Learning at NOA's Ark

At NOA’s Ark Nursery we strive to offer children the best possible learning environment, ensuring all children have the chance to explore and develop in our fantastic indoor and outdoor spaces.

The layout of our larger room is set up for the 2-3s (Otters) and the 3-5s (Peacocks).  The room is one whole room, made up of the two halves, which encourages free flow so that children can approach activities more suited to their individual stage of development and ability.  Both Otters and Peacocks share a routine, but this is flexible to ensure minimal disruptions to play; for example, group time is timetabled for 9:30am but this is flexible if children are fully engaged in their play.

In Koalas (0-2s) the aim is to provide a home away from home.  The practitioners are nurturing, friendly and strongly focused on the babies’ emotional as well as physical welfare.  They spend time ensuring the child feels ‘safe’ so that they are able to explore their environment and start the process of learning with us.  A book of the month has recently been introduced as a way to frame the learning with this age group. 

Pupil passports have been introduced if a child needs extra support, and are developed by key persons and parents to ensure the key person can tailor activities to the needs of the child. 

Although daily planning takes place, the children and their interests come first, which means that planning can change quickly and easily.  This can come from a single question e.g. ‘Where does water come from?’, which led to two days of investigation into the water cycle and a beautiful set of pictures with eager explanations of their content from the children involved.