*WEBSITE UNDER DEVELOPMENT*

Welcome to Drymen Nursery’s website.

Context of the Nursery

 This year, we celebrated our first full year in Drymen Nursery.  We offer high quality, stimulating and flexible early learning and childcare with the aim of meeting the needs of children and their families.  The nursery has a wide catchment area covering Croftamie, Drymen, Milton of Buchanan, Rowerdennan, Balmaha, Killearn, Balfron Station and Balfron. Drymen Nursery is open from 8 am to 6pm, 45.6 weeks of the year. We provide places for 29 two to five year olds on a daily basis.  This year the nursery has provided a service for 36 families and 38 children.

The Head of Nursery is a joint (peripatetic) headship post with Drymen Primary School.  The Head is supported by a Principal Early Childhood Educator (PECE), two Senior Early Childhood Educators (SECE), Early Childhood Educators (ECE) and Support Worker Early Childhood Educators (SWECE). We also have an administrative assistant, care taker and a lunch assistant.

Our Vision Statement in Drymen Nursery is

“Children and families at the heart”

 Our Vision: 

At Drymen Nursery our vision is to put children and families at the heart of all we do.  Through caring and nurturing relationships, we provide high quality play and learning spaces, interactions and experiences.  These enable all children to feel happy, included and to achieve their full potential.

Our Values: 

Our children, families, practitioners and community agreed our core values. Our values are seen in action during play and interactions with each other. These are:

Fun & Enjoyment, Outdoors, Kindness, Love, Uniqueness & Included.

 Our Aims:

To work in partnership with families and the community to;

• Foster love, kindness, teamwork, and respect, for all within our nursery community.
• Provide inspiring outdoor and indoor play and learning environments, which ignite children’s curiosity and love of learning.

Our Curriculum Rationale:                                                                 

In Drymen Nursery we promote the Image of the Child as competent;

Individuals, Citizens, Contributors and Learners.

Our balance of Adult Led, Child Led and Adult Initiated play and learning experiences within these four capacities, enables all children to develop those skills necessary, to ‘blossom’ within their ever changing, communities and world.

The nursery vision, ethos and values, alongside our pedagogical approach to making learning visible, ensures that we deliver high quality learning experiences that promote children’s rights and the principles and design of Curriculum for Excellence. Children are making very good progress in their learning. Learning is individualised and we value and celebrate children’s personal achievements.

Children’s interests are developed through collaborative working, where children and adults engage in action research and construct learning together. Educators plan, and are skilled at differentiating for individuals and group learning, taking into account children’s age and stage of development. Children are encouraged to participate in quality discussions and dialogue with each other and adults facilitate this process with active listening and questioning.

Children are encouraged to play, learn and make discoveries while accessing both the indoors and outdoors throughout their session in all weathers. Practitioners promote children’s curiosity and interests through responsive curriculum planning across Health & Wellbeing, Literacy, and Numeracy to ensure breadth and progression of learning. Children are encouraged to have real and relevant experiences and opportunities which are enhanced by community and family involvement enabling children to develop confidence, resilience and learn new skills.