Kirkgate Childcare

An allotment, open-ended art and relationships that begin with a home visit give Kirkgate Childcare its character. Behind The Old School in Sherburn in Elmet, this nursery combines practical exploration with close attention to how children feel. At its 31 July 2025 inspection, Ofsted rated it Outstanding and found safeguarding effective. The detail behind that judgement matters: children were learning through conversation, real responsibilities and contact with their community.

Kirkgate accepts children from 22 months to five years and has 22 places in total. That capacity describes the whole nursery, rather than the number attending a particular group. Its current approach includes a key person for each child, visits to the family home before starting, and settling visits shaped around the child. Full days, half days and shorter sessions give families several attendance patterns to work with.

Learning and Activities

The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) provides the framework for learning and care: children develop language, physical skills and social understanding through play, alongside early mathematics, literacy and creative exploration. Kirkgate gives personal, social and emotional development particular attention within that framework. Staff help children recognise feelings and find ways to manage them, making emotional understanding part of the day rather than a separate lesson.

Creation station puts the experience of making something ahead of the finished object. Children explore materials, ask questions and decide how to use them. For a parent who values experimentation over matching craft products, that is a useful distinction. Developmental Movement Play adds opportunities for children to move their bodies in different ways, giving physical exploration its own place alongside creative play.

In July 2025, language teaching extended into ordinary routines. Staff introduced vocabulary while children made butterfly pictures, explained position through conversations about where friends were sitting, and used signing to support understanding. Mathematics was similarly practical: children measured their constructions with a ruler and counted minibeast legs. These examples show how an activity can carry several kinds of learning while remaining recognisable as play.

Outdoor and Community Life

The nursery garden is part of the outdoor offer, with regular walks to the allotment, library and nursing home extending children's experiences beyond it. An account of an allotment visit describes children tending their vegetables by watering and removing stones. The practical work gives growing food a meaning that a picture or explanation alone cannot provide.

In July 2025, outdoor activities included growing herbs and tomatoes, searching for small creatures and using nets in water play to separate plastic from toy sea animals. Play equipment gave children opportunities to practise balance and climbing. Environmental ideas were attached to something children could actually do.

Community contact has a social purpose too. Parents can join outings to Hill Top Care Home for voices together sessions, which involve singing with residents, or help at the allotment. In July 2025, children also visited a care home to sing with people living with dementia, while library visits supported conversation and interest in books. The emphasis is on participating in local life, rather than simply leaving the nursery for a trip.

Relationships and Communication

Settling begins with a familiar adult. A child's key person and another practitioner visit the family home at a mutually suitable time, bringing a nursery play basket or using toys the child already knows. The visit gives parents time to explain family routines and their child's interests, while the practitioner begins getting to know the child in familiar surroundings.

Nursery visits follow. Parents stay with their child while they become accustomed to the setting and key person, and several visits may be needed before separation feels comfortable. This makes settling a process adjusted to the child, rather than a single introductory appointment.

The key person then supports everyday care and uses daily observations and assessments to identify strengths and areas needing further attention. For families, the practical value is continuity: the adult involved before the first day also has a role in understanding the child's development afterwards. Parent participation extends to community outings and allotment visits, giving families opportunities to share some of the experiences children talk about at home.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

A feelings box and tree help children identify emotions. During regular key-group time, a hello song gives children a way to communicate how they feel. Staff also model sharing and taking turns, acknowledge distress and help children work towards a solution. Those are concrete ways of supporting emotional development, rather than relying on reassurance alone.

Additional support has a defined route through the SENCO, with parental involvement, meetings, a support package and liaison with other professionals when needed. At the July 2025 inspection, Ofsted found that staff adapted their support to individual children, worked closely with professionals and provided effective help with communication and emotional development. These findings support the nursery's emphasis on relationships, while the current arrangements explain how a family can take part in planning support.

In July 2025, independence included learning to cut fruit safely and fetching more from the refrigerator. Children also chose stories and discussed their decisions. Small responsibilities like these connect preparation for the next stage of education with everyday actions children can practise for themselves.

Sessions and Attendance

Kirkgate opens Monday to Friday, from 7.30am to 5pm, for 46 weeks each year. A full day runs from 7.30am to 5pm. Half days run either from 7.30am to 12.30pm or from 12.30pm to 5pm; the application also includes shorter sessions from 8.30am to 12.30pm and from 12.30pm to 3.30pm. Ad hoc hours are another attendance option.

Term-time and stretched attendance arrangements sit alongside the different session lengths. The distinction matters for holiday planning: being open during a school holiday does not automatically mean term-time funding applies to that attendance. For 2026–27, the calendar includes a Christmas closure and a summer closure, as well as training days. Families paying privately for their usual attendance are not charged for training days.

Getting There

The address is Behind The Old School, Kirkgate, Sherburn in Elmet, North Yorkshire, LS25 6BL. Enquiries can be made through the contact form, by email or on 01977 689 119, and an online application lets parents select the sessions they require for each weekday.

Funding and Paid Extras

Funded childcare is offered for two-, three- and four-year-olds, with term-time and stretched arrangements. Funding is received for 38 weeks; attendance during open school holidays or unfunded weeks is charged to families using the term-time arrangement. For a stretched place, those periods do not change childcare costs. The distinction is worth understanding before comparing monthly bills.

Snacks are charged separately, with a monthly snack charge for children attending funded hours and the option for parents to supply their child's snack instead. The funded snack charge is collected by direct debit at the start of each month, excluding August.

Contributions towards activities and outings are requested as needed. These costs sit alongside attendance charges and snack arrangements, so families should use the nursery's current written quotation to understand their own package. School preparation also includes a parent resource encouraging families to build children's confidence for starting school.

• The settling process. Home visits and potentially several accompanied nursery visits are part of Kirkgate's approach. Use a showround, which can be requested through the application, to discuss how that sequence would work for your child and family timetable.
• Funding across holidays. Term-time funding covers 38 weeks, while stretched arrangements spread the provision differently. Match the proposed attendance pattern to the closure calendar and written quotation before deciding which arrangement suits your working year.
• Support beyond the SENCO's attendance days. The SENCO works Monday to Wednesday during term time. Families needing additional support may want to discuss how their child's support package is carried through other days and holiday attendance.

Kirkgate suits families seeking full days, half days or shorter morning and afternoon sessions, with an emphasis on emotional understanding, practical learning and community contact. Home visits and child-led settling are substantial parts of its appeal. So are Creation station and the allotment, which give children room to make decisions and explore.

The Outstanding judgement from July 2025 provides a strong inspection position. The practical decision is whether the session choice, annual closures and funding arrangement fit the family's routine as closely as the nursery's approach fits their child.