Welcome to Woodside Primary Academy Nursery 3-4's Provision

• Our 3-year-old daycare and sessional provision is currently full for the next academic year (applications accepted for September 2025 only).

Woodside Primary Academy Nursery forms part of the school’s outstanding provision. The nursery has a dedicated team of experienced leaders, qualified teachers and early years practitioners who provide exceptional care, learning opportunities and personal development for all children. The nursery has an established reputation for ‘high quality’ care and education amongst our current and returning families.

The 3-year-old provision consists of three nursery classes for children aged from three to four-years-old. 

• Responsible Ladybird, Honest Bumblebee & Respectful Butterfly classes.

3 & 4 Year-Olds Woodside Nursery Offer

We offer a wide range of provision to support the needs of all families:

• Free early educational funded 15-hour places for All three and four-year-old children
• Free early educational funded 30-hour places for three and four-year-old children (Government Eligibility Criteria applies)
• Extended wrap around day-care starting from: 8am and available to 6.00pm (Fees apply). 

Nursery Opening Hours

Open from 8am-6pm (Late fees apply) Monday-Friday. (Please see fees booklet for 50-weeks charging structure).

The nursery is closed for one week at Easter, one week at Christmas and for two weeks at the end of August.

Meal Provision

We provide healthy choices for breakfast, lunch, tea-time and midday snacks, all freshly prepared daily and cooked on site by our in-house catering team.

Our Curriculum - For Children aged 3-4 Years

The curriculum focuses on providing experiences and teaching that develops the essential aspects of early child development. It is sequenced to ensure it prepares children for the next stage in their learning journey. It encompasses a focus on the key skills and knowledge children need to be successful when starting school. The Early Years Foundation Stage Framework, learning and development provide an overview to support our curriculum:

Prime

• Personal & social development 
• Physical development 
• Communication, language

Specific

• Mathematics 
• Literacy 
• Understanding the world 
• Expressive art & design 

Planning for Learning & Development

At Woodside, we encourage each child to explore and extend their learning through a play based curriculum.

Adults support children’s learning through direct teaching in small group activities and while supporting play, both inside and in the outside garden learning zones.

Story Time

We think it is very important to read with the children daily.  As part of the routine we have a story and singing session to develop language and comprehension, personal and social skills and a love for books.  Books are also on offer for the children to access at all times during the free flow play sessions.

Tapestry Journal 

Learning is planned from what we observe the children doing while they are learning through play and what we know children should ‘typically’ learn at this age. We also plan around children’s interests, fascinations and half-term topics.

To best support your child’s learning we use an online learning journal system ‘Tapestry’. 

Tapestry is quite simply an ‘online journal’ where we will upload photos and videos of your child’s learning. This will enable you to see their progress at some and us to support their learning. You will also be able to upload photos and videos of your child’s progress at home. We will also post key information and messages. Any photos or videos uploaded will only be viewable by parents/ carers of the children in the photos and the school staff. Tapestry can be accessed via any web browser (Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, etc.) or downloaded as an app to smartphones or tablets.

Key Person

All children will be allocated a practitioner as a key person.

They will support with the settling and transition processes, as well as make assessments of your child while they are in the 3-4 provision. You can speak to the key person, room lead or any member of the leadership team, at any time about your child.

Dietary Needs

During the admission process we will ask you to provide details of any allergies or intolerances to food, as well as any particular dietary needs such as Vegetarian. All food provided at the nursery is Halal and is also Nut-Free.

We are a Nut-Free school.

Daily food orders will be adjusted according to the individual dietary needs of the children and staff will be made aware of this.  Posters will be displayed highlighting this to practitioners working with the children.

Daily Routine and Learning Activities 

This is what a typical session looks like

• 8:35am Doors open - self selection and self-registration
• 9:15am welcome song, Literacy (cross-curricular)
• 9:30am Inside Free flow (self selection- supported learning)
• 10am Open garden door -Inside/outside - free flow (self selection- supported learning)
• 11:00am Carpet teaching session (Rhyme/Maths focus), story
• 10:50am Tidy-up time 
• 11:10am Rhyme time (Phonological awareness)
• 11:30am Children get ready for lunchtime / home time routine - story/Lunch time 
• (Repeat for afternoon session from 12:30pm)  

The children are encouraged to flow freely between classes throughout the day, enabling them to learn side by side with their peers and experience different learning activities during their session.

Top 20 Tips for Getting Ready for Nursery

1. Toileting themselves

Support your child in being able to manage their toileting during the school day, successfully cleaning and dressing themselves afterwards. Ensure that they automatically wash their hands afterwards. Consider prompts in the toilet to help remind them such as a picture of hands being washed.

2.  Dressing and undressing

Children will need on occasions to dress and undress in school, such as if they have an accident or a spillage. Practise buttons and zips on any items of clothing and give your child time to practise before doing it for them. Again ensure your children can recognise which foot to put each shoe on and can put on their new school shoes and uniform independently. The flip trick is great for helping to put on their coats!

3.  Feeding themselves 

Again supporting your child with eating can be both encouraging and time saving.  Ensure that your child feeds themselves and if possible uses a knife and fork to cut and eat their food. Eating together to model the process and talking to ensure it is an enjoyable time can help reduce anxieties that may exist at meal time. Encourage your child to help you set the table/ clear away afterwards. Can they help you prepare the meal? Practise having lunch with their new lunchbox- can they open their lunchbox, water bottle etc. independently?

4.  Sleep and routines 

Support your child in getting  into a good routine of sleeping making sure they get enough sleep, going to bed at a regular time and leaving enough time in the morning for them to practise dressing themselves and completing their routine independently.

5.  Tidying up and looking after their belongings

Encourage your child to support with tidying up after using their toys, making sure if a range of toys are used that they all go back to their relevant homes. Looking after their belongings. When children take off their cardigan, shoes  at home, encourage them to return them to one place as they will need to in the classroom. Encourage children to hold their own belongings for a little while and to find things for themselves at home.

6. Recognising their name

Write your child’s name on a number of different pieces of paper and place around the house, encourage them to point to their name and say it out loud each time they see it.  Overtime add other familiar names and words around it, one at a time such as Mummy, Daddy, Nanny and so on. Encourage your child to find their name among the other words. Once they have got the hand of this, change the position of the words, can they still find their name?  This will help them in the busy classroom to find their coat peg and draw with ease as well as self-registration. Please write your child’s name with a capital letter at the beginning but the rest of the letters should be lowercase. Label their new uniform with their name and show them what it looks like.

7. Name writing

Practise writing their name regularly. Encourage your child to begin with writing their initial.

8. Listen to a story

Read to your child regularly and encourage them to listen carefully. Don’t be afraid to re-read classics or favourites and overtime encourage your child to retell the story alongside you.

9. Speaking

Encourage your children to respond to you in more than one word. At first, you may need to say the full sentence back to the child, overtime they will begin to build the number of words they use in a string, although it may not be a full sentence for a while. If they mispronounce something then do not tell them it is wrong, instead model it correctly. For example, if your child says ‘I want a Nana,’ you could reply, ‘OK would you like a banana?’

10. Contact with school

Play/attend as many sessions as possible both in school or virtually to help your child feel comfortable in the setting and with staff. 

11.  Reading books about starting nursery

Consider purchasing some books about starting nursery to read with your child. This may help alleviate and anxieties and help them to understand what to expect.

12. Ask and answer questions

As you are out and about, ask your child questions to promote thinking about the world around them.  Encourage them to look deeper at what they see and why is might be there or doing something. Take the time to listen to your child’s questions and answer them the best you can. Remember it's ok to say you don’t know, or we can find out together.

13. Social starters

If times allow support your child in making friends when in a social situation. Give them sentence starters to say to other children such as “Hello, what is your name?” and “Do you want to come and play with me?”

14. Sharing and turn taking

Play plenty of board games to encourage turn taking. You can even do this with over family members over video conferencing, supporting the other player with their moves. Sharing toys with siblings and even clearing out old toys to give to charity or put out the front for others to take.

15. Acts of kindness

Complete little acts of kindness that encourage your child to think about others and show concern for others outside their immediate family. This could be baking, making a card, or calling someone to check on them or cheer them up.

16. Counting

Practise counting whether it be climbing the stairs or laying the table for dinner.

17.Fine motor skills

Practise activities that will strengthen the muscles in their hands to help get them ready for writing. These may be activities such as threading, play dough, making Lego models, using scissors or even, colouring and writing using a pencil.

18.  Recognising numbers

Look at numbers and point to numbers to 10 when counting.  Point out numbers in the environment such as door numbers when on a local walk.

19.  Following instructions

Give your child a number of instructions to follow. Start with a simple instruction and then increase to giving them two or three things to complete in one go. Baking and following recipes can help children to learn these skills

20. Remember to have fun!