Great Haywood Under 5s CIO

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children flourish in this setting because they are at the centre of everything staff do. Staff go to great lengths to ensure new children settle in at their own pace and receive excellent support and reassurance. Children form very strong bonds with the adults that care for them, helping them to feel safe and secure. This also supports children to have the confidence and desire to explore their environment independently. Staff recognise and understand children's uniqueness and they are highly effective at prioritising and meeting children's individual needs. Staff consider children's well-being to be fundamental to excellent progress.

Children are curious and excited to explore the resources and show excellent levels of engagement for their age. They move very confidently between play areas and make their own play choices from the highly stimulating variety of activities on offer. Children have very good language skills for their age and use them effectively to communicate their ideas as they play. They are immensely valued by deeply nurturing staff who have high expectations of them all. As a result, all children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities, make rapid progress. Children are highly motivated and eager learners.

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

• Staff plan a coherent and well-sequenced curriculum. They skilfully take into account children's individual needs and changing interests. All staff have an impressive understanding of the curriculum and plan activities which are consistently aligned with this. Therefore, every activity has a very clear purpose and staff extend children's learning with suitable levels of challenge.
• Staff work as a strong and supportive team to ensure all children achieve the best outcomes. They have a detailed knowledge of their key children and use information from their observations to guide their planning. They closely monitor children's progress to identify any gaps in learning, so that these can be swiftly addressed.
• Children become deeply engrossed in their learning. They talk excitedly about the life cycle of a butterfly and look at cocoons. Children delight in building cocoons for themselves. They work out how to build structures using different magnetic shapes, such as squares, triangles, and rectangles. Children learn highly valuable skills, such as attentive listening and thinking critically.
• Staff are excellent role models for children. Staff listen to children and discuss what they like about their pre-school. This helps children to gain a sense of pride and belonging. Children welcome other children into their ongoing play, happy to share resources. They behave exceedingly well and form respectful relationships.
• Children thoroughly enjoy spending time outdoors. They enthusiastically practise the egg and spoon race ready for their sports day. They experiment making 'soup' with real herbs and tick off the insects they find on their checklist. Practitioners know that spending lots of time outdoors, observing nature or being immersed in activities, improves children's physical health and well-being.
• Staff offer consistently high levels of support for children who have additional needs. The special educational needs coordinator in the setting works very closely with parents and external agencies to ensure all children receive the support they need.
• Staff are highly skilled at supporting children's communication and language development. They engage children in conversations and skilfully encourage them to think, question and make decisions. Children enjoy sensory experiences as they use pipettes to make 'tea', with lemons and limes. They experiment and can explain how mixing certain colours results in green or purple.
• Partnerships with parents are exceptionally strong. Parents have the utmost praise for the setting. They say that they are very well informed about their children's progress and next steps in learning. Parents say this reflects how staff care deeply for the children and how well looked after children are.
• The manager thoroughly evaluates all aspects of the pre-school. Staff attend regular training to ensure their knowledge is up to date. The manager takes pride in her team, observes staff teaching and strives for excellence for children. As a result, staff enjoy working here and feel valued.