Rubery Day Nursery

A garden reached directly from every room gives Rubery Day Nursery a clear character: outdoor play is part of the everyday layout, rather than a separate destination. Covered areas sit between the rooms and the garden, while babies have their own outdoor space with soft flooring. For families who value time outside, those physical arrangements matter more than a general promise of outdoor learning.

At its November 2023 inspection, Ofsted rated the nursery Good and found safeguarding effective. The current age range runs from birth to 60 months. Four named rooms organise the progression from baby care towards greater independence, with movement between the younger rooms described through children's development rather than birthdays.

Based in Rubery, Rednal, the nursery combines individual baby routines, child-led choices and planned activities. Its strongest practical thread is continuity: diaries begin in the younger rooms, each child has a key person, and room changes include introductions between the adults responsible for their care.

Rooms and Ages

Hedgehog Room centres on individual baby care, keeping routines close to those followed at home and providing a separate outdoor area with soft flooring. This makes the youngest children's day different from the more independent choices expected later. Familiar routines remain part of the arrangement.

Squirrel Room takes children who are secure on their feet and ready for fresh challenges, continuing the daily diary as they develop new skills. Badger Room suits confident toddlers, using imaginative role play and language to build towards the next room. Wise Owls Room emphasises independence through self-registration, everyday decisions and consideration for other children and adults, with supervised indoor and outdoor spaces prepared each day.

These descriptions give parents useful developmental markers. Walking confidence, readiness for challenge and increasingly independent decisions form the route through the rooms; the emphasis changes as children become more capable of managing parts of their day.

Learning and Activities

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) brings together communication, physical development, relationships and learning through play, alongside early literacy, mathematics, creativity and understanding the world. Here, children choose toys and activities, while adults also introduce activities each day. The combination gives children a say in their play and provides occasions for staff to introduce something new.

Planning is displayed in the rooms, where parents can contribute. Each child also has a Learning Journey, a folder recording activities that parents can look through. Those two arrangements give families different ways to understand the day: one shows the plans, while the other records their child's experiences.

Dance and language activities add to the everyday programme. Regular walks and outings explore the surrounding area, extending children's experiences beyond the nursery garden. These are additions to the EYFS, rather than a replacement framework.

In November 2023, younger children joined dinosaur trains and built wooden routes, with adults naming colours during play; older children explored how different instruments produced sounds. These examples show learning embedded in something children wanted to do. They also give a concrete picture of the activities behind the curriculum description.

Outdoor and Community Life

The garden includes a grassy area for games and equipment, a vegetable patch and covered play space outside each room. Direct garden access gives the indoor and outdoor parts of the day a practical connection, while growing vegetables introduces children to where food comes from.

In November 2023, outdoor play included a mud kitchen, wheeled vehicles and making letter shapes with mud on fences. Children practised steering around obstacles and explored marks through physical play. The outdoor space supported several kinds of activity, rather than serving only as somewhere to run around.

Relationships and Communication

Settling starts with an induction attended by the child and parent together. Parents complete information with the key person while their child plays nearby, and a parents room provides somewhere to sit during the settling period. Up to two weeks of settling sessions are free, with at least two sessions required. That creates time for the child to become familiar with the room before the new routine takes over.

Each child has a key person responsible for observing development and planning activities. Babies' daily diaries can receive contributions from both staff and parents, and the diary continues in Squirrel Room. This gives families a written exchange alongside face-to-face conversation, especially useful when routines need to carry between home and nursery.

At its November 2023 inspection, Ofsted found that staff needed further development in extending learning when children's interest faded, and that key persons needed a fuller understanding of children's development to tailor their next learning steps. These were specific limits beneath the Good judgement. The issue was how well staff turned knowledge of a child into the next useful challenge.

Termly working in partnership meetings accompany development summaries. During a room change, the existing key person introduces the next key person and room staff, and parents are offered a tour of the new room. That gives transitions a recognisable process, rather than leaving families to piece together a different routine themselves.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

Hedgehog Room works with parents to understand each baby and follow their routines as closely as possible. Parents supply milk, nappies, wipes and creams, so familiar care items remain part of the baby's day.

Food is cooked on site with dietary needs accommodated, and children eat together in a dining area with staff at the tables. Lunch attracts a separate daily charge, so it needs to be included when families compare their overall childcare costs.

In November 2023, everyday independence included trying shoes and coats, serving food and beginning to manage toileting. Staff also talked children through how their actions affected others. These ordinary routines gave children opportunities to practise self-care and consideration throughout the day.

Sessions and Attendance

Opening hours are 7.30am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, across 51 weeks of the year. The nursery closes at Christmas and on bank holidays. The weekday opening window provides an early start and an evening finish, while those closures still need a place in a family's childcare calendar.

Settling attendance has its own minimum: parents attend at least two settling sessions. This is a settling requirement, rather than a minimum ongoing childcare booking. Families can make an enquiry by telephone, email or the contact form.

Getting There

The address is 1 Round Saw Croft, Rubery, Rednal, Birmingham B45 9TT. Telephone enquiries can be made during opening hours on 0121 453 3368, and email enquiries go to info@ruberydaynursery.co.uk.

Funding and Paid Extras

Early Years Free Entitlement For All 3 and 4 Year Olds, also called Nursery Education Grant Funding, is offered from the term after a child's third birthday. The entitlement provides 15 hours each week across at least 38 weeks, and the nursery handles the claim for families.

Private childcare is invoiced at the start of the month, with payment due in advance and a choice of weekly or monthly payment. The nursery explains childcare charges at induction or when families need that information. A non-refundable deposit books a place, and ordinary fees apply on bank holidays despite the nursery being closed.

Lunch is charged separately. In the baby room, families provide milk and the non-food care items: nappies, wipes and creams. These arrangements should sit alongside childcare hours when parents work out the practical demands and overall cost of attendance.

• Individual learning. November 2023 findings called for stronger knowledge of children's development within the key-person role. During a visit, ask how observations now lead to a specific next step for your child.
• Keeping play moving. In November 2023, staff needed to become more skilled at developing learning once interest in an activity dropped. Ask for an example of how practitioners adapt an activity when a child starts to disengage.
• Settling time. At least two settling sessions are required, with up to two weeks offered free and a parents room available. Allow time to take part, rather than treating settling as something that happens around a normal working day.
• Funding and the weekly bill. Lunch is an extra charge, baby care supplies come from home, and bank holidays attract normal fees. Which attendance pattern and additional charges would apply to your child's funded hours?

Rubery Day Nursery suits families who want outdoor access built into the room layout, baby care organised around familiar routines, and a clear process for settling and moving rooms. Its garden, developmental room progression and regular parent meetings give that offer substance.

The Good judgement is balanced by two useful cautions: extending children's learning and making key-person knowledge more precise. Those are the areas to explore alongside the practical appeal of early opening, an evening finish and childcare through most of the year.