learning through play and making new friends

All about our pre-school and our village

Welcome to Cheriton Bishop Playgroup. We are a small village playgroup providing pre-school education to the children of Cheriton Bishop and surrounding rural areas. Our playgroup opened approximately 27 years ago and is a voluntary, community based pre-school run by an elected committee, made up of parents/carers within the group.

We believe that facilities such as ours, for the under fives, are a vital part of the community. We are not a rigidly structured pre-school, we encourage creativity and the importance of play amongst the children. The playgroup follows the curriculum for the foundation stage of education, as set out by the Department for Education, and takes advice, guidance and training from Zero14Plus and The Pre-school Learning Alliance. Our staff are parents of former playgroup children and our close links with both the primary school and our village parent and toddler group, means that the transitions between the settings is an effortless one. We are a member of the Pre-School Learning Alliance and a registered charity.

We aim to:

· provide high quality care and education for children primarily below statutory school age;

· work in partnership with parents to help children to learn and develop;

· add to the life and well-being of our local community; and

· offer children and their parents a service which promotes equality and values diversity.

As a member of Cheriton Bishop Playgroup, your child:

· is in a safe and stimulating environment;

· is given generous care and attention, because of our high ratio of adults to children;

· has the chance to join with other children and adults to live, play, work and learn together;

· is helped to take forward her/his learning and development by being helped to build on what she/he already knows and can do;

· is in a pre-school which sees you as a partner in helping your child to learn and develop; and

· is in a pre-school in which parents help to shape the service it offers.

---- For detailed information click on the 'prospectus' button ----

Cheriton Bishop is situated close to the north east border of Dartmoor National Park. The village is approximately 10 miles from Exeter and 13 miles from Okehampton, just off the A30. Cheriton Bishop is mainly a farming community, but also has many daily commuters to its nearby towns and the City of Exeter. The village was probably founded in Saxon times and has been around for about a thousand years. An interesting point about the village is that it must have had a church from very early on in it's history, as the name 'Cheriton Bishop' means 'Church Town'. The font in our present village church is norman and dates from 1075 and traces of the original norman church can still be seen.

For further history and some photographs of the village visit:

The Cheriton Bishop Village Website

We have a parent and toddler group in the village, this meets every monday 9.30 - 11.30am (term time only) in Cheriton Bishop School Hall.

We maintain strong links with the village school, to learn more about Cheriton Bishop Primary, visit their website - www.cheriton-bishop-primary.devon.sch.uk