TWINKLES LEEDS CITY CENTRE – OXFORD PLACE
10% DISCOUNT OFF NURSERY FEES FOR NHS EMPLOYEES
Twinkles Leeds Oxford Place is a 60 place, private day nursery which opened in Leeds City Centre in October 2016 and is the newest nursery in the Twinkles Group. Read our December 2018 Ofsted Report
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Our qualified and experienced staff are dedicated to the development of the babies and young children in their care and at Twinkles, the children’s play experiences are based around their individual developmental needs. There are always lots of stimulating activities on offer and plenty of fun things to do, both indoors and outside. At Twinkles we operate a Key Person system, whereby your child will be allocated a Nursery Nurse who will support both yours and your child’s needs. They will build up a strong bond with your child during their time with us and help them to feel safe and secure in their new environment. The Key Person is also responsible for building up a Learning Journey for your child. This will include observations, photographs and art work, as well as individually planned Next Steps to support their individual needs. We have three different rooms, called Baby Stars, Rising Stars and Shooting Stars. Each of the rooms is carefully set out to offer a wide range of learning opportunities, specifically designed for children in that age range, through a variety of resources and activities. There’s also a room just for supporting Physical Development and a small but well resourced outdoor play area that can be used whatever the weather.
Kerri McGuire – Nursery Manager
Kerri has been a part of the Twinkles team for 3 years, joining the team when they first opened as a Nursery Nurse. Kerri stepped up to be the Senior Nursery in Baby Stars before coming Deputy Manager in July 2018. Before joining Twinkles, Kerri worked in a mainstream primary school for 5 years, working with children from the ages of 3 to 11 years old. Kerri is Level 3 Qualified and has also gained experience of supporting children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Kerri is the nursery SENDCo and has attended courses linked to SEND, which include Understanding ADHD, Autism and Speech and Language. Kerri enjoys creative/sensory activities and supports that staff team to develop these in the nursery.
“The learning environment for children is welcoming and stimulating and through effective activity planning and continuous provision, staff ensure children experience activities across all areas of learning. In each room, children of all ages have free and independent access to a good selection of resources, especially creative, messy and sensory experience.”
Ofsted – Boston Spa Nursery
Gallery
Education
A mix of adult led & child initiated activities ensure we support learning across the seven areas of development which form part of the Early Years Foundation Stage, these are:
Communication & Language – involves giving children opportunities to experience a rich language environment; to develop their confidence and skills in expressing themselves; and to speak and listen in a range of situations
Physical Development – involves providing opportunities for young children to be active and interactive; and to develop their co-ordination, control, and movement. Children must also be helped to understand the importance of physical activity6, and to make healthy choices in relation to food
Personal, Social & Emotional Development – this involves helping children to develop a positive sense of themselves, and others; to form positive relationships and develop respect for others; to develop social skills and learn how to manage their feelings; to understand appropriate behaviour in groups; and to have confidence in their own abilities
Literacy – involves encouraging children to link sounds and letters and to begin to read and write. Children must be given access to a wide range of reading materials (books, poems, and other written materials) to ignite their interest
Maths – involves providing children with opportunities to develop and improve their skills in counting, understanding and using numbers, calculating simple addition and subtraction problems; and to describe shapes, spaces, and measure
Understanding the World – involves guiding children to make sense of their physical world and their community through opportunities to explore, observe and find out about people, places, technology and the environment
Expressive Arts & Design – involves enabling children to explore and play with a wide range of media and materials, as well as providing opportunities and encouragement for sharing their thoughts, ideas and feelings through a variety of activities in art, music, movement, dance, role-play, and design and technology 1
As well as looking at ‘what’ children are learning, we also look at ‘how’ they are learning and ensure that our learning environments and highly skilled early years educators support children in developing the Characteristics of Effective Learning and these are:
Playing and Exploring – Engagement
Finding out and exploring
Playing with what they know
Being willing to ‘have a go’
Active Learning – Motivation
Being involved and concentrating
Keeping trying
Enjoying achieving what they set out to do
Creating and Thinking Critically –Thinking
Having their own ideas
Making links
Choosing ways to do things
Well Being
We want to make sure that you and your child settle quickly into nursery life. To achieve this your child will be allocated a member of staff called a Key Person who will be their own special person at nursery. The Key Person will help your child to feel happy, safe, stimulated and secure at nursery and will give you peace of mind that you always have someone with whom you can share information about your child. The key person will take responsibility for meeting your child’s needs and making careful records of your child’s learning, development and progress. You’ll be able to talk to your Key Person regularly at our Parent Evenings to find out how your child is getting on and your Key Person will also be able to support you with activity ideas to try out at home. There’s always lots of cuddles to go round and we believe that every child is unique, so the Key Person will plan activities just for your child, based around their current interest, that way we know they are going to enjoy every single day at nursery!
Parents as Partners
We really want you to be part of your child’s learning, so we use a secure online programme called ‘Capture’ to record your child’s progress at nursery. This means you can you can log in at any time to see what your child has been getting up to at nursery and read the observations written by their Key Person. We value the knowledge you have about your child, so you can add your own observations from home and let us know what new skills your child has developed!
Outdoor & Physical Play
We believe outdoor play to be vital to your child’s development, so at Twinkles we go outside every day, whatever the weather may be doing! There is nothing children love more than running around in the fresh air and that’s why we invest in outdoor areas for all of our nurseries. Our outdoor areas are well resourced, with lots for the children to do to support development in all areas of the EYFS. At Twinkles, children have all the same learning opportunities outside as they do inside, so you can be rest assured, wherever your child is playing, they will always be learning something new! As well as ensuring there are lots of opportunities for outdoor play, we also want to ensure that your child takes part in enough physical activity each day to keep healthy and for under fives, this means 180 minutes every day!
Nutritious food for your child
A well balanced and nutritious diet is vital to a child’s development. Here at Twinkles Nurseries our trained cooks prepare fresh, healthy, tasty and nutritious meals for the children daily. Our four weekly menus have been carefully put together, in line with the British Nutrition Foundation. Your children will enjoy tasty home cooking for both dinner and tea, as well as a choice of breakfasts and healthy snacks. At Twinkles we are able to cater to any dietary requirements that your little one may have, and try to incorporate the wealth of cultures we have at nursery into our meals!
We are always on the lookout for tasty new recipes to try, so please feel free to suggest a meal for us to try!
5 Star Rated Food Hygiene
All of our five nurseries have received a 5* rating in their most recent food hygiene inspections. Health and safety is of paramount importance to us and we are very proud to achieve the highest possible rating in ‘Food Hygiene’.
“Children in the pre-school room demonstrate advanced communication skills. They are able to express themselves effectively & use a range of tenses. For example, when listening to the story about the three pigs, they are very keen to join in and tell the story. Children talk to each other about the story & repeat the tale about the different houses they have built talking about the straw & the bricks, without prompts from staff. Children also express in depth how angry the wolf is as they pull their angry faces and show each other. This prompts staff to extend the activity by asking them to show each other happy and sad faces and they express these by using the puppets of the wolf, and pretend to talk with the puppet in an angry voice. This activity teaches children about their feelings along with the development of their literacy and communication skills, as they talk to each other and tell the story in some parts word for word.”
Ofsted 2013 Leeds City Centre Nursery
Our Rooms
We have four different rooms, each of them designed to cater for a different age group. The four rooms are called Baby Stars, Rising Stars, Shooting Stars & physical play. Each of these rooms is carefully set out to offer a wide range of learning opportunities, specifically designed for children in that age range, through a variety of resources and activities.
Baby Stars
Our Baby room has space for up to fifteen children at any one time and there will be one member of staff for every three babies. Babies will be given new experiences according to their individual needs. At such a young age babies learn through their senses, so we will provide a wide range of sensory experiences each day. There’ll be a comfy story corner, a kitchen for role play, a cosy black and white den, sand and water play and of course a comfortable place to sleep.
READ MORE There’ll be lots of support from the adults in the room, encouraging physical skills for crawling, standing and walking, as well as encouraging independence through a range of care routines or activities. We’ll be using our nursery pushchairs to explore the local environment and make good use of our outdoor space whatever the weather! The routine here at Twinkles is very flexible and we will happily fit in with you do at home, to help them feel safe and secure and settle quickly into their new surroundings. Enjoying early games such as peak-a-boo, clapping and finding hidden objects will all be part of your child’s daily play. There’ll also be painting, sticking and even a bit of baking, so there’s always lots of lovely things to take home. There will also be opportunities for one-to-one interaction with staff and other children.
Rising Stars
When our babies are ready they can move through to the toddler room. In here we can have up to 24 children, with one adult for every three children under two and one adult for every four children aged between two to three years. Children will be given the opportunity to explore colours, shapes and counting, through a range of activities and the practitioners will ask lots of open ended question, to help extend your child’s play. Everything in the room will be carefully labelled with clear
READ MORE writing as well as bright photographs, to encourage your child to be independent from a young age as they access their own resources within the room, all under supervision of course. Self-registration in the morning will help your child to feel part of nursery and develop a sense of identity. The younger children will find their photograph and the older children can look for their first name. Rising Stars will play outside every day, come rain or shine, so everyone will come prepared for the British weather with sun cream and hats, as well as wellies and waterproofs.
Shooting Stars
This is our biggest room and can accommodate up to 28 pre-school children. In Shooting Stars there will be a wide variety of activities for children to access; they will still be able to experience natural materials such as sand and water, as well as take part in role-play, dressing up and construction activities. Children will also take part in pre-reading activities such as colour and shape recognition via matching and sorting, as well as activities to develop early maths skills such as counting, comparing and number recognition.
READ MORE As well as using our outdoor area every day, there’ll be trips out to the City Art Gallery, the Library and the market. The children will also take part in lots of cooking and baking activities as they learn all about being healthy and looking after themselves.
Physical Play
Twinkles Leeds Oxford Place is the first of the nurseries in the group to have a soft play room, specifically designed to help support development of physical skills for all our children. Research has shown that children who are regularly involved in active play develop well on many levels, including physically, emotionally, mentally and socially. Active and exploratory soft play helps children learn new motor skills in a fun and stimulating environment. It helps
READ MORE develop physical activity and encourages children to enjoy exercising, but as it’s essentially play it also fun and exciting for them!
Healthy Eating…
A well balanced and nutritious diet is vital to a child’s development. Here at Twinkles our trained cooks prepare fresh, healthy, tasty and nutritious meals for the children daily. Our four weekly menus have been carefully put together, using the guidance provided by the Children’s Food Trust to ensure we are providing a healthy, balanced and tasty diet.
Our Garden
Despite the central city location, there’s still a small but exciting outdoor space that the children will access every day. There’ll be a wide range of activities to keep the children busy when outside, including a music wall, sand play, water play, ball runs, small world play and more. We’ll be able to go outside every day, whatever the weather may be doing thanks to a full size canopy to keep off the heat of the sun and torrential downpours!
“Children are very well supported to develop their social skills. They are encouraged to use ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ and are given the opportunity through play and activities to learn to share, take turns and play co-operatively with each other. Children are constantly busy, engrossed in their play and very well occupied which has a positive influence on their very good behaviour”
Ofsted May 2014 – Wetherby Nursery
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Your children’s education and welfare are our main priorities