Nursery World - Your Opinion: Letters (24)

LETTER OF THE WEEK

OPEN PLAN BENEFITS

I was interested to read your news item on Bents Farm Day Nursery (12June), which has taken the decision to provide an open-plan setting forchildren from birth to five. I am surprised that Ofsted was not aware ofany other nursery operating like this, as ours has been since we openedin April 2004. We are a 45-place nursery which holds the Key Personapproach as our guiding principle. Staff are paired as 'buddies'(working opposite shifts) with children aged six months to six years,joining them to form a family group.

We have had two very positive Ofsted inspections since opening, whichhave recognised and been appreciative of this system. We have had manyvisits from local and not-so-local nurseries who have been recommendedto visit us as an example of best practice in using family grouping andthe Key Person Approach in an open-plan setting. Parents have beenextremely positive, so much so that we no longer need to advertise as weare so oversubscribed with word-of-mouth recommendations.

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