Replace Chestnuts Primary School EYFS Playground

Aim: We are fundraising to replace broken, unsafe play equipment in the Early Years and Foundation Stage playground at Chestnuts Primary School

Who are we?

The Chestnuts Primary School Parent and School Association (PSA) works to fundraise to support the education and enrichment of all pupils at Chestnuts Primary School. Our school is in South Tottenham, London, and has 450 pupils from a broad range of cultural backgrounds. The school is the heart of the local community. The school team and PSA work hard to offer an exciting and inclusive educational experience for every pupil and their family. 

Why do we need your help?

The Chestnuts Primary School PSA is fundraising to replace the play equipment in the Early Years and Foundation Stage (EYFS) playground with a play equipment which offers engaging play and learning opportunities for our youngest pupils to enjoy.

Sadly due to the budget restrictions schools have been operating under this renovation is long overdue. If you visit this playground regularly you will have seen equipment that has rotten and become unsafe being removed which has sadly left fewer and fewer opportunities to play.

This playground is used throughout the day by reception class. However it also benefits other year groups - nursery use this playground daily for their lunchtime playtime. In addition, the other year groups in the key stage 1 (year 1 and year 2) for after school club as well as all year groups benefit from these facilities when attending playscheme. In addition, all year groups in the school access spaces in this playground for forest school and the creation of the new fencing in this project will allow for the protection and on-going improvement of these areas as well.

At Chestnuts Primary School we believe that play is a essential part of education for children. We know that play is vital for children's cognitive, emotional, social and physical development as well as being crucial for well being. 

Our plans

We need to fundraise to bring to life the exciting plans that the school have developed for a new playground. These plans provide a wide variety of play experiences which will allow for all the play based educational experiences necessary in the early years as well as exciting and stimulating play experiences across key stage 1 and the school. Plans include a  new climbing frame as well as a number of separate frames to balance on, hang from and climb over. There is a model road way with street furniture and signs to be used with trikes. An interactive water play area with moveable parts to allow for maximum creativity to experiment with cause and effect. A maths, literacy and creativity corner to allow for space purpose built to support the learning goals of play in the early years and foundation stage (EYFS - nursery and reception). There is a space for a mud kitchen and sensory planting to offer a connection between play and the natural environment.

In order to be able to move forwards with this plan the school and PSA have committed to covering the expensive preliminary work to remove the existing play equipment and resurface the playground from existing funds. 

What is our goal?

We need to raise £40,000 to be able to completely redevelop the EYFS playground with all the features planned for and outlined here. However, we recognise that this is an ambitious target. 

Whatever we raise in this fundraising campaign will be put towards this target, however, completing the full plan outlined here will only be possible if we meet the full target. 

Our aim is to move forwards quickly with the re-development of the playground quickly with the removal of the old play equipment and resurfacing over the summer and then the construction of the new play equipment at the beginning of September 2025. Although this may cause some disruption at the beginning of the new academic year we believe the benefit to the environment our children learn and play in will be worth it. 

How can you help us?

Every contribution big or small is so appreciated and helps us move towards our goal of being able to give our children the playground and school environment they deserve. 

• Buy a reward - Make a donation and buy one of our amazing rewards sourced from our supportive local community. Please don't delay in making a donation because momentum is key to our fundraising and the rewards will be snapped up quickly! 
• Share! Share! Share! - Spread the word of our project on your social media pages and local community groups and tell the world to get behind us! The more people we reach, the more support we will get. 
• Offer a Reward - Get involved if you are a local business by donating things we can offer to our supporters. We will give you a shout out! 
• Fundraise for Us - If you want to run your own fundraiser – maybe a sponsored activity or similar – use the 'contact project' button at the top of our page to let us know. Setting up your own page only takes a few minutes and you won’t need any bank details. Just a fundraising page joined to this one - give us a shout and we will guide you through it! 

We appreciate any contribution big or small and we know that together we can make sure our children can have the facilities they need. 

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 20th July 2025 at 8:16pm