Adventure Valley Day Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children enjoy the time they spend at this warm and welcoming nursery. They form strong attachments with staff and demonstrate that they are emotionally secure. Children show that they feel comfortable as they play alongside adults or enjoy sitting on their laps when listening to stories.

The curriculum is rich and exciting. Children take part in an excellent range of activities. Staff make full use of the nearby adventure area to enrich children's experiences. For example, children regularly make trips to the farm to see and feed the animals. Children recall these experiences with excitement and enthusiasm. The highly qualified staff team consistently brings children's learning to life, making it interesting and fun. For example, when learning about transport, staff arrange for children to ride on a bus.

Children benefit from effective settling-in processes. Staff know their key children well. They confidently talk about children's individual characteristics, including their abilities, likes and dislikes. Staff give children's safety the highest priority. They are extremely vigilant and help children to understand about possible dangers, especially during visits within the local community. Staff have high expectations for all children. They encourage good manners and are good role models. All children behave well and play cooperatively with others.

What does the early years setting do well and what does it need to do better?

• Staff are skilled at finding out about the experiences which children have at home. They plan to broaden these. For example, children use their imaginative skills to pretend to be firefighters. Staff extend children's knowledge, and organise a real fire engine and firefighters to visit the setting. Children wait patiently in turn to use the fire hose.
• Staff in the baby room introduce new experiences to enhance babies' sensory development. For example, babies develop their physical strength as they stretch forward and use their hands to scoop slices of lemon and fruity tea bags from the water tray. They enjoy using their senses to explore them.
• Staff skilfully support children to develop their communication and language skills. They encourage children to extend their vocabularies when they play. Children delightfully count and name the dinosaurs in the tuff tray. Staff introduce and repeat interesting words, such as 'stomping' and 'crunching'.
• Children have good attitudes to their learning. They are curious, inquisitive and keen to take part in all activities. Children show high levels of cooperation and respect for one another. They take turns and share equipment. For example, children count the number of scissors available for the activity. They problem solve to work out there is not enough for all of them.
• Staff support children's independence skills. They help children to learn how to take safe risks. For example, children cut vegetables with knives. Staff verbally guide children about how to use the knives and supervise them closely.
• Staff play very close attention to promoting children's good hygiene. For example, they encourage children to wash their hands regularly. Staff have a robust approach to ensuring that children's needs are consistently met. For example, they serve children's food from the kitchen on coloured plates according to their dietary requirements.
• Staff report that they feel well supported, both personally and professionally. Some steps have been taken to reduce their workload. However, on occasions, staff are not consistently available to interact and focus on children's care and learning, due to completing excessive paperwork.
• Parents are overwhelmingly positive about the nursery. During the COVID-19 pandemic, staff kept in touch with all families. They shared ideas to extend children's learning at home. Parents comment that they feel 'privileged' that their children attend.
• The special educational needs coordinator (SENCo) completes relevant training. She carries out her role effectively. The SENCo ensures that children with special educational needs and/or disabilities receive the additional support that they need. For example, staff use visual aids and sign language to help some children's understanding.
• The passionate manager and deputy lead their staff team very well. They offer valuable support and training for staff's professional development. However, managers do not fully embed training for newer and less-experienced staff, to help strengthen their good practice further.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• ensure that all staff are consistently deployed, so that their time is spent with children and focused on their learning
• strengthen and embed support for newer and less-experienced staff to help raise their good level of practice higher.