This year, Busy Bees teamed up with Disney to encourage our nurseries to design a ‘Winnie the Pooh’ themed garden area. The nurseries designed and developed their own garden areas, with the help of a specially designed pack provided by Disney, and entered the designs into a national competition.

After receiving many entries, Disney have now chosen 10 finalists, with the winning nursery receiving a visit from Charlie Dimmock, who will be replicating the winning garden design. As well as this, the nursery will receive a whole host of ‘Winnie the Pooh’ goodies!

The partnership with Disney is the next step in Busy Bees’ efforts to encourage children at our nurseries to lead a healthy lifestyle, with large play areas in many nurseries, new adventure playgrounds in recently refurbished gardens, and partnerships with organisations offering activity play sessions, such as baby yoga, dance classes, and football.

Busy Bees’ efforts follow recent campaigns and research, which have highlighted the importance of outside play, including the government’s Change4Life campaign and the new government framework, the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS). The EYFS recognises that outdoor play is a key part of developing children’s knowledge of the natural world, as well as their movement and imagination.

Operations Director, Marg Randles, said “Teaming up with Disney has been a fantastic chance for us to create great learning and fun outdoor opportunities for the children at Busy Bees to enjoy, as well as raise money for an excellent cause. The project is an opportunity to involve children and parents in the development of their nursery, and for everyone to work together on further improving our nursery gardens.

Busy Bees hope to work together on similarly exciting projects in the future.”

The 10 nursery finalists are as follows:

Busy Bees at Hatfield Road, St Albans
Busy Bees at St Davids, Eleow
Leapfrog at Woking
Busy Bees at Shenley
Busy Bees at Quedgeley
Busy Bees at Thames Ditton
Leapfrog at Basingstoke
Busy Bees at Mardley Hill
Busy Bees at South Staffordshire Water
Busy Bees at Nottingham City Hospital

The winning nursery will be announced at the beginning of August.