Busy Bees Day Nursery at Chislehurst

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are confident and happy. They enjoy warm relationships with staff, who know them well. Babies explore their environment with confidence. They show high levels of engagement in the range of good activities available. Babies check in with staff and seek them out to play.

Children play cooperatively with each other and are imaginative. Toddlers bring 'food' to adults in pots to eat. Older children use large wooden blocks to build a jet and talk about why the engine is stuck. Children feel safe and secure in the nursery, and their behaviour is good.

Children share ideas and lead their own learning. Older children talk about the activities and equipment they would like at a monthly 'children's council'. Staff implement these changes. For example, children request a change in the role-play area, which is converted to a Spanish market. This participation helps children to develop confidence and to feel included in decision making about their nursery environment.

Children, including those with additional funding, make good progress from their individual starting points. Leaders and staff have high expectations of all children. They provide an inclusive and challenging curriculum. Younger children develop their physical skills outdoors using climbing equipment and balance bikes. Children are resilient learners and staff offer support and encouragement for children to persevere when they fail. Older children build on mathematical concepts during play. They divide a 'pizza' into parts and describe quarters and halves.

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

• Leaders and staff use effective systems to share information with parents. They use an online app effectively to share care routines and children's learning. Staff share activity ideas with parents using another app to support children's learning at home to build on continuity. Leaders and staff have exceptionally good relationships with parents, and parents report that they feel supported.
• Staff know children well and talk about what children know and can do. They use effective systems for planning and assessment to identify children's next steps and any gaps in learning.
• Children are well behaved and interact respectfully with each other. Staff use positive language to support all children to understand right and wrong. For example, staff gently encourage children to use 'kind hands'. Staff praise older children when they offer to share. Such as, offering their preferred choice of story props to their friends.
• Staff are consistent in how they talk to the children and teach them new vocabulary. Children confidently discuss what 'delighted' and 'vanish' mean in the context of a story. Staff are good role models and use thoughtful questioning to extend children's language. For example, 'I wonder why the engine's stuck?' This helps to build on children's thinking and speaking skills.
• Children concentrate and pay close attention when listening to stories, they enjoy rhymes and songs. Very young babies look at pictures in books and competently turn pages. Older children build on what they know. They recall familiar stories, such as 'The Three Billy Goats Gruff'. Babies and toddlers clap, dance and copy actions and older children sing along. Children acquire good communication and language skills for future education and life and are prepared well for their next stage of learning.
• Overall, leaders and staff provide a well-planned curriculum to prepare children well for life in modern Britain. Staff celebrate different festivals to develop children's understanding of the world. They sing songs and talk about other languages. For example, staff sing French songs and teach older children Spanish. However, support for children who speak English as an additional language is not consistent enough to help children to make the best possible progress.
• Staff praise and value children's achievements, which builds on children's self-esteem. Children know how to keep safe and manage risks safely They know how to climb the stairs safely on the way to the garden. Staff promote children's independence through care routines. Older children put on their coats, and younger children wipe their faces after lunch.
• Leaders have effective systems in place for staff supervision and training. Staff benefit from a good induction as well as regular supervisions. Staff feel well supported by leaders. They have access to external counselling and regular meetings to support their well-being. Staff have a range of internal training opportunities to develop their knowledge further. However, leaders do not always ensure that the induction and monitoring of temporary staff's practice is strong enough to help identify minor weaknesses in their teaching skills, such as their knowledge of the curriculum intent for individual children.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• improve further the support for children who speak English as an additional language to make even better progress in their learning and development
• make sure the supervision and induction of temporary staff is robust enough to implement the curriculum intent effectively.