Busy Bees Day Nursery at Evesham

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are very happy and content at this warm and welcoming nursery. They form secure relationships with the kind and caring staff team. Children benefit from a well organised learning environment. They access a wide range of good-quality toys and resources. Children are eager to play and motivated to learn. Good settling-in procedures help children to quickly settle into the nurturing staffs' care. Babies giggle and babble as they engage in their play. They receive lots of cuddles throughout the day. This helps them to feel emotionally secure.

Pre-school children display skills they will need when they move on to school. They develop early friendships and play cooperatively together. Pre-school children independently manage their self-care and understand the importance of washing their hands at regular intervals throughout the day. Children take responsibility for small tasks. They help to tidy away the toys when they have finished using them. Children display good manners. They say 'please' and 'thank you' throughout the day. Young children excitedly squeeze and mould coloured dough with their hands. This helps them to develop the strength needed in readiness for early writing. Staff demonstrate how to effectively use tools. They introduce mathematical language, such as the words 'big' and 'small' to describe the size of their dough. Children enthusiastically join in with action songs and rhymes. They excitedly stomp their feet as they pretend to go on a bear hunt.

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

• The newly appointed management team have improved the organisation of the nursery. They reviewed the layout of the baby room to ensure that babies engage in meaningful play. The management team work alongside their staff team on a daily basis, to ensure that they are effectively deployed and have a good understanding of their roles and responsibilities.
• Managers regularly meet with staff to discuss best practice and identify their individual training needs. This helps staff to continue with their professional development and improve the overall quality of care and education they provide. Managers make regular observations of staff practice and provide them with some feedback. However, on occasion, the feedback the manager provides on the delivery of planned activities is not always constructive. Although she talks to staff about children's learning intentions and offers them praise, she does not always engage staff in an evaluative discussion to identify ways to raise the quality of their teaching to an outstanding level.
• An effective key person system is in place. Key persons know their children well. They spend quality time with them to establish secure relationships and help children to feel safe and secure. Key persons successfully meet children's individual needs.
• Staff provide children with a good balance of child-initiated and adult-directed play. They plan a wide range of interesting play activities around children's current interests to support their learning. Staff regularly assess their progress to identify what children need to learn next. They add this information to children's online learning records. This supports parents to continue or extend children's learning at home.
• Children have fun as they play outside in the garden. They develop good physical skills. Children learn to balance and climb on apparatus. They confidently ride on wheeled toys. Staff support children to express their creativity. Pre-school children display high levels of concentration. They observe a vase of flowers, paying attention to detail as they draw a still life picture.
• Staff provide children with some activities to support their understanding of how to keep themselves safe. For example, they teach children to use knives safely and talk to them about road safety during play activities. However, staff are yet to provide children with enough experiences to help them gain an effective understanding of when they might be at risk when using the internet or digital technology.
• Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) are supported well. Staff build good relationships with parents and other professionals. They share information in a range of ways. For example, staff regularly meet with parents and other professionals to discuss children's learning and development. All children, including those with SEND, make good progress from their starting points.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen the monitoring of staff practice to engage them in constructive and evaluative discussions to help them identify ways to raise the quality of their teaching to an outstanding level
• provide children with more experiences to help them gain an effective understanding of when they might be at risk when using the internet or digital technology.