Cornerstone Day Nursery

A real fishing boat in a quarter-acre garden gives Cornerstone Day Nursery a memorable centrepiece for outdoor play. This Priestley Road setting in Basingstoke combines substantial outdoor space with an indoor hall, private outdoor areas beside its playrooms and quieter places for reading or rest. There is room for movement and for a slower pace.

Children can attend from birth to five years, and the nursery has capacity for 150 children in total. That whole-setting figure matters when choosing the scale of care a family wants; it is not the size of an individual group. Seven playrooms divide the indoor provision, with open-plan spaces and resources children can choose for themselves.

Ofsted rated the nursery Good at its 2 March 2022 inspection. The strongest practical attractions today are its outdoor provision, a key person for each child and attendance options spanning full days, mornings and afternoons.

Learning and Activities

The early years foundation stage provides the framework for children's learning, development and care: play, conversation and practical experiences help children build skills. Cornerstone's open-plan playrooms make space for sensory exploration, pretend play, early number work and creative expression. Children can reach resources themselves, giving them a part in choosing what to investigate.

Quiet, comfortable areas provide a different pace for books and rest. Preschool rooms introduce a more school-like setting as children prepare to move on, while the indoor hall adds space for dance, yoga, storytelling and music with movement. Its interactive whiteboard is another resource for shared activities. These are different ways to use the day, rather than a single room doing every job.

In March 2022, babies explored textured toys and paint, while toddlers chose pictures to accompany songs. Older toddlers handled lavender and bark, using scooping and pouring to explore quantities and share materials. Preschool children used a domestic role-play area to care for pretend babies. The examples show how familiar activities can combine physical skills, language and cooperation.

At that time, the nursery's curiosity approach involved natural and reused materials, including everyday household objects for imaginative exploration. This was an addition within the statutory framework, not a replacement for it. The useful detail is the material children handled: real objects offered different possibilities from purpose-made toys.

Outdoor and Community Life

The garden's fishing boat gives pretend play a substantial physical setting. Enclosed outdoor areas also support planting, gardening, water activities, nature exploration and mud kitchen cooking. Each of the seven playrooms has its own outdoor area, so outdoor provision is connected to the rooms as well as gathered in the larger garden.

An annual Summer Fete uses the garden, which also hosts farm visits. Family events during the year include Mother’s Day Afternoon Tea, Craft Mornings and Christmas Performances. These create occasions for families to take part in nursery life beyond routine conversations about their own child; farm visits add encounters with animals to the outdoor offer.

In March 2022, outdoor play included bikes, scooters, trikes and sit-on cars, with children putting on helmets before riding. A group game also brought early mathematics into active play.

Relationships and Communication

Every child has a key person responsible for understanding their interests, needs and abilities. That gives families an identified practitioner around whom conversations about their child can be organised, while helping activities respond to individual development. Quiet reading and resting areas offer a place to pause during a busy day.

Settling includes up to three pre-visits before the official start date. These give children opportunities to become familiar with the setting before their normal attendance begins.

In March 2022, parents contributed to online learning journals and received home-learning resources, including help with potty training. Each child also had a focus week every term, during which parents shared interests from home and staff considered what the child could do. This linked assessment with family knowledge, rather than treating nursery and home as separate accounts of development.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

At the March 2022 inspection, Ofsted found safeguarding effective, with staff able to recognise welfare concerns and explain their response, alongside close supervision indoors and outside. That is a dated judgement. It should be read with its date, rather than as a fresh assessment of current practice.

In March 2022, everyday independence included learning to use cups and cutlery and working towards toilet use. Books and songs supported communication across the rooms. There were also two clear improvement points: staff requests sometimes interrupted group learning, and dummy use beyond times of comfort needed closer attention because of its potential effect on emerging language.

Sessions and Attendance

The nursery is at Priestley Road, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG24 9PU. Opening hours are 7.30am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, throughout the year except bank holidays. The opening window and the booked day are separate: families can choose a full day running either 7.30am to 5.30pm or 8am to 6pm.

Morning sessions run from 8am to 1pm, and afternoons from 1pm to 6pm. Full-time, full-week attendance is also offered. Sessions can be extended for an additional charge, subject to availability. The two full-day windows therefore give different start and finish combinations, while mornings and afternoons offer genuinely shorter attendance patterns.

Enquiries can be made by telephone on 01256 818118 or by email to cornerstone.enquiries@gmail.com. The visit enquiry form includes a choice of the Priestley Road nursery and is followed by contact from the team to arrange a date and time.

Funding and Paid Extras

Funded childcare is offered alongside privately paid attendance. The funding arrangements include 15 hours for children from the term after their third birthday, with a further 15 hours for eligible working families; eligible working families with children aged nine months or older may also receive 15 hours from the following term. Funding can be used in term time or stretched across the year, with the stretched arrangement described as 11 hours weekly for 51 weeks.

A privately paid full day includes lunch, afternoon tea and a morning snack, with breakfast included before 8.45am; meals during funded sessions are charged separately. For funded-hours-only attendance, a consumables charge covers snacks and extra activities, but it does not apply to children under three or when sessions are topped up by five hours or more each week.

A registration charge applies and includes a nursery jumper, polo shirt and up to three settling visits. A refundable deposit equivalent to two weeks' fees is required when the place is confirmed; it is deducted from the final invoice when a month's written notice has been given and the account is up to date. Current prices come in the nursery's written quotation, with the charge structure set out on its fees page.

• Scale and room experience. Capacity is 150 children across the setting, with seven playrooms. During a visit, ask how your child's room is organised and how its own outdoor area is used alongside the larger garden.
• Group learning and comfort. In March 2022, interruptions to group activities and dummy use beyond comfort were improvement points. Ask how group time is protected and how children are helped to settle while developing communication.
• The funded attendance mix. Funded meals are charged separately, while the snacks-and-activities charge is exempt for children under three or those topping up by at least five hours weekly. A written quotation for the intended pattern will make the different categories clear.

Cornerstone suits families who want substantial outdoor space and a choice between full-day care and morning or afternoon sessions. The fishing boat, garden and indoor hall give children several settings for active and imaginative play, while key-person care and settling visits provide a more individual thread through a large nursery.

The Good judgement from March 2022 is useful context, with concrete learning examples and clear improvement points beneath it. The decision rests on whether the scale, room organisation and attendance pattern suit the child, and whether the funded and private charge structure fits the family's plans.