Finkley East Anton Nursery and Pre-School

A role-play beach used to explore recycling, garden materials turned into imaginary vehicles, and farm outings gave Finkley East Anton a practical, outward-looking character in June 2023. Its base is Augusta Park Community Centre in Andover. The strongest thread in that dated picture is children learning through things they can handle, discuss and do together.

At its 2 June 2023 inspection, Ofsted rated the nursery Good and found safeguarding effective. The current age range is 4 to 60 months, with 51 places in total. Opening hours are 7.30am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, across the year, with closures for bank holidays and a week at Christmas.

Learning and Activities

The early years foundation stage sets the requirements for children's learning, development and care: in everyday terms, play and interaction give children opportunities to practise communication, movement and independence. In June 2023, activities brought those elements together. Children chose resources for themselves and used objects gathered from the garden to imagine a car or aeroplane. That gave ordinary materials a purpose in their play.

Language work had several forms in June 2023. Small groups created opportunities for conversation; songs and movement encouraged participation; story reading drew attention to important words. Staff also used signing and visual prompts during play. These different routes into communication matter for children who cannot yet express everything they want to say. There was a clear limitation, however: younger children sometimes needed longer to think before an adult moved the conversation forward.

Outdoor and Community Life

In June 2023, environmental learning included sorting discarded items at a pretend beach and talking about recycling. Walks reached local parks and a nature reserve, while weekly farm outings connected children's learning with experiences beyond the nursery. The frequency of those farm visits made them part of the learning pattern rather than an isolated excursion.

Community contact also had a social purpose in June 2023. Children sang with older people during visits to a nearby care home, and shared their home languages and cultural celebrations with one another. Physical play included balancing bicycles and equipment in the soft-play room. These experiences put conversation, coordination and learning to judge risk into real activities, rather than leaving them as abstract ideas.

In June 2023, children formed close relationships with staff and settled readily into play with other children. Practitioners gathered information about each child's abilities at the start and continued to share assessments with parents. That connection between initial information and later observations gave conversations about development a concrete starting point.

At the June 2023 inspection, Ofsted found that special educational needs coordinators worked with practitioners and other professionals to address developmental gaps, and that children with SEND and children learning English as an additional language made good progress. Additional funding paid for resources matched to individual care and learning needs. This was support organised around particular children, rather than a general promise of inclusion.

A lending library and activities for home extended the nursery's learning beyond its premises in June 2023. Parents could continue familiar experiences with their children, while staff shared what children were working towards next. Daily routines also included exercise and opportunities to make decisions about play. Food at that time included breakfast for children who needed it, nutritious meals and healthy snacks.

Sessions and Attendance

The address is Augusta Park Community Centre, East Anton Farm Road, Andover, SP11 6RD. The nursery opens Monday to Friday from 7.30am until 6pm and operates across the year. Bank holidays and a week at Christmas are closure periods, so families using care through the working year need to account for those breaks.

Joining and Funding

The visit-booking form includes Finkley East Anton as a location choice. The registration process requires a visit before the registration form is completed; after submission, the nursery contacts the family to confirm dates. That puts the visit before the formal registration step, giving parents an opportunity to assess the setting before progressing.

In June 2023, the nursery provided funded early education for two-, three- and four-year-old children. That is a dated account of participation, separate from the current opening hours and age range.

• Time to think. In June 2023, some adults moved too quickly when questioning younger children. Ask how practitioners now leave space for children to answer and develop their own solutions.
• Care for the youngest children. The current age range begins at 4 months, while children attending in June 2023 were aged 2 to 4. Use the visit to discuss how baby routines and spaces work for your child's stage.
• Year-round planning. Bank holidays and a week at Christmas interrupt the otherwise year-round opening pattern. Families relying on weekday care should build those closures into their plans.

Finkley East Anton suits families seeking weekday care across the year who value learning connected with outdoor experiences and the wider community. Its June 2023 picture combined weekly farm outings, imaginative play and practical language activities, with a clear improvement point around giving younger children more thinking time. The current opening window offers useful scope for the working day; the baby-care arrangements deserve close attention from families joining at the youngest end of its age range.