Cranmer Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are warmly welcomed into the pre-school by a caring, friendly and well-established staff team. A wide range of activities are made available for children to investigate that inspire them to explore the environment. Children make their own choices about activities they want to engage in. Young children enjoy playing with their friends in the sandpit with the diggers. Older children use their imagination as they pretend to make breakfast in the mud kitchen.

Children are happy and feel safe and secure. Staff offer cuddles to children who seek out comfort when they are unsure or have tripped over. Children enjoy fresh air outdoors, as they practise developing their physical skills, ride tricycles and push cars along. Children enjoy using their developing small-muscle skills when they draw pictures on the playground with chalk.

Children learn to take turns and be kind to their friends. They share tools as they mix paint and wait for their turn to walk along the balancing beams. Staff provide children with reminders and explanations of what is right and wrong to help them manage their own behaviour. For example, staff ask children not to knock a wall down that another child has built, by explaining how it might make their friend feel.

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

• The manager and staff work hard to implement a curriculum that builds on what children know and can already do. Staff listen to children's interests and plan activities, which enable children to follow their own ideas and find out more. For instance, children show an interest in finding out about how kites fly. Children use a variety of collage materials to decorate their kites and enjoy trying to fly them outside.
• The staff team work well together and understand how children learn. They introduce children to new words, ideas and mathematical concepts during activities children have chosen for themselves. For example, staff talk to children about how many bricks they need to finish building a wall. Children make choices in their play and learning. This helps to develop their confidence. However, staff do not always use planned group activities to challenge children and extend their learning.
• The outdoor area is well used. All children have the opportunity to play outside every day. There is a wide range of resources, which meet children's needs well. Older children play cooperatively with their friends and get engrossed in imaginative play as the take the dolls for a walk. Younger children develop their sustained thinking as they persevere with making Hula-Hoops spin.
• Children behave well, they are well mannered and polite. Staff help children improve their own behaviour through clear expectations and consistent messages. Staff are good role models and use the 'pre-school promises' to remind children to say please and thank you when talking to each other.
• Staff generally support children's language development well. They talk to children modelling new vocabulary and ask some thoughtful questions to extend children's learning. For example, they discuss how to rescue Rapunzel from behind the brick wall they have built. This supports the development of children's communication and language skills. However, on occasion, some staff do not challenge the children as well as they could. They do not give them time to express their own thoughts and ideas, in order to help build their critical-thinking and problem-solving skills.
• Staff work closely with parents to settle children into the pre-school. They provide regular updates to parents about their children's day and well-being, and support them with how to support their child's development at home. For example, staff support parents with information about what their child needs to learn next.
• The manager works with staff, she helps them to aim for excellence through training, modelling and mentoring. She uses supervision meetings to encourage staff to reflect on their practice and make plans about how they can continue to improve. Staff are supported to undertake training as a team, focusing on specific areas of improvement. For example, the whole staff team have recently completed paediatric first aid training and have achieved Millie's Mark.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support staff to improve the implementation of group activities, to ensure that they consistently engage children and provide appropriate levels of challenge
• ensure staff allow children more time to share their own knowledge, think their ideas through, and respond to questions they are asked, to maximise their learning.