Watermead Day Nursery

A brook-side preschool, dedicated art rooms and woodland learning give Watermead Day Nursery a character built around making, exploring and spending time outdoors. Its Loughborough provision spans the nursery and the adjacent Brook Farm House Pre-School, with different spaces for babies and older children. There is plenty here for a child who likes to investigate.

Ofsted rated the nursery Good on 4 August 2025. Watermead has capacity for 110 children, with nursery care from birth to five years. The youngest children have separate spaces for sleep and changing, while preschool children can use art facilities, gardens and rooms overlooking the brook. These are practical differences between stages, rather than one room arrangement repeated throughout.

Morning and afternoon sessions sit alongside school wraparound and holiday care. For parents, the attraction is the combination of an exploratory nursery day and attendance options that extend into the school years.

Rooms and Ages

The main nursery building caters for children from birth to three years and occupies three levels. Its outdoor areas include an enclosed space for babies and the secret garden, where children can build, climb and play. Brook Farm House Pre-School provides the older children's setting next door, keeping preschool provision connected to Watermead while giving it its own spaces.

Storks and Ducklings share the ground-floor baby provision, where parent-led routines sit alongside a conservatory opening outdoors and separate rooms for sleeping and changing. The separation matters: rest and personal care have dedicated spaces rather than competing with the activity of the main room.

Robins combines sensory and pretend play with construction, a reading nook and the Badgers Set for art, messy play and dining, plus outdoor access to a busy board and growing area. Hedgehogs brings together cooking and creative work, a large LED sandpit, a water tray, imaginative play and a snug with cushions, beanbags and a sensory den. Both arrangements give children places to be busy and places to pause.

At preschool, Herons offers open-ended, topic-led play with direct outdoor access; Kingfishers looks towards the brook and opens onto a patio for observing wildlife; The lodge links garden activities with a heated indoor base, a covered entrance and its own toilet facilities. Each room offers a different relationship with the outdoors. That is a useful distinction for children who enjoy watching wildlife as much as those who want to build and move.

Learning and Activities

The early years foundation stage is the framework for children's learning, development and care: play and everyday routines provide opportunities to practise communication, physical skills and independence. Watermead adds a Reggio Emilia approach, using children's interests and hands-on discovery to shape their learning. Its Curiosity Approach accreditation also centres on discovering, exploring and doing. These approaches sit alongside the framework, giving a clearer sense of how activities are chosen.

Every Child is an Artist puts children's choices into creative work, with painting, drawing and sculpture among the media available. A silhouette project began with children choosing their poses and colours, then continued digitally. The value is in the process: children can decide how to represent themselves rather than reproduce a single adult-designed picture.

At Brook Farm House, Atelier One and Two provide spaces for ceramics, textiles, clay modelling and painting. Art therefore has both dedicated facilities and a child-led approach. Music takes another form through Kimble’s Music and Movement classes, which combine movement with exploring sounds through instruments and voices.

Sports Enrichment includes tennis, athletics, cricket and football, while obstacle courses use equipment such as tunnels, hoops and balance beams. Parachute games and throwing activities add group play and coordination practice. This gives physical activity several forms, from organised games to negotiating a course, rather than relying on outdoor running alone.

Outdoor and Community Life

Forest School is Watermead's hands-on outdoor learning provision, using its own facilities and the Outwoods for experiences such as den building, trails and exploring the natural world. Children help develop ideas and carry them out with staff support. Activities include sensory walks and cooking with foraged ingredients, including wild garlic.

The Edible Garden connects growing with eating. A greenhouse and raised beds give children somewhere to tend plants, watch them develop and sometimes cook what they harvest. At preschool, The Lodge Garden adds a herb garden, climbing wall and construction site; a heated cabin and the forest school retreat provide sheltered places to continue outdoor experiences.

Community involvement has also reached beyond the nursery grounds. In March 2025, children and staff joined local residents at Jubilee Park in Loughborough for a woodland tree-planting project promoted by Earthwatch Europe. This was a dated activity, rather than a promised recurring trip, but it gives a concrete example of children taking part in work that changes a shared local space.

Relationships and Communication

Each child has a key person, and settling sessions are free, with the number shaped around the child's needs. In the baby provision, routines follow parents' preferences. Together, these arrangements give families a named role to communicate with and a way to carry familiar care patterns into nursery life.

Famly gives parents access to information about development and daily activities, alongside online learning journals. Parent meetings take place termly, with additional meetings possible through the key person. Parents can also telephone during the day for an update. Communication therefore includes both ongoing digital information and opportunities for a conversation.

In August 2025, children practised everyday independence through serving food, taking off shoes, washing hands and putting coats away. Older children also helped prepare lunch tables. These are small tasks with a clear purpose: participation in the nursery's routines gives children repeated chances to do things for themselves.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

At the August 2025 inspection, Ofsted found safeguarding effective and SEND support very strong, including adapted equipment and individual help with making choices, while identifying weaker support for younger children's early language when staff sometimes played alongside them without enough conversation. The language point deserves attention alongside the positive findings: enjoyable activities still need adults to supply words, responses and exchanges.

The baby unit has separate sleeping and changing rooms, and children have their own bedding, washed weekly or when needed. Fingerprint-controlled entry and CCTV are access and security arrangements across the settings. These are concrete provisions; the safeguarding judgement belongs to the dated inspection above.

Meals are cooked on site using fresh ingredients, with vegetarian alternatives, while preschool children practise choosing portions and serving themselves. The allergy policy uses kitchen photographs, room information sheets and labelled food to communicate dietary needs; parents can bring expressed breast milk or formula for babies.

Sessions and Attendance

Watermead is at 2 Watermead Lane, Loughborough, Leicestershire LE11 3TN. It opens Monday to Friday from 7.45am to 6pm, with arrangements possible outside those hours. Morning and afternoon sessions are offered. Closures include bank holidays and a week at Christmas.

Changing a regular booking or cancelling a place requires one month's notice. Fees are paid monthly in advance and remain payable during sickness and holidays. These terms matter when comparing the childcare bill with the days a child actually attends. Current prices should come in the nursery's written quotation.

Breakfast and After School Club serves children attending Holywell Primary School, up to age eight, with staff escorting children to school and collecting them afterwards. Holiday Club offers full-day and half-day care during school holidays for children up to eight, with activities including woodland walks, dance, sports coaching, art and woodwork.

Getting There

Parents are encouraged to use the large nearby car park for the safety of families and local residents. Enquiries can be made by telephone on 01509 239205 or through the contact form.

Funding and Paid Extras

In August 2025, funded early education was offered from nine months upwards. Parents supply nappies and wipes suited to their child. Payment options include bank transfer, cash, cheque and Tax-Free Childcare.

• Younger children's language. Strengthening early language support was the improvement priority in August 2025. During a visit, ask how practitioners now build conversation into baby and toddler play.
• Two connected settings. Babies use the main nursery provision, while preschool children have Brook Farm House and its outdoor spaces. A show-round can help families understand the room their child would use and how movement between stages works.
• Booking and the written quotation. Morning and afternoon sessions are offered, but changing a regular pattern needs one month's notice and absences remain chargeable. Ask for a quotation showing the chosen hours, funded-hours arrangement, meals and any additional charges together.
• Food allergies. The allergy policy relies on information shared across rooms and the kitchen. Families affected by allergies should discuss current practice and their child's individual requirements before care begins.

Watermead suits families looking for morning or afternoon nursery attendance with substantial opportunities for art, physical activity and outdoor exploration. Its school wraparound and full-day or half-day holiday care may also interest families planning beyond preschool. Separate baby sleep facilities, the ateliers and the brook-side preschool spaces give the offer substance.

The Good judgement from August 2025 sits alongside a clear improvement priority for younger children's language. For parents drawn to child-led discovery, that makes adult interaction the key point to weigh alongside the facilities: the spaces invite exploration, and conversation needs to make the most of it.