The Baby Toddler Room
Welcome to Baby Toddlers!
Baby Toddlers is the next step in your child’s progression through the Early Years Foundation Stage. We have a slightly more structured routine than in the Baby Room, but it is very flexible to fit in with every child’s needs.
Our Baby Toddler room cares for a maximum of 21 children a day. The ratio is 1 member of staff to 3 children.
We encourage our children to play independently, to share, and to enjoy all aspects of play. We enjoy seeing the children smiling and giggling throughout the day and this is incorporated into our daily activities.
Our daily timetable is very flexible. The children can choose from a variety of toys stored on shelves which they can easily reach as well as toys and activities which are set out and ready. The very popular items such as the house, the books, the cars and the dolls are always readily available.
The children can choose free play through the day, whilst joining in the more structured activities as they wish. Every day we have singing time, story time and lots of individual time with each child.
The Baby Toddler room love to see the children smiling and having lots of fun. As a staff team we love to be part of this and enjoy dressing up, making funny faces and showing the children that we are having fun as well. We love to sing loudly, have running races and jump in and out of puddles!
Our Activities
We prepare lots of activities and experiences for our children every day. These include; tactile play such as water, sand, tea leaves and dry pasta; early mark making such as drawing, painting and sticking; cooking, dressing up and singing. Have a look at the gallery for lots of examples of our fun!
We encourage the children to choose the toys and games they wish to play with during the day by providing a wide range of resources in clear see through boxes all within easy reach of the children.
We also encourage the children to learn through heuristic play. This method of play is carried out in a quiet area with only a couple of children at a time. Activities such as posting buttons into boxes or putting pegs on a line help hand-eye co-ordination and fine motor skills. During this quieter play we can make very good observations on each child which allows us to see how they are developing. These observations inform our planning and are kept in your child’s profile.
Outdoor play
We love playing outside, whatever the weather, and we take our planned activities into our large garden whenever possible. We provide ‘Muddy Puddles’ clothes and welly boots to keep the children warm and dry so we venture out come rain, shine, wind and snow!
We understand that children learn better outside and this informs our planning. We have lots of fun toys in the garden such as bikes, trikes, push-alongs as well as a ball pit, a sandpit, a play kitchen and a book corner. We often have tactile play outside and we all get very messy and have lots of fun with shaving foam, rice, cornflour and water. This allows the children to freely express themselves and to develop self confidence as well as practice turn taking, group play and hand washing!
We often take the children out onto The Millennium Green which is right behind the nursery. We visit the wooden crocodile, ‘Tellytubby’ Hill and the dark forest! We also see the changing seasons in the trees and the pond.