Overbury Grasshoppers

Tractor-trailer outings, orchards and a working farm give Overbury Grasshoppers a childhood firmly connected to the countryside. This purpose-built nursery in Overbury, near Tewkesbury, makes growing, wildlife and outdoor exploration part of its daily life. The setting matters here: children have real places to explore and real work to observe.

With 34 places in total, it accepts children aged 12 to 60 months. At its 7 March 2025 inspection, Ofsted rated the nursery Good and found that its interest-led curriculum supported communication and language, while identifying learning plans and digital safety as areas requiring further work. That balance is useful for parents: the countryside offer has substance, but individual learning targets deserve attention too.

Rooms and Ages

Dormice, hedgehogs and squirrels have their own staff teams, each with a senior practitioner. These named groups give families a starting point for understanding how care is organised, rather than treating the whole nursery as one undifferentiated group.

Learning and Activities

The early years foundation stage provides the framework for learning, development and care, with children learning through play and everyday experiences. Here, early maths and literacy sit alongside creative work, conversation and exploration. Group gatherings bring children together for stories and singing, while activities indoors can involve art or experimenting with materials.

Small routines also carry learning. Children help prepare snacks and pour drinks for themselves; later, they help arrange the tea table and serve their friends. Independence is practised through useful jobs. Afternoon activities include sensory play, shared projects and stories, with practitioners using questions to encourage children to develop their ideas.

Food provides a concrete thread through the learning. In September 2025, children explored the journey from wheat growing and harvesting to making bread for their snack. The following month, Bake Your Lawn, a Real Bread Campaign project, involved planting wheat in the kitchen gardens. These experiences connect an ingredient children recognise with the work needed to produce it.

Outdoor and Community Life

Gardens, fields and orchards are used in wet weather as well as sunshine, with climbing, balancing and watching wildlife woven into the day. Links with Overbury Enterprises & Farms extend that experience beyond the nursery garden: farm-trailer trips reach the lambing pens, Christmas Tree plantation and Bluebell wood.

Recent outings make those links tangible. In April 2026, the nursery travelled by tractor trailer to Park Farm as part of its farm-animal topic. Some Squirrels and Hedgehogs children also visited Bluebell Woods that month. These are specific examples of countryside learning, rather than a promise of trips on a fixed weekly timetable.

The wider community contributes too. During summer 2026, People Who Help Us introduced children to emergency and rescue work through firefighter and paramedic visits, alongside SARA (Severn Area Rescue Association), whose visit explored safety around water. Children meet people who can explain the jobs behind familiar uniforms and vehicles.

Familiar adults and everyday conversation are central to the care described here. In March 2025, children built close relationships with staff, and parents received updates through conversations, electronic messages and online learning records. Staff also gathered information about children's interests at home, giving families a practical way to contribute to activity planning.

At the March 2025 inspection, Ofsted judged safeguarding effective and found attentive personal care, support for children's wellbeing and dietary arrangements that addressed individual needs. In that month, staff asked children before wiping noses or changing nappies, involved younger children in simple care tasks and stayed alongside sleeping children. Those details show how care was handled at the time, including moments when a child needed quiet attention rather than another activity.

Learning communication was less consistent. In March 2025, children's next learning targets were too general, and parents did not always receive enough detail to continue that learning at home. Daily updates and a precise explanation of what comes next serve different purposes. Families should weigh both.

Moving on is marked with a family celebration. Leavers Picnic 2026 took place in the Court Gardens, with a photograph hunt, keepsake gifts and mortarboards the children had made themselves. The evening gave children and their families a shared occasion to recognise the end of nursery before starting school.

Sessions and Attendance

The address is Overbury Grasshoppers, Overbury, Tewkesbury, GL20 7NT. Opening hours run from 8am to 6pm Monday to Thursday, with Friday ending at 5pm. It operates throughout the year, closing for bank holidays and a week at Christmas. The earlier Friday finish is a concrete consideration for working parents arranging collection.

Enquiries can be made by telephone on 01386 725 755. Nursery visits can be booked to meet the team and discuss joining.

Funding and Paid Extras

Funded childcare is offered through working parents funding and Worcestershire Early Years 3 and 4 year old funding, subject to eligibility. The arrangement stretches funding across 50 weeks: the working parents entitlement provides 22 hours each week, while the 15-hour entitlement is stretched to 11 hours weekly. Funding is capped at six hours per day, three hours for a half day and a maximum of 22 hours per week, so funded hours should be considered separately from the full opening window.

Children have a home-cooked lunch and a light tea during the nursery day.

The nursery describes itself as a feeder for the adjacent Overbury First School. Attendance does not guarantee a school place; families still apply through the local authority admissions process. Community contact includes a Maypole dancing visit in May 2026, but that relationship should be understood separately from admission to Reception.

• Individual learning targets. In March 2025, planned next steps lacked precision and were not consistently shared with parents. At a visit, ask to see how a child's next target is explained and connected to activities at home.
• Digital safety. March 2025 identified insufficient teaching about staying safe with technology and the internet. Ask how this now forms part of children's learning alongside practical safety experiences such as the rescue-team visit.
• Funding and the working week. Funding has a daily cap, and Friday closes earlier than the other weekdays. Ask for one written attendance quotation showing your proposed pattern, private hours, meal charges and consumables arrangements.
• An outdoor childhood. Exploration continues in rainy weather, and farm-trailer outings form part of the offer. Discuss outdoor clothing and how outings work for your child's age during a visit.

Overbury Grasshoppers suits families who want countryside exploration to shape ordinary nursery life, with growing, farm visits and community encounters giving children plenty to talk about and investigate. Its year-round opening will matter to parents arranging care beyond school terms, while the stretched funding arrangement needs to be matched carefully to the hours a family wants.

The strongest reason to choose it is the connection between place and learning. The main educational questions are equally clear: how precisely staff plan each child's next steps, how parents receive them, and how digital safety is taught.