Settling in

Starting nursery is a bigger day for the parent than the child, and we plan for both. Your child gets a named key person before their first visit, three sessions to get used to the room with you in it and then out of it, and a first week where we ring you at the time you want. You get a list of what to bring, a tour of the fridge, and permission to cry in the car park.

A month before the start date we confirm the key person: a named member of the room's staff who will do the settling sessions, the daily diary, the two-monthly review and the parents' evening, and who will be the one on the phone. For a baby, the key person offers a home visit first, an hour at your house where they meet the baby where they are happiest and write down the routine, the comforter, the bottle, the words you use. Most parents of babies say yes to this; most parents of three-year-olds do not need it.

The three settling sessions are spread over the fortnight before the start date and are free. The first is an hour in the room with you there, playing, and the key person alongside. The second is two hours, with you in the parents' room downstairs with a coffee and the door open, going back in if your child needs you. The third is a morning on their own from nine until after lunch, which is the first time they eat with the others and the first proper test of the goodbye. If the third one is hard, we add a fourth, and a fifth; nobody starts a full day until the morning has worked.

In the first week we ring you every day at the time you ask for, usually an hour after drop-off, with the truth: how long the crying lasted, what they ate, who they played with. The daily diary carries the rest. Comforters, dummies, a muslin that smells of home and a family photograph for the wall all help, and the key person will ask for them. We do not take a child from a crying parent at the door; we take the child from the parent who has said goodbye, which is a different thing and which the key person will coach you through on the first morning.

Most children are settled within a fortnight; some take a half term, usually the ones who started at eighteen months or who have had a lot of change at once. If it is not working we say so and change something: a different start time, a shorter day for a few weeks, a different key person if the fit is wrong. The one thing we have learned in fourteen years is that a child who is unhappy at nursery is a problem to solve this week, not one to wait out.

What is included

• A named key person confirmed a month before the start date
• A home visit for babies, an hour at your house, if you want one
• Three free settling sessions over the fortnight before: an hour, two hours, a morning with lunch
• More sessions added, free, until the morning works
• A phone call every day of the first week at the time you choose
• A two-monthly review with the key person and a parents' evening each term

What it costs

The three settling sessions are free. The registration fee is £50 and the deposit £200, held against the last month's fees. The fees page has every rate side by side and a calculator for your days with the 30-hours offer applied; the day page has the routine and this week's menu.