Staff

Our caring, creative, and observant staff are our greatest resource at Lake Street Nursery. The children benefit from having a small team of passionate educators and caregivers, each bringing unique perspective, skills, and personality. We have an ongoing programme of staff training and career development opportunities to support our staff really build on their particular areas of interest within the Early Years framework.

Catherine Morey

Manager

PGCert in Education (PGCE) Systems Leadership
Level 6 qualification in Child Care and leadership, holds Early Years Professional Status (equivalent to Early Years Teacher Status) and her Level 3 Diploma in Early Years Education.

Catherine has been the manager at Lake Street since 2000. She led in transforming Lake Street from its humble beginnings as Lake Street Playgroup, to the vibrant and nurturing five-day-a-week independent nursery setting it is now.

Catherine is a valued leader in Oxfordshire Early years community and offers peer-to-peer support of other independent early years settings in Oxfordshire from time to time.

Catherine is our Special Educational Needs Coordinator, SENCO and is the Designated Safeguarding Lead for the setting

Kady Maloney

Key person, Yellow group
Kady joined the Nursery team in 2023 and has quickly become a valuable member of our team, and loved by the children. She has had two children at Nursery and previous experience working in the childcare sector. She has begun studying for her Level 2 Early Years Practitioner Qualification with Abingdon and Witney Collage.

Kady provides the children with a secure Key Person who quickly forms caring professional relationships with the children in her group and brings a wealth of creative ideas to her planning for the children’s learning.

Saira Afzal

Key person, Red group
Level 3 Diploma, Child Care and Education

Saira has undertaken numerous training courses whilst working at Lake Street, and is looking forward to further study in Early Years Education, alongside her work at nursery. In 2023 she has been taking part in Forest School training for the under 5s and enjoys supporting children in their outdoor learning, especially growing fruit and vegetables and caring for the plants.

Saira also has experience deputising and supervising the room. She is also our Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead.

Parents say:

“Saira is incredibly creative and thoughtful in her approach. I love the way she takes the time to really understand my son, and the way she takes his point of view seriously. He had a spell where he refused to use the toilet at nursery. I couldn’t figure it out. Saira talked to him and got under the skin of what he was worried about, and then they used his own ideas to make a plan together that really worked!”

“ I chatted to Saira once about how she chooses activities for the day and was fascinated at how effortlessly she held in mind the physical development, emotional needs, learning needs, attention span, social skills and so on of each of the children in her group as she planned what looked on the surface like a ‘simple’ task of cutting and gluing, or a ‘simple’ yoga session. She really is very knowledgeable!”

Munirah Begum

Key person, Red group

Munirah tarted at Nursery on placement as a student and stayed with us for three years while studying first for Level 2 and then her Level 3 for the childcare workforce.

In July 2024 Munirah completed her training and received her Level 3 certificate and is now fully qualified.

She joined our team to work alongside Saira in a job share across the week – currently working Wednesday to Friday but also offering support on Mondays and Tuesdays often.

Melissa Earnshaw

Key person, Green group

Melissa joined our team in September 2024 and is moving from the Care Sector into childcare. She is studying for her Level 3 for the Childcare workforce and has many skills to bring to the Nursery. Melissa is very creative with a much experience of caring for others and an interest in involving the children in creative experiences. She is well training in health and safety and safeguarding practises that transfer from one care sector to another.

Melissa works everyday at Nursery and works with Ben to lead our Staying for Tea sessions as well Tuesday to Thursday each week

Sophie Foster

SEND Support (1 day from 2025)

BA (hons) in Early Childhood Studies

Sophie is an Oxford Brookes University graduate. and joined Lake Street in 2021, and bringing a wealth of child development expertise with a gentle, thoughtful approach. She has been key in introducing the WELLCOMM Communication and Language assessment tool to our setting. This simple assessment is used throughout Oxfordshire to support early identification for children who need a boost to their language skills and provides fun games and activities to engage the children during their play

Linsey Hickman

Key Person, Blue Group

Linsey joined our team in March 2025 and has over 20 years experience in early years education.

She hold a Level 3 NNEB qualification for the the Early Years Workforce as an Early Years Educator.

Linsey brings a wealth of ideas and tools to her role and is especially interested in working outside to promote interest in the natural world and nature. She is used to supporting children with a range of needs and promoting communication and language skills as well as supporting children with Special Educational Needs in a range of settings.

Elisha Allen – Administrator

Ellsiha joined us as Administrator in September 2023 and has quickly become an essential member of our deal. She keeps our office in order and deals with enquiries, books, invoices and stock ordering. She also helps organise our Management Committee Meetings for us.