High Legh Pre-school Nursery

A converted cottage, a separate garden for babies and outings to High Legh Garden Centre give High Legh Pre-school Nursery a clear rural character. Rosemead provides the indoor base; gardens, covered outdoor space and links with nearby farms extend the day beyond it. This is a setting where the physical surroundings help shape what children do.

Ofsted rated the nursery Good at its inspection on 25 February 2022. It now caters for children aged six months to five years and has capacity for 26 children in total. Full days, half days and school hours sessions give families different attendance patterns to consider.

A parent-led committee runs the nursery as a registered charity. For parents choosing between settings, the strongest practical distinction is the combination of a dedicated Baby Room and substantial outdoor provision, rather than a named teaching brand.

Rooms and Ages

The Baby Room serves children under two, with sensory activities, opportunities to investigate and its own outdoor area. That separate garden gives the youngest children space to explore outside as well as indoors.

Toddlers and preschool children share a separate room. Within the converted cottage, children can move through a free-flow indoor area, allowing them to explore rather than keeping every activity in one fixed place. Families considering the nursery for siblings will therefore be choosing a setting with separate provision for babies and a shared room for the older age groups.

Learning and Activities

The early years foundation stage is the required framework for children's learning, development and care. Here, play and exploration provide concrete ways to practise language, movement, early mathematics and social skills. Sensory activities for babies sit alongside gardening, outdoor equipment and outings for the wider nursery.

In February 2022, children investigated how toy cars moved along pieces of piping, changing the slope and testing their ideas. Other activities involved comparing sizes and shapes, making collage pictures and looking closely at worms with magnifying glasses. These examples show the different kinds of thinking involved: making something, observing it and working out what happens next.

Story time also supported conversation in February 2022. Younger children selected books and discussed the illustrations, while older children responded to questions that required more than a short answer. There was a clear weakness alongside this activity: staff did not consistently pronounce letter sounds accurately when helping children with familiar letters. That matters when children begin connecting spoken sounds with written letters.

Outdoor and Community Life

A mud kitchen and water tables support hands-on play, while tree stump stepping stones and tyre walls add opportunities for movement and balance. Shelters and a covered activity area make outdoor play possible in wet weather. The grounds offer more than space to run: children can build dens, garden and investigate insects.

Mini Adventures is the nursery's outings provision, taking children beyond Rosemead to places including nearby farms, parks and High Legh Garden Centre. The Spotty Bus is part of these trips. Regular farm outings connect the nursery's rural surroundings with experiences beyond its own garden, although the trips should not be read as a weekly timetable.

Visitors have included the fire service and a farmer bringing a lamb. In February 2022, outdoor activity included vegetable growing and energetic play in different weather conditions. Together, the current facilities and these dated examples give parents a concrete picture of the nursery's outdoor emphasis.

A SENCO role sits within the staff structure, alongside leadership roles for the baby and toddler provision. Leadership includes degree-level expertise in early years, giving families a clear point of reference for discussing development and additional needs. The existence of these roles is useful information; it does not establish how an individual child's support will work.

At the February 2022 inspection, Ofsted found safeguarding effective and described positive support for children's emotional development, while identifying a need for more consistent behaviour guidance in the baby room. Younger children's potentially unsafe play was not always recognised or followed by clear reminders. This was a specific practice concern, despite the effective safeguarding judgement.

During February 2022, children talked about their feelings and considered how to help a friend who was upset. Staff also shared learning activities and behaviour strategies with parents for use at home. That gave communication a practical purpose: parents could continue an activity or use a familiar response beyond the nursery day.

A further February 2022 improvement point concerned opportunities for staff to exchange effective practice. The issue was about learning from colleagues, rather than simply having access to training, and belongs alongside the concerns about behaviour guidance and letter sounds when weighing the inspection.

The nursery employs a chef, and meal provision can cover breakfast, dinner and tea as required, using fresh produce daily. Its dietary policy covers allergies and individual dietary needs.

Sessions and Attendance

Opening hours are 8am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, across 51 weeks of the year. Full days, half days and school hours sessions are offered, alongside an extended nursery day running from 8am to 6pm. These are different choices: the opening window should not be treated as the length of every booking.

The nursery closes for bank holidays and Christmas. Enquiries can be made through the contact form or by telephone on 01925 756061, and visits can be arranged through the same contact route.

Getting There

The address is Rosemead, Pheasant Walk, High Legh, Knutsford, WA16 6LN. High Legh lies between Lymm and Knutsford, with the nursery based in a converted cottage within the village.

Funding and Paid Extras

The nursery offers 15 and 30 hours funded childcare for eligible families, with its age-specific description covering two-, three- and four-year-olds. Eligibility remains a condition of the funded offer; it is not an entitlement for every child attending.

Families should obtain current prices in a written quotation covering their chosen attendance pattern. The fees and sessions page identifies full days, half days and school hours sessions, so the quotation needs to relate to the pattern being purchased.

• Baby-room behaviour guidance. In February 2022, younger children's unsafe play did not consistently prompt recognition and clear guidance. During a visit, ask how staff now respond to these situations in the Baby Room.
• Early literacy and staff learning. The February 2022 improvement points included accurate letter sounds and sharing effective practice between colleagues. These are useful priorities against which to assess current teaching routines.
• Funded attendance and the total bill. Both 15 and 30 hours funded childcare are offered. Ask how those hours fit the proposed booking, and whether meals and non-food consumables are included, charged separately or supplied from home.

High Legh Pre-school Nursery suits families seeking a cottage setting with substantial outdoor play, separate baby provision and experiences connected to the surrounding village and farms. Its full-day, half-day and school hours options also make it relevant to families comparing different lengths of attendance.

The February 2022 Good judgement provides a dated quality reference, with practical strengths in outdoor activity and parent communication. The behaviour, literacy and staff-learning improvement points deserve equal weight. The best fit is a family that values the gardens and outings and uses a visit to examine how those teaching concerns have been addressed.