him up from one of his settling in sessions it was during snack time and they actually had a member of staff sat with him and he was sat eating his snack with them. 

How Does Your Child React? 
When we went to look around where Ollie goes to pre-school he actually ran off straight away to play and start interacting with people which I was completely taken aback by as Oliver can be very clingy and not sure of situations where he doesn't know anyone so I thought being in a room full of adults and children he doesn't know would make him very clingy and closely guarded but he was the exact opposite. In fact he actually tantrum-ed because we tried to get him to leave to come home that didn't go down very well with him at all. Knowing that Oliver was comfortable and enjoying himself made me happy and comfortable with our choice. 

Routine 
Does the nursery you want to send your child to have any kind of routine in place? Where we have chosen to send Oliver has a routine in place for throughout the day as well as the opportunity to for the children to engage in free flow play as periods throughout the day. Which was another big tick for us as we want Oliver to play, have fun and make friends but we also want him to know the importance of a routine and doing other things beside play like picking up and tidying up after himself which they teach them as a part of their routine. 

Facilities/Activities  
What are their facilities like? Again Oliver's pre-school also ticked all the boxes on this one! They have both indoor and outdoor facilities that are available to the children all throughout the day weather permitting. Their outdoor part has things like the little tikes cars, playhouses, sand and water play and a mud kitchen which I know Oliver will love as he enjoys playing outside and getting messy. Indoors they have the facilities for all-sorts of art and crafts which are set up so your child can choose whether they want to do them or not. They have a quite area filled with books and music for nursery rhymes all of this ticked major boxes for us as it gives Oliver a variety of things to do. They also have all the things that will help aid Oliver with his potty training when we get back into starting it. 

Staff
How do the staff come across? Are they interacting with the children? Are they playing with the children and helping them if they need help? Again this ticked all the boxes for us! When we went for our visit all the staff were so lovely and actually got down to Oliver's level and spoke to him. All the children seemed happy interacting with all the members of staff and asking for help if they needed it. The pre-school also has members of staff trained in several areas such as SENCO, behaviour specialist and a speech and language specialist ect. 

Safeguarding 
How safe does it feel? Before you even get into nursery you have to get through two locked doors that both have pass-codes only members of staff know. They have also have a system in place for when other members of family pick your child up which is a password that only you and who you choose to tell it too will know. They also like to know who is picking up you child in advance and also like to meet them beforehand so they have a face to a name. They also have a closed Facebook group so they can share pictures of your children with from activities and sessions they've done without risking your children's safety so you can stay updated at all times. 

A few other key things that ticked the boxes for us were; 

• They do regular parents evenings and send reports home everyday with things that you child has done and achieved. 
• They do things such a themed days throughout the year (when Oliver went for his settling in session it was national sandwich day so all the children were making sandwiches), they do bonnet competitions at Easter and do a nativity a Christmas. 
• They start work with things such as letters, number and colour with the younger children Oliver's age so they get a head start in those areas.  

I hope you've enjoyed this post of my key points to look out for when choosing a nursery/preschool and that you find it helpful if you're going through the same process we've just gone through.