Swaffham C of E Primary School and the Diocese of Norwich Education Academies Trust are delighted to be considering opening Nursery provision on our school site for children aged 3 and 4.

This proposal will ensure a consistent approach to learning for our youngest children and enable us to meet some of the needs of the local community in relation to Early Years educational provision. The Local Authority have conducted a sufficiency survey on our request.  The conclusion of this survey is that currently there are insufficient numbers of funded early education and childcare places if all local parents wished to access local provision and so there is current need for childcare places. We believe our nursery would help provide families with the childcare places needed in the area, which are currently not provided for locally and require families to attend provision outside of Swaffham.  Our provision will also ensure school readiness by fostering a love of learning from the very early years and offering an opportunity for our EYFS team to build relationships with our families and children from the very start of their Early Learning Goals.

We are launching this consultation as we would value receiving your thoughts and comments regarding the proposed change to age range, which we are hoping will commence by Summer 2025.  As part of this consultation, we are also seeking views about provision for children aged 2 and above.  Please share your views about this in the comments section for that question.  We appreciate many families with and without children, our neighbours and current Early Years providers will have a few questions. We have put together an FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) information sheet as part of this a letter. We hope that this may answer some of your initial queries and share out our proposed offering.

Why are we proposing to change the age range at our school?  

We recognise that high quality Early Years education is key to improving outcomes for all pupils, including those in receipt of free school meals.  We have a well -established Bold Beginnings Early Rears Reception curriculum- recognised by Ofsted in June 2023 to be ambitious for all children.  We wish to build on this to provide an Early Years Hub of excellence for children aged three and upwards.  Providing nursery pupils with a language rich, social and inclusive environment with a curriculum which enables for all to learn creatively in an outdoor and indoor setting.  

We are aware that there are currently insufficient childcare places in Swaffham to meet the current need and that some families are having to travel outside of Swaffham to secure childcare places.  Our engagement with The Local Authority Pupil Planning and Early Years Teams has shown further projections and sufficiency linked to current and future housing development in the town which will yield further childcare places.

Our vision is to provide high quality Early Years learning in our school setting, in line with the Early Years Framework to meet this local need for childcare places. In our nursery provision we will impart our high expectations with Early Years children- some of whom will go on to attend our school in Reception.  Sharing, modelling and teaching our school rules, values and ethos from this early stage of each child’s educational journey will have a very positive impact on their learning and development at this critical age- enhancing our transition work.  Children in our nursery will practise our school routines, use our school facilities such as our playground, hall, library, practise sitting still on a carpet and listening, practise turn taking and navigating their world so they will be well -prepared for their next stage of learning as they move into Reception.

This enables us to identify and overcome barriers, build strong early partnerships with families, so that all children are able to thrive and flourish, thus improving outcomes for all. This includes disadvantaged children and those with SEND.  Through our nursery provision, we will be able to use the strong partnerships we have in place with external professionals to identify needs early including special educational needs and disabilities and put actions in place to support children and families from an early age- thus improving outcomes for all pupils.  Our Early Years Hub model will enable our Reception teaching team to get to know children and families early building a holistic awareness and understanding of each individual child’s early development and starting point to allow practitioners to effectively put next steps in place.  We recognise that these benefits will support children’s learning and development from the start of their educational journey.

We also believe that all our school children will benefit greatly from the experience of socialising and developing relationships with even younger children.  We aim to include our Nursery not only in our daily school running, but also in key celebrations, worship-based opportunities, performances, and events from across the school. 

The proposal – Rationale 

At Swaffham C of E Primary Academy, we believe that every child deserves the best possible start in life, and support to fulfil their potential- to SHINE, LEARN, BELIEVE and BELONG. A child's experience in the Early Years has a major impact on their future life chances.  Following the journey of our school as it has changed status from a Junior school to become a primary in September 2020, we now have a full primary curriculum which was recognised by Ofsted in June 2023 to be ambitious for all children.  Throughout this journey we have recognised the true value of an excellent early start and we are passionate about our EYFs provision. 

Our vision is to expand our Early Years education to include pre- statutory school age children.  Children who attend our proposed school-based nursery will access the full support of our school which includes our SENDCO, our Student and Families Support Lead, our excellent team of qualified teachers in Early Years, our full curriculum which includes physical education and music and continuous education from 3 years to 11 years.  At Swaffham C of E Primary, our expansive outdoor and creative learning environments develop inquisitive minds to engage in early reading and number skills alongside excellent outdoor creative learning.  Our school benefits from a large outside playing field including garden area and small areas of woodland.  We believe learning through the outdoors develops fine motor, communication/ socialisation and supports children in developing a love of life-long learning. The research behind School-based nurseries, DFE ‘Good Practice in Early Education’ reiterates these benefits.

We are eager to extend our school community with the addition of a nursery to offer a secure, safe, and happy setting, which will provide the foundation for children to make the most of their abilities, offer provocations which will stimulate thought, curiosity and exploration of their interests and support them to become independent and inquisitive learners.  

How will the nursery run?

The proposed nursery provision will run in line with our school’s academic term times and operate as another class within our school.  Funded sessions are proposed to run from 8:45am to 11:45pm and 12:15 to 3:15pm.  An optional lunchtime will be available from 11:45am to 12:15pm where families can order and pay for a school meal for their child if they wish.  The school will offer 15-hours and 30-hours per week funded Early Education for 3 and 4 year-olds and we will look to offer Nursery for 2 year olds once established if provision is required.  To support our families and other providers, we will look to offer appropriate split-funded spaces for pupils eligible for funded-hours as well.

We will continue to maintain the strong working relationships we have, working together in partnership with other local providers.  We understand that a school-based setting offers a different academic and transitioning start for families who are looking for this approach for their child.

How many children will the nursery take?   

Initially we are looking to accommodate a maximum of 15 children per session.  We already have the space available to be able to accommodate this number of children.  We are hoping to increase these numbers to 30 once further building adaptations have been made.

Where will the nursery be based?

Our proposed nursery will be based in one of the classrooms in the area of our school where our Reception cohort classroom is located.  It is our proposal to make this area of our school an Early Years Hub.

Early identification of needs and support:

One of the biggest benefits to our nursery provision offer, is our ability to offer early support and identify needs, including Speech and Language and social skills. By identifying, reducing, or removing barriers to learning and providing support to our pupils and families at the earliest opportunity, we would be able to improve the outcomes for pupils at the end of the Early Years Foundation Stage and give them the best start possible for Key Stage 1.

In our primary school we have an excellent qualified SENDCO who is also a Specialist Leader in Education, access to Local and Trust support, a non- teaching Student and Families Support Lead, three qualified Thrive Practitioners, access to weekly play therapy sessions, staff who are trained in Communication and Language Intervention, and access to a Speech and Language specialist.  We run three different Speech and Language programmes to ensure the best possible support for individual children’s needs and have been a part of the Nuffield Early Language Programme through the DFE.  All of our Qualified Teachers, Higher Level Teaching Assistants and Teaching Assistant’s in EYFS are trained in Jolly Phonics.  We will ensure that staff in our nursery provision have the necessary childcare qualifications as per the Early Years Framework requirements. 

You can access our consultation here: