Brightwalton Pre-School Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children arrive at the setting with big smiles and are eager to learn. They quickly form loving bonds with staff, which helps them to feel safe and secure. Children have free access to a wide range of interesting resources. Their suggestions are valued by staff, who are responsive to their needs. Children happily play on their own and with others. They are excited by learning and make interesting comments. For example, they talk about the sharp blades turning out grass, when a tractor is mowing the lawn. Children learn well and make good progress.

Children adore being outdoors. They competently use the wooden climbing frame and make up their own games. Children are kind and considerate towards each other and carefully navigate risks. For example, they push their friends on swings with the right amount of force, ensuring that both them and their friends are safe. This demonstrates compassion for each other, while fostering emotional well-being.

Children have ample opportunities to be physically active. They balance, run and climb in the woodlands garden. Children learn to adopt healthy lifestyles. They have healthy snacks and talk about nutritious foods in their lunch boxes. Children are encouraged to be independent from the outset. They wash their own hands before meals and serve their own snack. This helps to develop good self-help skills for future life.

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

• Leaders and staff are passionate about children achieving to the best of their abilities. Staff actively assess what children know and can do. They plan effective and exciting activities that enable children to progress. For instance, children follow their own ideas to make their drawbridge work on a free-standing model of a castle. Staff skilfully support them if they run out of their own ideas. This helps to enhance children's motivation to learn further.
• Leaders and staff think of innovative ideas to promote children's learning about the world around them. Children take part in voting for activities they want to do. They develop an understanding that the most votes establish the outcome, for example, when they vote for a tea party or a superheroes day. This effectively supports children's knowledge of living in a democratic society.
• Leaders are committed to continual improvement. They plan projects and actively involve others. For instance, both staff and children contribute to the project of designing a wild garden in the playing field. The staff are knowledgeable about the curriculum and its delivery. However, leaders do not always accurately identify individual staff's professional development needs to help improve their practice further. This leads to an inconsistent approach across the provision.
• Staff place a strong emphasis on early literacy skills. Children show an awareness of letter sounds and put these together to make simple words. Children have a repertoire of favourite songs, which they sing in tune. They have a real passion for books and use their knowledge of stories to make up role play. For example, they use the enclosed part of the climbing frame and act out the story 'The Three Billy Goats Gruff'. Children correctly sequence the events and chant the repeated phrases in the story with confidence and expression. This helps to prepare children for their move to school.
• Children are keen to share their ideas. They make up pretend scenarios in the castle role-play area and think about who they can rescue and how. However, they tend to talk over each other and not listen or take turns to speak. Children are not always encouraged to consider using good listening skills and value each other's contributions. This can lead to children missing out on useful information that could help them to learn further.
• Parents are complimentary about the care and education their children receive. They comment that it is a 'little gem of a pre-school'. Parents say that their children come home full of enthusiasm and share interesting facts, such as that Prince Phillip was married to Queen Elizabeth. They comment on the good progress their children have made emotionally and educationally, and that their children are well equipped for school.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• identify more accurately the professional development opportunities to strengthen the individual staff's skills and knowledge in order to build consistency of practice across the provision
• strengthen support for children to develop good conversation skills, take turns to speak, listen attentively and value others' contributions in discussions.