Please tell me all the good things about your nursery / pre school....

[Lilyloo]

I am going to take over the managers position at my pre school in September.
I have some ideas for change and things that we already do well, I have sent a questionnaire to parents also.
Would love to hear about the things that make you happy as a parent or staff about your nursery.
Tia

key worker,
15 mins at start of session dedicated to have time for meeting and greeting each child, asking them how they are, chat with parents.

free flow.

nice building and garden.

friendly staff.

head always at gate etc and available.

staggered start, one child a day,
gradual settling in period, based on reactions of child,

topic sheets and suggested activities once a term

trips to local area, on bus and train, to shops etc,

good transition arrangements with schools.

what i would like to see is times for parents to stay in nursery so see focused activities, group time etc to get an idea of how kids learn in nursery.

I don't have a lot of time at the start/end of the day so really good communication between home and pre-school (via contact book or something) is helpful.

Setting up the room in a similar way to a reception classroom, for familiarity.

Thanks for these points am noting them all, anymore?

What do you think about feedback on the progress of your child?

We had daily sheets, but best of all, the staff were warm, friendly, welcoming and happy to chat.

• good staff retention

- they bring the kids (from preschool room, not toddlers and babies) on trips

We don't get much feedback in a formal manner which is ok with me but, thinking about it, for my preschooler, it would be nice to have had a note/meeting (whatever would be easiest to organise) about how she had done over a term.

Good staff retention
Staff varying ages. and employs three men out of 12 staff.
Friendly staff

A healthy, varied menu. Kids will try things at nursery that they won't try at home, a healthy menu at nursery takes the pressure off at home.

Good staff retention, continuity of staff as they progress in careers, move between rooms.

Extremely enthusiastic staff and genuinely so!

The facilities are somewhat secondary to me, other than that the toys and so on seem clean and new, replaced regularly. DD used to go to a nursery with spectacular grounds and buildings. Her current nursery is much smaller but the staff are committed and enthusiastic and THAT to me is the difference!

Not fussed about trips, I can do that myself. Special visits from people like the Fire Service are good though.

Less important to me than getting kids academically ready for nursery is help with being independent - hygiene, teeth brushing, going to the toilet, washing hands well, coat buttons, zips, shoes, etc. Programmes to tackle these things are good.

Friendly staff who seem to get almost as much pride of children developing as parents do (just thinking of the reaction i got when i told dd's key worker that she had taken her first few steps over one weekend still makes me smile 18months later)

Manager greets all children by name when.she sees them.

Free flow between room and garden.

Most importantly staff who.appear to care / play / cuddle children when they need to be cuddled and you feel that they do the.job because they enjoy it.

Sorry to hijack (this is really interesting thread). Do other people get daily sheets for older children (over 2s)? At our nursery they only do this in the babyroom and say they can't in the older room because of the change in ratios. Just wondering what the nurseries that you all 'love' do on this. thks

Ooh good I already have a head start as we do have great staff :)

I hope think.ours stop at 2. Though tbh, i'm absolutely not.bothered by having one.at all - as long as they can tell me if she's eaten/ pooed, I trust she's had a fun day and dd loves nursery so don't mind so.much what she does.

I am not sure we would have time for daily sheets tbh, we only take over 2 year older anyway.

I think that daily sheets are a waste of time. I really didn't want to know how many times my daughter had pooed. My main concerns is whether is safe and happy and preferly learning.

My son's nursery had a time table on the door that showed what the children had been up to.

Summer I work in a preschool room, and do daily sheets, but only really use them as an aide memoire or for parents collecting late (as there may be no staff still on shift who worked directly with the child). I tend to lead with the sheet, then talk to parents about something we've really enjoyed that day, I love it when the child enthusiastically joins in, explaining aspects of the activity from their viewpoint.
OP, my nursery is great of course it is, I work there
We have Staff with good qualifications (mostly level 3, some level 4, FDeg, BA, PGCE, EYP) and a commitment to staff development and ongoing training.
Lots of time outdoors for all the children, lots of mark making equipment, paper, craft supplies (IME skimping on these is a false economy).
Lots of cuddles, and small enough rooms that I know all the children to wave to when I see them out in the area (which happens quite a lot).
Food freshly prepared from scratch on site each day, sometimes grown on site too, in the nursery garden.
Leavers' "graduation" to celebrate the time each child has spent at the nursery as they go onwards to school.

We get daily sheets in the Pre-school room as well as younger rooms. It means that if DD's key worker is on a break or otherwise occupied, any staff member can hand over.

Personally I find them useful to help me discuss her day with DD (who she played with, what she ate) and DH looks at them when he gets home, which is nice for him if he gets home after she goes to bed (most days).

They really don't have much detail on them. The baby ones were more detailed.

Thanks, we do have notice board with all activities on which is done daily.

The thing that makes me happiest is that DS is greeted by every member of staff as we go in and they sound genuinely pleased to see him!

They play outside a lot, which is great, and eat tea out there when the weather is good.

DS's favourite thing is PE once a week - someone comes in to do a sports/dancing session which is really well run.

Feedback on his progress is patchy, to be honest. Parents' evening is about every 6 months and takes about 5 mins of looking through his book of observations and work. We can take this home if we want to as well. To be fair, I'm not that fussed as I don't have any areas of concern about his learning. What's most important to me is that it's a safe, loving place for him to spend his days.

Bornto that's lovely, sounds like a lovely nursery