The Country Park

Address: Dalkeith Country Park, Dalkeith, Midlothian, EH22 2NA
Tel: 0330 202 1180 Option 1

Age of children:At The Country Park Nursery we care for children 3 months to 5 years.

Places:75

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Situated within the beautiful grounds of Dalkeith Country Park (adjacent to the Palace) our magical nursery is nestled amongst the trees giving us fantastic links to nature both indoors and out. Our ethos at Chapter One is to bring outdoor adventure and learning to children’s early years and being situated in these beautiful grounds gives us great opportunities to explore, investigate and play, right on our doorstep.

Split placements are available with Treetops, our outdoor nursery.

Facilities

Our country park nursery has been purposefully designed to meet the needs of the children within them and consists of 6 wonderful areas:

Bunnies – Our Bunnies room is for the youngest children at our nursery, approx. 3 months to 15 months. There is an abundance of baby sensory resources to stimulate the children as well as free access to outdoor play.

Hedgehogs – The Hedgehog room caters for slightly older babies from approx. 15 months to 20 months. This room ensures younger babies and older babies are in an environment that is suited to their age and stage of ability.

Squirrels – This room is the next stage on from the Hedgehogs room and is age appropriate for children approx. 20 months to 26 months.

Badgers – The Badger room is for 2-3 year olds and includes core resources like painting, water, gluing etc, for the majority of the day so children can begin to make choices about what they want to play with.

Foxes – Our Foxes room is for our 3-5 year olds and again, we ensure core resources are available all day as well as free access to outdoors. The children are in control of their own learning through using a variety of resources, whilst learning through play.

(Please note the ages mentioned above are a guideline as each child is different and we do not move children rooms based on age alone. It is dependent on room availability and development stage of each individual child.)

Extra Curricular Activities

We want every child to have the skills, confidence and motivation to be active and healthy through, sport, dance and music, so we also offer the following extra-curricular activities:

Busy Bee – Buzzy Bee classes focus on the singing voice and in particular unaccompanied singing games. This is important in helping children to focus with little distraction and also teaches them about melody and pitch. These classes are themed so if we have anything in particular we are working on in the nursery, Buzzy Bees can try to theme them accordingly. The classes are also progressive, aiming to encourage the children’s musical ability and build on their self-confidence.

Food

All food and refreshment are provided by Chapter One and are included within the fees, including breakfast, morning snack, cooked lunch and pudding, as well as afternoon snack.

Breakfast - cereals or porridge.

Morning snack – fresh fruit and milk.

Lunch - Daily fresh meals are provided by our outside catering company, Healthy Tots with healthy, nutritional meals such as wholesome soups, casseroles and mild curry dishes followed by yoghurt, berries and purees.

Afternoon snack – comprising sandwiches, veggie sticks, dips and fresh fruit.