Daisy Fays Helston
Daisy Fays Helston is a day nursery in Helston for children aged 1 to 4, with 65 registered places. Ofsted report card, 7 August 2026: Strong standard in 1 area, Expected standard in 5 areas; safeguarding standards met.
19 Coinagehall Street, Helston, TR13 8ER
Key facts
- Type
- Day nursery (Full day care) (Ofsted childcare register, as at 30 June 2026)
- Ages
- 1 to 4 (Ofsted childcare register, as at 30 June 2026)
- Registered places
- 65 (Ofsted childcare register, as at 30 June 2026)
- Registered
- 26 August 2025 (Ofsted childcare register, as at 30 June 2026)
Opening hours
Monday,Tuesday,Wednesday,Thursday,Friday : 07:30 - 18:00
Source: Ofsted report, inspection on 7 August 2026
Who runs it
Daisy Fays Helston is run by Daisy Fays Limited (Ofsted register).
Latest inspection
- Inclusion: Strong standard
- Curriculum and teaching: Expected standard
- Achievement: Expected standard
- Behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines: Expected standard
- Children's welfare and wellbeing: Expected standard
- Leadership and governance: Expected standard
- Safeguarding standards met
Source: Ofsted, inspection on 7 August 2026. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
What it's like to be a child at this setting
Children develop a sense of belonging at this nursery. They arrive happily, separate confidently from their parents and carers and quickly settle into familiar routines. Children show visitors their interests, invite staff into their play and seek out friends. Children appear to feel welcomed and valued because they see their languages, cultures and family experiences reflected in the environment. Children from service families, children who speak more than one language, children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) and children who are disadvantaged take part alongside their peers.
Children achieve through purposeful everyday experiences. Babies explore sand and paint, developing creative skills. They build an awareness of early science as they observe how water melts from ice to a liquid. Toddlers feed themselves, building skills in independence. Children's communication is effective. For instance, young children use signs and early sounds to communicate. Toddlers wash their hands independently and are kind to others, sharing toys. These experiences strengthen children's coordination, communication, concentration and self-care skills. Older children enjoy books, showing concentration as they turn the pages of a book and listen to staff read stories. Interactions are generally rich. Pre-school children enjoying talking about their birthdays, pets and the movements they learn in dance lessons. They build their vocabulary with the support of staff, learning new words, such as 'woodlouse' and 'worm'.
Children thrive because they are active, curious and increasingly independent. Outdoors, they balance on tree trunks and throw hoops into branches, taking physical risk and building movement skills. At lunchtimes, older children pour their own drinks and ask politely for what they need. Children build a sense of social responsibility as they clear their plates and wait for their turn to tidy up. These routines help them to develop confidence, responsibility and positive social habits.
What Ofsted found in each area
Inclusion: Strong standard
Leaders have created a highly inclusive culture where staff identify, assess and support children's needs effectively. Staff promptly recognise when children may need additional help. They use effective support strategies, additional funding and advice from external professionals to reduce barriers to children's learning and wellbeing. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) benefit from reasonable adjustments, such as visual prompts, communication boards, signs, sensory resources, adapted routines and close adult support. These approaches help all children communicate, join in, feel secure and take part alongside their peers.
Children with SEND, additional needs or who are disadvantaged make meaningful progress from their starting points. For example, children who were previously less settled now attend much more happily and manage routines with confidence. Children with communication needs use more words, signs and visual supports to express themselves confidently. This shows that support is having a positive impact on children's participation, confidence and development.
Leaders use additional funding, for example early years pupil premium funding, to effectively widen children's experiences, support communication and strengthen access to the curriculum. Staff welcome and consistently support children from different backgrounds. They reflect children's cultures and languages in the environment so families feel represented. Inclusive practice is consistently evident, highly impactful and supports children's confidence, belonging and progress.
Curriculum and teaching: Expected standard
Leaders have designed a curriculum that covers the areas of learning and reflects children's interests, routines and next steps. Staff use assessment, termly reviews and key-person knowledge to plan experiences that support children's communication, personal, social and emotional development, physical skills and school readiness. Children take part in songs, building early music skills. Toddlers and pre-school children explore drawing with pencils, building their creative experiences.
Staff adapt teaching for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and those receiving additional funding. Visual cues, communication boards, signs, familiar routines and close adult support help children to access activities and take part alongside their peers. Staff promote language through conversation, questioning and new vocabulary. For example, children learn new vocabulary when exploring insects outdoors. They talk confidently about their pets and foods they like.
However, the implementation of the curriculum outdoors for pre-school children is not yet as consistently purposeful. Children spend a significant amount of time outdoors and enjoy physical play and early science exploration, learning about insects and nature. They build movement, curiosity and understanding of the world through these experiences. However, staff do not consistently use this time to teach across the wider curriculum. In particular, mathematics is not promoted routinely through counting, comparing, measuring, sequencing, positional language or problem-solving while outdoors. This means children do not always benefit from the full learning potential of outdoor play.
Achievement: Expected standard
Children achieve well as they explore, communicate and take part in everyday routines. Babies learn to crawl and walk, building coordination and core strength. They develop hand strength as they squeeze water bottles to clean the art area confidently. Through this, children develop movement, hand strength, early independence and curiosity about how things change.
Pre-school children typically smile as they listen to staff read stories and then look at books independently. Some older children speak in sentences of 6 words or more and remember that a horse they met is '32'. They say this is 'old for a horse', showing high levels of communication skills. Toddlers typically develop social skills as they share magnifying glasses outdoors. They learn new vocabulary as they explore insects hiding under logs, repeating new words such as 'ant' and 'caterpillar'.
Children display concentration as they play remaining engrossed in their games for extended periods. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities confidently use a range of strategies to communicate, share space and join in more successfully. These achievements help children to prepare for their next stage of learning and development.
Behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines: Expected standard
Children understand and respond to the routines of the day. This helps them to feel secure and ready to learn. When children are late or absent, leaders follow this up promptly with parents and carers. This reinforces the importance of attendance and helps to keep children safe. Children typically wash their hands before eating, line up calmly when moving indoors and join circle time or choose quieter activities when this better meets their needs. Through these repeated routines, children generally learn independence, self-care, patience and how to be part of a group.
Children typically show positive attitudes as they explore, talk and play together. They invite adults into their play, show visitors their interests and ask politely for what they need. Children take turns well and wait for others to finish jobs at lunchtime and clear away plates and rubbish. These moments teach children cooperation, respect, responsibility and consideration for others.
Children learn to manage transitions and emotions through familiar songs, visual prompts and consistent routines. Some children use traffic-light cues and familiar expectations to understand what will happen next. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities take part in shared routines with support, helping them to feel included and secure.
Children's welfare and wellbeing: Expected standard
Staff build warm and responsive relationships with children and help them to feel happy, settled and secure. Across the baby room, toddler room and pre-school, staff know children's daily care and dietary needs well. They manage routines, such as sleep, feeding, handwashing, lunch and transitions, calmly and purposefully. Staff follow safer sleep arrangements and complete regular checks.
Children's individual needs are usually met well. Staff use visual cues, adapted routines, additional funding and close adult support to help children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and those receiving early years pupil premium funding to take part in nursery life. Leaders typically promote children's health and wellbeing through nutritious healthy meals, regular outdoor play, attentive supervision and suitable support for children with dietary needs.
However, leadership systems do not yet ensure that parent partnerships are consistently effective. Parent feedback indicates that some parents do not feel sufficiently informed about their child's progress or learning journey, and some reported that information about a nursery closure day was not communicated clearly. Although leaders share some information about children's development and the nursery calendar, current arrangements do not consistently ensure that all parents receive important information. This does not enable parents to be fully informed and actively involved in decisions about their children's learning, support and wellbeing.
Leadership and governance: Expected standard
Leaders typically have a clear understanding of many of the setting's strengths and are reflective about what still needs to improve. Leaders use group systems, regular self-evaluation, development planning and oversight from senior leaders and specialist staff, to support consistency. They have established secure safeguarding systems, suitable recruitment, regular supervision sessions and checks on staff wellbeing. Staff say they feel supported and have access to relevant training, including safer sleep and baby-room practice.
Leaders take decisions that are generally in children's best interests. They use additional funding thoughtfully, typically work well with external professionals and make adaptations that help children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and those facing disadvantage access nursery life.
However, leadership systems do not yet ensure that communication with all parents is consistently effective. Evidence from parent feedback showed that some parents do not feel kept up to date with their child's progress or learning journey and that they had not been informed clearly about a closure day. Although leaders share some information to parents about children's progress and the nursery calendar, leaders need to strengthen systems for sharing important information, support strategies, and closure dates so that communication is consistent and parents are fully informed about their children's progress and development.
What the setting must and should do next
The provider should:
- Leaders should strengthen the implementation of the pre-school outdoor curriculum so planned learning is purposeful and sequenced, with a particular focus on mathematics.
- Leaders should further extend communication methods to enhance partnerships with parents and carers and best support children's learning and development.
Ofsted's words, from the report on the inspection on 7 August 2026. Read the full report on the Ofsted website. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Ofsted report cards (England, from November 2025)
Since 10 November 2025 Ofsted has graded nurseries and pre-schools on a report card. There is no single overall grade. Instead, each of six areas gets one of five grades: Exceptional, Strong standard, Expected standard, Needs attention, Urgent improvement.
The six areas are inclusion; curriculum and teaching; achievement; behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines; children's welfare and wellbeing; leadership and governance. Safeguarding is judged on its own, as met or not met.
Expected standard means the setting does what Ofsted expects of every setting. Strong standard and Exceptional are above that; Needs attention and Urgent improvement mean Ofsted found things the setting has to put right.
Source: Ofsted reports
Funded childcare hours in England
All 3 and 4 year olds in England can get 15 hours of free childcare a week, for 38 weeks of the year.
Working parents of children aged 9 months to 4 years old can get 30 hours of free childcare a week for 38 weeks of the year (Free Childcare for Working Parents), if they meet the earnings rules. You confirm your details every 3 months.
Some 2 year olds can get 15 hours a week when the family gets certain kinds of extra support.
The hours are used at a registered provider that offers them, so ask each nursery how it offers the funded hours.
Source: GOV.UK: Free Childcare for Working Parents, check if you're eligible · GOV.UK: Free childcare and education for 2 to 4 year olds (checked 31 October 2026)
Other nurseries nearby
- Lizard C.H.I.L.D Trust - Day nursery, Helston TR13 8AR, ages 0 to 11, 42 places, 0.4 milesOfsted, 6 April 2023: Good overall; safeguarding is effective
- Helston Day Nursery - Pre-school, Helston TR13 8NR, ages 1 to 4, 30 places, 0.4 milesOfsted, 9 September 2025: Good overall; safeguarding is effective
- Little Merlins Pre-school - Day nursery, Helston TR13 8DJ, ages 1 to 4, 36 places, 0.5 milesOfsted, 7 May 2025: Good overall; safeguarding is effective
- Puffins Day Nursery - Day nursery, Helston TR13 0LW, ages 0 to 8, 76 places, 0.9 milesOfsted, 3 February 2023: Good overall; safeguarding is effective
- Helitots Day Nursery - Day nursery, Helston TR12 7RH, ages 0 to 4, 60 places, 1.5 milesOfsted, 30 May 2022: Outstanding overall; safeguarding is effective
Schools nearby
- Parc Eglos School - Primary, 0.2 miles
- St Michael's Church of England Primary School - Primary, 0.4 miles
- Helston Community College - Secondary, 0.4 miles
- Nansloe Academy - Primary, 0.4 miles