Stepping Stones Day Nursery
GoodBirth to 8+Long established
A day nursery in Skelmersdale for children from birth to 8+, open 07:30 to 18:00, 5 days a week. They do not publish prices, so that is the first thing to ask. Rated Good by Ofsted in May 2022. Open since 2015, with 88 places.
What you might pay
This setting does not publish its fees, and no national dataset holds them. This is what childcare costs across the council, as a starting point for the call.
What childcare usually costs in Lancashire
This is not this setting's price. It is the median hourly fee across all providers in Lancashire from the Department for Education's 2025 provider survey. No national data holds what an individual nursery charges, so ring and ask.
Places, hours and the day
Who they take, when they are open, and what a day there includes.
Where it is
WN8 8AZWhat the inspector found
One grade is one visit. A run of them tells you whether it has been good for years or has only just got there.
Ofsted inspector, 26 May 2022 · read the full report
What it is like to attend
Babies are well cared for and the atmosphere in the room is calm and tranquil.
They are highly engaged with their surroundings. Babies pick up the dried oats and drop them from a height, stimulating their curiosity. They laugh in delight and clap as the oats fall. Staff skilfully link nursery rhymes to activities and develop children's use of single words.
Children display impressive concentration levels when completing tasks. Toddlers love filling and emptying water. Pre-school children discuss and explore different occupations and how their roles assist the community. Children are imaginative and explore in various ways. For example, older children pretend to be firefighters and work collectively to extinguish a pretend fire. Children learn to adopt perseverance when their cars reach the end of the physical racetrack and need to land in a safe way.
What Ofsted told them to improve
To further improve the quality of the early years provision, the provider should:
- support staff to always be clear about what they intend children to learn, so that children can make the best possible progress n strengthen the use of strategies to consistently support individual children's communication and language development n focus staff supervision more precisely on raising staff teaching skills to the highest level.
- 26 May 2022Good
- 10 August 2016Good
Rated Good or Outstanding at 2 of the last 2 graded inspections.
Still missing for Stepping Stones Day Nursery
- What it costs
- Funded hours
- Youngest age taken
- Meals
- Nappies
- Waiting list
No dataset holds any of this. Two parents telling us the same thing puts it on the page for whoever looks next.
What to ask them
None of this is in any national dataset and this setting has not published it, which is exactly why it is worth asking.
- What does it cost, all in? What is on top: meals, nappies, late pick-up, and what happens if you are late.
- Can I use my funded hours here? Whether they stretch them over the year, and the minimum days you have to book.
- Is there a place for my child's age? Baby rooms fill first and waiting lists are common.
- Who would my child's key person be? And how long have the staff been there. No dataset holds this and it matters more than anything above.
- Can I visit at a busy time? Mid-morning on a weekday tells you far more than an empty room after hours.
Day nurseries within a couple of miles
This one is first. Tick it and one or two others to see them side by side.