Caterpillars Nursery At St Johns

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy to enter the nursery. They are enthusiastically greeted by staff and quickly settle. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, staff have identified children's ability to self-regulate their emotions as an area for development. Changes to the settling-in process for new children have been really successful at supporting their inclusion into nursery life. For example, they adapt the amount of sessions they attend before starting according to each individual child's needs. Children have a key person, who remains the same throughout their time in the nursery. This allows children to be resilient, and staff know their key children very well. Children form a strong bond with staff and are clearly comfortable approaching them when needed. This helps to support children's personal, social and emotional development well.

Children confidently engage in play and clearly feel safe and secure. They behave well and listen to and follow instructions from staff. Children make friendships and interact well together. They respect their peers and staff alike. Children enjoy daily physical play and fresh air and exercise. For example, they have access to a large outside space, which offers many opportunities to explore nature and the world around them. Children share their interest of animals with staff, who encourage them to build on their learning through this. For example, children have access to a wormery, and they watch caterpillars grow into butterflies. Staff extend this learning for children, explaining to them how to care for and feed these insects. All children make good progress, including children who speak English as an additional language and children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND).

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

• Staff believe that children learn through play. They plan activities around a topic and adapt this according to children's interests. For example, during the Easter break, children visited the local community café, and then staff recreated this café within the nursery. This included using real tea, coffee and food, a menu and a kitchen with a cardboard oven. In addition to extending children's real-life experiences of the world around them, children develop their fine motor skills by pouring and scooping, and they understand the concept of sinking and floating.
• Staff identify that being independent and being able to take care of themselves are important skills for children to have in preparation for starting school. Children experience many activities to promote their independence and prepare them for school. For instance, they take themselves to the toilet, help to cut up fruit ready for snack and take off their outdoor shoes. Staff work in close partnership with parents to ensure children are school ready. For example, they offer advice and leaflets to help parents support their children when starting school.
• Staff identify communication and language as an area for development. They support this by putting strategies into place. For example, they talk to children during activities and ask them questions. Staff wait for children to reply to questions they ask about the stories they read together. Overall, staff implement mathematical skills effectively throughout the nursery, asking children, for example, to identify colours, shapes and numbers. However, on occasion, the promotion of children's number and counting skills needs to be extended further.
• Staff have high expectations for how children should behave in the nursery. They remind children of the nursery rules and boundaries, such as sitting down to eat their lunch so they do not choke on food. Staff ensure that the nursery is a safe place to be by regularly risk assessing with the children. For example, they encourage children to conduct mini audits of their environment, to understand and recognise the risks and hazards.
• The manager fully supports staff, and they feel they can approach her at any time. Staff say their well-being and mental health are very important to the manager. They regularly attend meetings to discuss concerns about children and planning. Staff have continuous access to regular training, such as through an online facility and face-to-face meetings. This supports their continued professional development and furthers their knowledge of providing the best outcomes for children.
• Parents compliment staff at the nursery. They say how they support children effectively who need extra help, such as when settling in. Parents state how they receive regular feedback on their children's development, such as during parents' evening and through a regular newsletter. They say that the progress children make is very clear. For example, parents have seen an improvement in speech and language skills, in children's confidence and in their recognition of letters and sounds. Parents state that children love coming to the nursery, which reassures them that they are in a kind and nurturing environment.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• enhance children's understanding of mathematics further, and support staff to be more consistent in their promotion of children's number and counting skills.