Little Acorns Pre School

Northridge Park provides the backdrop to Little Acorns Pre School, whose self-contained building combines a colourful playroom with its own outdoor play space. This is a preschool with a practical emphasis on communication: families can contribute to an online learning journal, while children needing extra help have access to daily concentration and turn-taking activities.

Ofsted rated Little Acorns Good at its inspection on 12 July 2021. That is a dated judgement. The current offer includes term-time sessions with several collection times, rather than a single attendance pattern.

Little Acorns welcomes children from age two until they reach school age and has 25 places in total. Its session arrangements cater for up to 24 children at a time; that session limit is separate from whole-setting capacity. For parents, the appeal lies in the combination of a preschool setting, outdoor space and several ways to stay involved in their child's development.

Learning and Activities

The Early Years Foundation Stage framework guides children's learning and staff planning here. Communication, concentration and taking turns are part of the day, supported by visual timetables and daily bucket time activities; staff use observations of development to plan subsequent learning. The practical point is that activities can respond to the child, including advice from professionals supporting an individual need.

Daily Attention Autism bucket time sessions practise concentration and taking turns. Alongside these, visual timetables use photographs and symbols to support children with speech and language delay or English as a second language. Sensory resources provide another means of adapting activities. These are concrete mechanisms for participation, rather than a general promise that every child will learn in the same way.

Tapestry, the online journal, records learning through photographs, videos and observations. Parents can see activities and progress, then add milestones or experiences from home. This gives staff and families a shared picture of the child across both settings, rather than limiting communication to what happens during a preschool session.

Outdoor and Community Life

The building overlooks Northridge Park and includes a kitchen, toilets and an outdoor play area. Outdoors, cushioned flooring serves the climbing frame and slides, while a separate playground surface accommodates running, ball games and outdoor cars. The different surfaces make room for different kinds of movement.

Walks, picnics and outdoor games are subject to risk assessments, with individual children's needs discussed beforehand. Parents may join as helpers if they wish. That arrangement gives families a way to participate when their child needs additional reassurance about an outing.

Relationships and Communication

A key person is involved from the beginning. Before attendance starts, a Play and Stay session introduces the child to that adult through play; taster sessions can also be arranged where needed. Information about preferences and healthcare needs helps staff prepare for the individual child.

Communication continues through daily feedback, regular parent consultations and open afternoons each half term. Stay and play events provide another opportunity to discuss friendships, favourite activities and development. Tapestry adds a record families can revisit between those conversations.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

For a child whose needs are identified before joining, SENCO co-ordinators discuss equipment, staff training and the organisation of the setting with the family. Key persons and co-ordinators then monitor development together. Support can involve speech and language therapists, health visitors, educational psychologists and other professionals, with parental consent obtained before referrals to outside agencies.

Physical access has useful specifics: the building has no stairs, an accessible toilet and a dipped kerb. Equipment can be moved to accommodate a child's needs, and staff will seek to borrow specialist equipment needed for an individual child. Changing facilities, potties and toilet steps also support children still developing independence with toileting.

Healthcare plans and a signed medication consent book form part of arrangements for prescribed medicine. Staff undertake training for specific medical needs. Designated safeguarding roles and paediatric first-aid certificates are also part of the staffing arrangements.

School transition is supported through teacher visits to the preschool, with the child's key worker present while they meet and play together. For children attending another setting or a childminder, journals can be shared termly. The emphasis is continuity: familiar adults and information accompany the next step.

Sessions and Attendance

Little Acorns operates Monday to Friday during term time. Sessions beginning at 9am have collection options at noon, 1pm, 2pm or 3pm. The booking choices also include an afternoon session from noon to 2pm, a lunch club from noon to 1pm and an extra hour between 2pm and 3pm. This gives families both shorter attendance and a longer preschool day.

The usual intake points are September and January, with an Easter intake sometimes considered. An online form adds children to the waiting list, and places released during a term are allocated to the next child on that list. Neither a place nor particular days or sessions are guaranteed.

Half-term breaks and the Christmas and Easter holidays are closures in the term calendar, alongside staff training days. Families arranging work around attendance need to account for those interruptions to the weekly pattern.

Getting There

The setting is based at Warners End Community Centre, Northridge Way, Hemel Hempstead, HP1 3QG. Enquiries can be made by telephone on 01442 266732 or by email to wenalittleacorns@hotmail.co.uk.

Funding and Paid Extras

Little Acorns offers 15 hour funded places and 30 hour funded places, with the latter for eligible working families. Its term-time operation determines the attendance calendar. Additional private hours or sessions can be purchased alongside funded hours, giving families a way to extend attendance beyond their entitlement.

There is no administration charge or other fee beyond the session charges. An occasional voluntary contribution may be requested towards a Christmas party. Current session prices come in the nursery's written quotation; the fees and funding page sets out the booking options and funding arrangements.

• The session ceiling. Attendance is capped at 24 children per session. At a visit, discuss how activities and adult support are organised when the session reaches that size.
• Term-time childcare. Half terms and school holiday periods interrupt attendance. This pattern needs to fit the family's arrangements beyond the preschool term.
• Specific days are not guaranteed. The waiting-list system allocates places as they arise. Establish the agreed attendance pattern before organising commitments around it.

Little Acorns suits families seeking morning sessions, afternoon attendance or a longer term-time preschool day. Its strongest practical features are the shared Tapestry journal, daily Attention Autism activities and a settling process built around the key person. The accessible building and adaptable resources give substance to its support arrangements. Balance those benefits against holiday closures and the need to agree particular days through the waiting-list process.