Cheadle Pre-School & Day Nursery

A separate cot room for babies, a garden with a mud kitchen, and a sensory room give Cheadle Pre-School & Day Nursery a clear physical character. This is a setting with 41 places in total, taking children aged 6 to 60 months, where quiet spaces sit alongside opportunities for movement and exploration. The distinction matters: sleep, energetic play and sensory experiences each have somewhere to happen.

At its June 2026 inspection, Ofsted judged achievement, behaviour and routines, welfare, inclusion and leadership to be at Strong standard, with safeguarding standards met, while curriculum and teaching reached Expected standard. That is a positive profile with a specific qualification. The curriculum was still being established, and the next step was to make teaching consistently meet leaders' expectations.

Full days and half days are offered, alongside full-time and term-time funded attendance. For parents, the appeal rests on the combination of separate developmental rooms, practical independence and activities delivered by visiting agencies. The teaching consistency identified in June 2026 deserves equal weight alongside those attractions.

Rooms and Ages

Baby Room combines a home corner, space for physical exploration and investigative play with a separate cot room, allowing rest to take place away from the room's other activities.

Toddlers Room emphasises communication, imagination and movement, with independence practised through helping at mealtimes and starting to dress themselves.

Preschool combines activities guided by adults with play chosen by children, within a planned routine that includes preparation for primary school.

Learning and Activities

The EYFS framework shapes learning and care: here, children learn through play as well as activities led by adults, with their interests helping to shape what happens next. Weekly topics are built around those interests.

Gardening, Rhythm and Rhyme, Footy-Totz and Baby Ballet are additional activities included in the daily price for paid attendance; outside agencies deliver activity classes. They add organised sessions alongside the room-based day. For funded-hours-only attendance, extra activities fall within the separately charged package, with an option to decline extras and their charges.

In June 2026, stories and rhymes were used throughout the setting to encourage communication. Babies exchanged sounds with their key persons, while older children held longer conversations with adults and one another. The progression is concrete: communication starts with responding to a baby's attempts to engage and develops towards sustained exchanges.

Assessment also informed individual next steps in June 2026. Activities took account of both children's development and their interests, and staff adjusted teaching around those next steps. The remaining task was to establish the curriculum more consistently across teaching. Parents should weigh the thoughtful planning alongside that unfinished work.

Outdoor and Community Life

The garden has trees around it, a sand tray and a mud kitchen, giving children physical materials to explore as well as space for movement. These are useful complements to indoor play: digging, handling sand and using the mud kitchen offer different experiences from stories or room-based activities. A sensory room adds lights, sounds, colours and textures, providing another way for children to investigate their surroundings.

Regular community outings extend the day beyond the nursery. In June 2026, children also visited a local care home for shared arts and crafts.

Relationships and Communication

Settling starts with the routine a child already knows. Staff take their lead from the family's existing pattern when a child begins, and practitioners are allocated key children so they can build individual relationships. For a baby or toddler, this connects the new setting with familiar habits and gives families a particular practitioner relationship around which to build communication.

In June 2026, staff responded to unsettled babies with comfort and toys to draw them back into play. Children were also encouraged to talk about feelings, with adults modelling considerate behaviour. These examples show what emotional support looked like in practice: immediate comfort for younger children and language for understanding feelings as children grew.

Communication with families was regular in June 2026, and staff worked with parents around attendance and routines. That links home and nursery around the child's day, including difficulties that might interrupt attendance. Parents were involved in learning and development rather than receiving information only after decisions had been made.

Inclusion and Wellbeing

At the June 2026 inspection, Ofsted found that children with SEND received effective targeted support, with plans reviewed alongside families and external agencies, and made sustained progress. The practical mechanisms matter as much as the judgement. A plan that is revisited with parents provides a way to adjust support as a child's needs change.

In June 2026, communication prompts supported children learning English as an additional language, and room layouts were adapted for a child with a physical disability. Handmade books explored children's cultures. These examples describe different responses to different needs, rather than treating inclusion as one standard activity for everyone.

All staff have undertaken paediatric first aid training. The in-house chef prepares breakfast, lunch with two courses, and a light afternoon tea, catering for dietary requirements. For funded-hours-only attendance, meals and snacks are part of the separately charged extras package, so the food arrangements and the payment arrangements need to be considered together.

Preparation for primary school is part of Preschool's work. In June 2026, staff also encouraged personal care, including using tissues and washing hands afterwards. Such small routines give school preparation an everyday dimension alongside communication and learning activities.

Sessions and Attendance

The nursery is at City Care, Riversdale House, 18 Gatley Road, Cheadle, SK8 1PY, next to Cheadle Village. It opens Monday to Friday, from 8am until 6pm, across the year, with bank holidays excluded. The weekday pattern is straightforward for families arranging regular care around work.

A Full Day runs from 8am to 6pm. Half Day attendance has two alternatives: 8am to 1pm or 1pm to 6pm.

Full-time and term-time funded places are also offered. Enquiries can be made through the contact form or by telephone on 0161 711 0930.

Funding and Paid Extras

The nursery offers 30 funded hours for children aged three and four, and 15 funded hours for eligible two-year-olds. Private paid attendance is also offered. Current prices come in the nursery's written quotation, allowing families to consider their chosen sessions and funded hours together.

For families using funded hours only, a separate daily extras charge covers food, including snacks and dessert, and non-food supplies such as sun cream, wipes and nappies. Activities and additional resources also sit within that package. The charge therefore covers more than meals alone; its scope matters when comparing the cost of different attendance arrangements.

Families may opt out of extras and the associated charges, with alternative arrangements discussed with the manager. Paid daily attendance includes the additional activities described above. Keeping these arrangements separate helps parents distinguish the funded learning and care from the extras they choose to use.

• Teaching consistency. In June 2026, the curriculum was still being embedded, and leaders needed to help staff deliver teaching consistently at the intended level. At a visit, ask how that work now shapes activities and individual next steps in each room.
• Funded extras. Funded-hours-only attendance carries a separate extras charge, with an opt-out option. Ask for a written breakdown for your chosen pattern and discuss the alternative arrangements if you want funded hours without extras.
• Baby Room and settling. The separate cot room and use of a child's existing routine are useful practical features. At a visit, discuss how your baby's sleep pattern would fit the day and how the key-person relationship would begin.

Cheadle Pre-School & Day Nursery suits families considering full-day or morning and afternoon half-day care, including those seeking term-time funded attendance. Its strongest practical details are easy to picture: babies have a separate cot room, toddlers practise independence through daily tasks, and the garden and sensory room broaden the spaces children use.

The June 2026 assessment gives families substantial positives alongside a clear development point. Relationships, inclusion and children's progress carried strong judgements; teaching consistency remained the task to address. The funded extras arrangement also deserves close attention when deciding whether the nursery fits both a child's day and the family's budget.