Cholsey Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The pre-school is a hive of learning, fun and activity. All children benefit from an extremely safe and stimulating environment. Children are completely engrossed in their learning from the moment they enter the pre-school until the end of the session. Children benefit greatly from taking part in rich experiences. Children love to rise to challenges set by the staff. The quality of teaching and learning is excellent. For example, staff challenge children to put two numbers together, such as six and zero is 60 and five and two is 52.

Children are extremely well supported to develop important independence skills and learn how to keep themselves safe. During snack time, staff ask children to choose and serve themselves a drink of their choice. Mealtimes are immense fun, as children chat about what they have in their lunch boxes and talk about experiences outside the setting. Children use sign language confidently and are very proud to demonstrate their knowledge to the inspector. They expertly use their skills to indicate they would like milk and bananas. Children pretend that they are monkeys and know that monkeys open bananas from the other end.

Children behave extremely well and respond to prompts from staff quickly. Those who are unable to manage their behaviour when they first arrive at the pre-school receive targeted support and reassurance. As a result, children settle quickly and their behaviour improves, often significantly.

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

• The pre-school benefits from a management team that is strong and work exceptionally well together. They have a clear vision for the future, which they implement to raise the quality of children's experiences and provide them with the very best start in life.
• Staff collect a wealth of information from parents and spend ample time to get to know children. Their precise observations and assessments of children's learning helps them to identify and close any gaps in children's learning swiftly. As a result, children, including those who speak English as an additional language, make rapid and sustained progress from their various starting points.
• Staff attend many training courses to develop their already excellent knowledge and skills. The manager monitors staffs' practice and shares ideas as a staff team. The manager and staff continually strive for improvements to ensure children receive a superb quality of care and learning.
• The team makes excellent use of all additional funding sources available to the pre-school. This is spent well and has a highly positive impact on children's lives. The strong partnership working with other agencies and organisations further supports this.
• Staff encourage children constantly, and their enthusiasm is infectious. They continually use their excellent interaction skills with children, along with books and songs, to develop children's language and communication. They build children's interest and curiosity, taking every possible opportunity to introduce and reinforce new vocabulary. For example, while making models from wooden blocks, staff introduce new complex words, such as hemisphere and semi-circle. Children compare a flat circle to a sphere and learn about 3D shapes.
• Children play together extremely well. For instance, a large group of children work as a team to eagerly build a bus out of large wooden blocks. The learning is expertly extended, as staff encourage children to lay the blocks of wood to make compartments.
• The pre-school fosters excellent relationships with parents who speak very highly of the setting and about how their children have become extremely confident and articulate.
• Excellent attention is given to continually improving and developing the very best possible practice. The manager and all members of staff are committed to reflecting on and evaluating what they do. Thorough induction and ongoing mentoring is complemented by regular peer-on-peer reviews and supervision meetings. Staff confirm that they feel listened to and very much supported to develop to be the best practitioners they can be.
• Children have fantastic opportunities to learn about the wider community during trips to local shops and parks. They visit their allotment every week to tend the plants and vegetables, bringing produce back to the setting to share. A second allotment is currently being developed to enable those in the community to take advantage, free of charge, of the produce grown there.