The Secret Garden Pre-School, Attenborough

Weekly Forest School at Attenborough Nature Reserve gives this pre-school a clear outdoor identity. During term time, children’s learning extends beyond the Butterfly Room into activities with mud, wildlife and the natural environment. Spanish games and songs add another strand to the pre-school day. These are concrete reasons to consider it for a child who enjoys exploring and learning through play.

The Secret Garden Pre-School, Attenborough has capacity for 30 children aged two and a half to five at The Strand, Nottingham, NG9 6AU. Ofsted rated it Good at its July 2021 inspection. That is a dated judgement, rather than a description of a recent visit.

Rooms and Ages

Butterfly Room is the separate pre-school opposite the cricket club entrance, accommodating up to 30 children and emphasising imaginative play alongside physical and emotional development. Its separate premises matter when choosing between the pre-school and the younger children’s nursery: this review concerns the older age group, rather than the baby and toddler rooms elsewhere.

The Early Years Foundation Stage provides the basis for learning through play here. In practical terms, children use their ideas and imagination while developing physical skills and learning about emotions. Spanish activities, including songs and games, sit alongside that framework rather than replacing it. They give children another way to explore communication during familiar play activities.

The areas of learning include communication and language, literacy, mathematics, understanding the world and expressive arts and design, alongside physical, personal, social and emotional development. This gives parents a broader picture of what learning through play is intended to cover: language and early mathematical understanding sit alongside relationships, movement and creative expression. The emphasis is on children discovering the world around them, the people they interact with and themselves. For families, the useful connection is between these areas and the concrete experiences already described: imaginative play in Butterfly Room, Spanish songs and exploration of the natural environment.

Outdoor and Community Life

Forest School means hands-on exploration of the natural environment. Pre-school children attend weekly during term time at Attenborough Nature Reserve, making outdoor learning a recurring part of their attendance rather than an occasional special outing. The term-time frequency is useful for parents weighing the outdoor offer against their child’s likely attendance pattern.

Activities are organised around termly themes. Mud painting, a mud kitchen and a mud slide provide different ways to investigate materials and movement; making wildlife feeders connects an activity with the animals sharing the surroundings. There is room for energetic exploration as well as making things. These practical examples explain the outdoor emphasis more clearly than a general promise of time outside.

Nature trails also take children through the village and the nearby reserve. Together with the Spanish activities, this gives the pre-school two recognisable strands: exploring its immediate surroundings and encountering another language through games and songs. Neither needs to be presented as an academic lesson to have a place in a young child’s day.

Play in Butterfly Room includes emotional development as well as physical activity. That gives care and learning a shared purpose: children’s feelings and developing physical abilities are part of the same daily experience, rather than separate subjects.

The educational approach recognises that children develop at different rates and places importance on relationships between practitioners, children and parents. Its principles also include responding to individual needs, including those of children with special educational needs and disabilities. These are the stated foundations for planning children’s experiences; they should not be read as an inspection judgement about the effectiveness of individual support.

Sessions and Attendance

The pre-school address is The Strand, Nottingham, NG9 6AU. The separate Butterfly Room is opposite the cricket club entrance, distinct from the younger children’s nursery site.

The opening window runs from 8am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, with a 7.30am start possible by request and charged separately. It closes on Bank Holidays and for a week over Christmas and New Year. The distinction between the usual start and the requested earlier start matters for families whose working day begins early.

Funding and Paid Extras

The pre-school offers funded sessions for three- and four-year-olds, up to 15 hours each week. Meals for funded sessions attract a separate charge, so funded childcare and the food bill need to be considered separately when comparing costs. A written quotation provides the current prices for the intended arrangement.

Enquiries can be made by telephone on 0115 922 5723 or by email to enquiries@attenboroughdn.co.uk. Visits are arranged by contacting the nursery first.

• Outdoor attendance. Forest School takes place weekly during term time. At a visit, ask how the trip fits the days your child would attend and what clothing they need for the mud-based activities.
• Starting early. The 7.30am start requires a request and an additional charge. Discuss the booking pattern you need, including how the earlier start would fit it.
• The complete funded bill. Funded sessions carry a separate meal charge. Ask for a written quotation covering your proposed attendance, meals and non-food consumables together.

This pre-school suits families seeking an outdoor emphasis for children aged two and a half to five, with weekly term-time Forest School and Spanish games and songs giving the day identifiable content. The separate Butterfly Room is also a useful distinction for parents choosing provision specifically for preschool children. Its strongest practical appeal is the connection between play indoors and exploration at the nearby nature reserve. The Good judgement dates from July 2021; the requested early start and separate funded-session meal charge are practical considerations for families.