Room Leader – Ducklings Room 18 months–2.5 years
Dots & Tots Day Nursery – Brixworth, Northamptonshire
£15.00 per hour | Full-time
Brand-new Children’s Day Nursery
*COMING END OF 2026*
Chief organiser, den builder & occasional chaos coordinator.
We’re looking for a brilliant early years practitioner to take the lead in our Ducklings Room, caring for our wonderfully busy 18-month to 2.5-year-olds.
Dots & Tots is a brand-new children’s day nursery in the Brixworth area of Northamptonshire, so this isn’t simply an opportunity to join an established team — it’s a chance to be there right at the beginning.
You’ll help shape your room, establish routines, build your team and create an environment that brings the Dots & Tots ethos to life from day one.
There are no “but we’ve always done it this way” conversations here. We want people with ideas, personality and the confidence to help us create something really special.
A little about Dots & Tots
Our ethos is simple: children should be allowed to be children.
We believe some of the best learning happens through play, exploration, real-life experiences and adults who genuinely enjoy being alongside children.
That might mean building dens, getting muddy in the garden, growing fruit and vegetables, caring for our nursery animals, investigating something completely unexpected or reading the same story for what feels like the 97th time.
We want children to feel safe enough to explore, confident enough to have a go and completely comfortable being themselves.
Inclusion isn't an add-on here.
Every child should feel that they belong. We celebrate individuality, adapt our environments and practice to meet children's needs and work closely with families and other professionals to ensure children receive the right support.
And we want that same sense of belonging for our team.
We take our work seriously. Ourselves? Slightly less so.
Leading our Ducklings
Anyone who has worked with this age group knows just how much happens between 18 months and 2.5 years.
Language explodes. Independence appears. Friendships begin. Emotions can be enormous. And “me do it!” can quickly become the soundtrack to your day.
Your job is to create a room where all of that is understood, encouraged and celebrated.
As Ducklings Room Leader, you'll take responsibility for the day-to-day leadership of your room while remaining very much part of the play, learning and care happening within it.
You'll be responsible for:
- Leading, supporting and motivating the practitioners within the Ducklings team.
- Creating a warm, nurturing and inclusive environment where every child feels that they belong.
- Ensuring consistently high-quality EYFS practice throughout your room.
- Planning meaningful, play-based experiences around children's interests, development and individual needs.
- Overseeing children's observations, assessments and next steps, ensuring they are meaningful and genuinely inform practice.
- Monitoring children's progress and identifying where additional support or challenge may be required.
- Acting as Key Person for a group of children within the Ducklings Room, building secure relationships and developing a strong understanding of each child's individual needs, interests and development.
- Supporting and overseeing your team in their own Key Person responsibilities, ensuring every child's development, next steps and individual needs are understood and consistently supported.
- Building strong partnerships with parents and carers and sharing meaningful information about their child's development, wellbeing and nursery experiences.
- Supporting children's rapidly developing communication and language skills through stories, songs, conversations, play and everyday interactions.
- Encouraging independence, confidence, friendships and emotional development.
- Working closely with the nursery SENDCo and DSL to identify and support children who may require additional help.
- Attending and contributing to meetings concerning children within your room, including SEND meetings, safeguarding meetings, parent meetings, transition meetings and meetings with external professionals, where appropriate.
- Supporting SEND plans, strategies, interventions and individual approaches within the room.
- Maintaining accurate records and ensuring important information is appropriately shared.
- Leading by example and supporting the professional development of practitioners within your team.
- Maintaining excellent safeguarding, health & safety and infection-control practice.
- Overseeing ratios, routines, deployment and the smooth day-to-day organisation of the room.
- Working closely with the Nursery Manager, Deputy and wider nursery team.
And yes, you'll probably also become exceptionally good at finding missing shoes, negotiating whose turn it is and understanding sentences that nobody else on earth can decipher.
Who are we looking for?
Being a great Room Leader isn't about standing at the side telling everyone else what to do.
You're part of it.
We want someone who leads from within their team, models the practice they expect and is just as willing to sit on the floor, join a story, comfort an upset child or get covered in paint as everyone else.
Essential
✓ Full and relevant Level 3 Early Years qualification or above
✓ Experience working within an early years setting
✓ Strong knowledge and understanding of the EYFS
✓ Good safeguarding knowledge and understanding
✓ Experience supporting children's observations, assessments and next steps
✓ A good understanding of the Key Person approach
✓ Strong communication and organisational skills
✓ Confidence communicating with children, families, colleagues and other professionals
Desirable
✓ Previous Room Leader experience
✓ Experience working specifically with children aged approximately 18 months–2.5 years
✓ Experience supporting children with SEND
✓ Experience working alongside external professionals
We're looking for someone warm, reliable and organised, but we're also looking for personality.
Someone who understands young children, values inclusion, brings ideas to the table and isn't afraid to have a little fun along the way.
Working at Dots & Tots
A nursery can only be a lovely place for children when the people caring for them feel valued too.
We want to create a workplace where our team can develop, feel appreciated and actually enjoy coming to work.
Our Benefits Package
28 days annual leave
Inclusive of bank holidays.
Christmas Eve off on us- An additional paid closure day, separate from your annual leave entitlement.
Two paid wellbeing days- After one year's service, you'll receive two additional paid wellbeing days each year — one to use between January and June and one between July and December.
Staff childcare discount- 50%- Helping make childcare a little easier for members of our own team, subject to availability and the nursery's staff childcare scheme.
Training & development
We want people to grow with us, with opportunities for ongoing training, professional development and progression.
Dedicated development time
Planned opportunities for team learning, observations, reflection and professional development.
Long-service rewards
£250 after 2 years' service
£500 after 5 years' service.
Team events
Team events and a Christmas party — because the grown-ups deserve to have fun too.
Genuine progression opportunities
You're joining a brand-new nursery at the beginning of its journey. As Dots & Tots grows, we want our people to grow with it.
Why join a brand-new nursery?
Because you get to help create the culture rather than simply step into one.
You'll have the opportunity to influence your environment, contribute ideas, establish how your room operates, support the development of your team and watch the nursery grow from its very beginning.
We want Dots & Tots to be somewhere children remember fondly, families feel genuinely welcomed and staff are proud to belong.
There will be muddy clothes.
There will be very enthusiastic singing.
There will almost certainly be paint somewhere it shouldn't be.
But there will also be big opportunities, a supportive team and the chance to help us create something pretty special.
Our Recruitment Journey
We know interviews work both ways.
We want to find out whether you're right for Dots & Tots, but it's just as important that you have the opportunity to decide whether we're right for you.
Our recruitment process has three stages:
- Initial phone conversation – Let's have a chat
- In-person interview – Let's talk properly
- Stay & Play – Come and meet us
Safeguarding & Safer Recruitment
Safeguarding children is everyone's responsibility.
Dots & Tots Day Nursery is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, and safeguarding runs throughout our recruitment process — not simply at the DBS stage.
Appointments will be subject to satisfactory safer recruitment and suitability checks, which will include, as appropriate:
- Enhanced DBS checks.
- Identity verification.
- Right-to-work checks.
- Verification of relevant early years qualifications.
- Full employment-history checks and exploration of any gaps.
- Appropriate professional references.
- Consideration of the candidate's suitability to work with children throughout the interview and selection process.
- Any additional checks required for the position.
As part of our safer recruitment process, we will make direct telephone contact with the applicant's most recent childcare employer to verify their reference and discuss their previous employment and suitability to work with children.
Offers of employment will be subject to satisfactory completion of the required safer recruitment checks.
Dots & Tots is committed to creating an inclusive workplace and welcomes applications from people of all backgrounds.
Think you'd fit right in?
If you're looking for a Room Leader position where you can bring your ideas, personality and experience — while helping to shape a brand-new nursery from the very beginning — we'd love to hear from you.
Apply now and come and grow with us.
Dots & Tots Day Nursery
Brixworth, Northamptonshire
Where little hearts feel at home.
Pay: £15.00 per hour
Benefits:
- Additional leave
- Childcare
- Company events
- Company pension
- Employee discount
- Employee mentoring programme
- Free parking
- Health & wellbeing programme
- On-site parking
Application question(s):
- Do you hold a current and valid Level 3 qualification?
Work authorisation:
- United Kingdom (required)
Work Location: In person
