Nursery
Early Learning
Every activity at Ryde Nursery has a purpose. We don’t just fill your child’s day; we scaffold their development. By balancing active physical play, creative play, outdoor exploration and communication and relationships, we ensure your child develops skills as they grow and prepare for school as a confident, empathetic and independent learner.
Westhill Nursery uses the EYFS framework to plan and create an enriched curriculum that is interesting, stimulating and tailored to give your child a joyful head start in foundational learning.
Lower Nursery: Nurturing Wonder and Curiosity
For our youngest learners, the world is a sensory adventure. We provide a gentle, stimulating environment where they can explore their capabilities and build foundational skills.
- Early Numeracy in Action: Through simple, fun cooking activities, children develop fine motor skills, learn about textures and healthy choices, and practice early math skills like counting, measuring ingredients, and exploring shapes and sizes.
- The Weekly Ramble: Donning our boots, we venture out to connect with nature. These rambles build physical stamina, encourage curiosity about the natural world, and foster a sense of adventure.
- Mindfulness and Movement: Through playful Yoga and Soft Shapes sessions, our children develop core strength, balance, and spatial awareness while learning early techniques for relaxation and emotional regulation.
- The Building Blocks of Language: Long before reading begins, we immerse our youngest children in a world of rhythm, rhyme, and storytelling. We tune their ears to sounds through songs and games, laying the essential groundwork for phonics success.
Upper Nursery: Building Confidence and Skills
As our children grow, their world expands. In Upper Nursery, we introduce broader experiences that encourage independence, teamwork, a deeper connection to the community and a more structured approach to early learning.
- Playful Phonics: We introduce children to letters and sounds using a highly interactive, synthetic phonics approach. Through games, puppetry, and multisensory activities, children learn to recognize letters and blend sounds, turning the first steps of reading into an exciting game.
- Mathematical Adventures: Math at Ryde is concrete and meaningful. Whether counting the steps on a walk, sorting natural objects by size, or mapping out shapes in the playground, we build deep numerical understanding. Children develop a strong grasp of number bonds, patterns and spatial reasoning through real-world problem-solving.
- Enriched Physical Play: New activities are added to their days, including ballet, tag rugby, and cricket. These sessions support their development of spatial awareness, agility and the joy of teamwork, communication and sportsmanship.
