About Us
Our vision is to have happy and contented children who enjoy being in a culture that nurtures and values the importance of offering the best learning experiences for all babies and children.
We ensure that every child is given an equal opportunity to learn through high quality play experiences. Play is vital for children. It helps them to understand the world around them and it is through play that our children learn, develop at their own pace and have fun with adults who understand, support and care about them.
We want the children we care for to feel safe and secure and leave with the confidence to deal with whatever life may bring.
Our Approach
We focus on developing children’s natural curiosity and confidence through the seven areas of learning which are as follows:
1) Communication and language development.
2) Physical development.
3) Personal, social, and emotional development.
4) Literacy development.
5) Mathematics.
6) Understanding the world.
7) Expressive arts and design.
Using ‘Planning in the Moment’ with a mix of different approaches. We identify children as individuals with their own unique learning style and build strong foundations within them, while promoting creativity and by giving children the opportunities to be imaginative and critical thinkers. Children learn best through play, and we develop these moments through scaffolding and extending their interests to ensure learning opportunities are always met.
We provide a happy, caring atmosphere that enables us to embrace a nurturing environment allowing children to feel safe to learn and build healthy attachments. We promote high standards of behaviour and help children to understand each other’s feelings and begin to learn the foundations to be able to self-regulate. We strive to help children develop confidence, independency and develop a positive ‘can do’ attitude to learning.
Our Support
We support our children to build strong, positive relationships with themselves and others; to be sensitive to the needs and feelings of others and to inequalities associated with race, gender and ability.
We work closely with parents and carers as we believe that the child’s learning and achievement is something we should all be a part of, and this creates a real sense of family. When your child joins the Arc, you join The Arc family.
Food and nutrition really matter to us which is why our chef is based onsite cooking fresh, healthy meals.
At Arc, we are fortunate to benefit from a wonderful roof-terrace and downstairs garden where children go daily to explore the elements, our animals and our outdoor play areas.
The Arc History
The nursery and the building it occupies have a long history in Southwark.
In the 19th century Charter House established a Christian mission in the area to try and bring about some prospect to residents living in the area which was one of the most deprived areas of London. They established on Crosby Row a church called St Hughes and also a series of meeting places.
The building The Arc Nursery now occupies was established in 1900 as a women’s refuge to provide support, care and education to women of all types whether they were single, married, with or without children. It carried on providing this safe space until the 1970’s when a group of people got together to use the space to provide informal childcare – a drop-in play centre for children where parents could get a few hours of support, offering sessions for 25p!
It then developed into a more formal nursery setting operated by Charter House School, and it ran as a nursery supervised by Southwark Council until 2008.
Peter Ames, who stepped down from the Board in 2021 was one of the parents who sent his children to the nursery at the time when just before Christmas in 2008 parents received a letter saying the nursery had run out of funds and was going to close. Peter and other parents joined forces and managed to get a stay of execution from Southwark Council giving them time to formulate a business plan to take over the nursery for the benefit of every parent and child who used the setting.
In March 2009, they formed a not-for-profit company to take over the operation of the nursery, overseen by a board of trustees ‘Arc Community Trustees’ (ACT). They hired a new nursery manager, retained all of the staff on their contracts and set about providing childcare and early years education for local residents. In 2010, ACT secured sufficient funding to allow the nursery to be refurbished, permitting it to become the completely child focused and child centred building you see today.
About Us
Our vision is to have happy and contented children who enjoy being in a culture that nurtures and values the importance of offering the best learning experiences for all babies and children.
We ensure that every child is given an equal opportunity to learn through high quality play experiences. Play is vital for children. It helps them to understand the world around them and it is through play that our children learn, develop at their own pace and have fun with adults who understand, support and care about them.
We want the children we care for to feel safe and secure and leave with the confidence to deal with whatever life may bring.
Our Approach
We focus on developing children’s natural curiosity and confidence through the seven areas of learning which are as follows.
1) Communication and language development. …
2) Physical development. …
3) Personal, social, and emotional development. …
4) Literacy development. …
5) Mathematics. …
6) Understanding the world. …
7) Expressive arts and design.
Using ‘Planning in the Moment’ with a mix of different approaches. We identify children as individuals with their own unique learning style and build strong foundations within them, while promoting creativity and by giving children the opportunities to be imaginative and critical thinkers. Children learn best through play, and we develop these moments through scaffolding and extending their interests to ensure learning opportunities are always met.
We provide a happy, caring atmosphere that enables us to embrace a nurturing environment allowing children to feel safe to learn and build healthy attachments. We promote high standards of behaviour and help children to understand each other’s feelings and begin to learn the foundations to be able to self-regulate. We strive to help children develop confidence, independency and develop a positive ‘can do’ attitude to learning.
Our Support
We support our children to build strong, positive relationships with themselves and others; to be sensitive to the needs and feelings of others and to inequalities associated with race, gender and ability.
We work closely with parents and carers as we believe that the child’s learning and achievement is something we should all be a part of, and this creates a real sense of family. When your child joins the Arc, you join The Arc family.
Food and nutrition really matter to us which is why our chef is based onsite cooking fresh, healthy meals.
At Arc, we are fortunate to benefit from a wonderful roof-terrace and downstairs garden where children go daily to explore the elements, our animals and our outdoor play areas.
The Arc History
The nursery and the building it occupies have a long history in Southwark.
In the 19th century Charter House established a Christian mission in the area to try and bring about some prospect to residents living in the area which was one of the most deprived areas of London. They established on Crosby Row a church called St Hughes and also a series of meeting places.
The building The Arc Nursery now occupies was established in 1900 as a women’s refuge to provide support, care and education to women of all types whether they were single, married, with or without children. It carried on providing this safe space until the 1970’s when a group of people got together to use the space to provide informal childcare – a drop-in play centre for children where parents could get a few hours of support, offering sessions for 25p!
It then developed into a more formal nursery setting operated by Charter House School, and it ran as a nursery supervised by Southwark Council until 2008.
Peter Ames, who stepped down from the Board in 2021 was one of the parents who sent his children to the nursery at the time when just before Christmas in 2008 parents received a letter saying the nursery had run out of funds and was going to close. Peter and other parents joined forces and managed to get a stay of execution from Southwark Council giving them time to formulate a business plan to take over the nursery for the benefit of every parent and child who used the setting.
In March 2009, they formed a not-for-profit company to take over the operation of the nursery, overseen by a board of trustees ‘Arc Community Trustees’ (ACT). They hired a new nursery manager, retained all of the staff on their contracts and set about providing childcare and early years education for local residents. In 2010, ACT secured sufficient funding to allow the nursery to be refurbished, permitting it to become the completely child focused and child centred building you see today.