City Way Day Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children, their families, and the local community are at the very heart of this exceptional setting. Leaders and managers are incredibly passionate and proactive. They strive to continually provide all children with the highest quality care and education. For example, staff learn and speak a range of different languages to support children to settle in and use sign language to help children communicate and understand. Staff are highly ambitious for children, providing an inclusive and personalised curriculum. They provide one-to-one support and create individual plans to tailor and target children's next steps. This very effectively supports all children to make significant progress from their starting points.

Staff provide children with a high-quality environment that is rich in language. Children demonstrate very positive attitudes to learning. For example, babies delight in choosing their favourite books, demonstrating excitement when joining in with rhymes they know. Older children remain engrossed and deeply engaged when making play dough. They learn about using different herbs and spices, talking about the differences between oregano and cinnamon. Staff skilfully extend children's knowledge by explaining how to use scales to measure ingredients. Children concentrate very well identifying how much they need. These opportunities ensure children embed learning, providing them with a strong foundation for the future.

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

• Leaders and managers are dedicated to supporting families in innovative and inspiring ways. They help parents access a range of funding to support them to learn English, gain qualifications and employment. Leaders and managers employ translators to help parents learn first aid, and provide vouchers and free sessions to help them. As a direct result, children with English as an additional language make excellent progress.
• Staff work tirelessly, providing children with an extensive range of activities. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities display high levels of engagement when learning to use light-up toys. Staff use sign language to help them communicate. supporting their development successfully.
• Staff support children's emotional well-being very well. Nurturing staff cuddle and comfort babies and are immediately responsive to their needs. Staff help older children identify how their friends feel by using mirrors to identify different emotions. Children immediately go to help their friends when needed displaying very good social skills.
• Staff help children to be very inclusive and to learn about diverse families. Children learn to say 'hello' and 'goodbye' in their friends' home languages, helping them feel welcome. Children learn about different religions, showing deep interest and respect.
• There are excellent arrangements to support children to develop a love of books and language. Children enthusiastically join in with stories, songs and rhymes. They are expertly supported by staff, who are excellent role models, making the most of opportunities that arise to build on children's keen interest to extend their learning. For example, they explain different sea creatures to children, who use words such as 'octopus' and 'stingray' in conversation showing their understanding of new vocabulary.
• Assessment and tracking information is used successfully by staff to implement highly effective interventions to support children's next steps. Funding is used very well to deliver literacy booster sessions so that children learn important skills for school, supporting children to make seamless transitions.
• Children are supported incredibly well to learn how to keep themselves healthy. They are highly motivated to join in with yoga sessions learning to keep themselves fit. Staff explain expertly how different foods help children to grow. Children eagerly explain how nutrients in blueberries help their brains develop and vitamins in carrots help their eyesight. Children model how to brush their teeth and use floss, developing important knowledge about oral health.
• Leaders and managers are unwavering in their commitment to making a difference. They are incredibly proactive, working very closely with outside agencies, partners and wider organisations to ensure families receive as much help as they can. They provide a minibus service to help parents with school drop offs and holiday care and offer specialist support on topics such as bereavement, separation and divorce. Staff report incredibly high levels of well-being and support.
• Relationships with parents are excellent. Staff provide extensive opportunities for parents to help their children at home, delivering a range of sessions, for example first aid and healthy eating. Parents talk incredibly highly of the progress their children make and how they feel part of the family. They talk passionately about specific support they get, for example, individual recipes created by the settings in-house chef, to help their children eat a wide range of foods.