Hawkslade Farm Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children settle well into the pre-school. They form strong bonds with staff, which helps them to feel safe and secure. Children follow simple instructions and behave very well. Staff support them well to take turns, share resources and be respectful of each other. Children explore and communicate with confidence. Staff have created a nursery library to encourage children to borrow books to read at home. This helps to support children's early literacy skills.

Children spend much of their time outside at the pre-school. Staff provide them with lots of opportunities to be active and to develop their physical skills. For example, they take turns to ride bikes and build with large blocks. This helps them to build on their core strength and coordination. Older children help younger children to join in when exploring play dough together and teach them how to create shapes. Children show high levels of concentration when creating 3D models. They remain intently focused and motivated. Staff encourage children to be increasingly independent, in readiness for their eventual move on to school. They offer lots of praise as children try to do things for themselves, helping to build children's sense of responsibility effectively. For example, children help to serve themselves food at snack time.

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

• The managers have taken effective action to address the weaknesses identified at the last inspection. They have reviewed their risk assessments and made necessary changes to ensure that hazards are removed. The managers have recently put in place a new curriculum. This focuses on purposeful learning experiences. Staff have received support in this new approach to their practice. However, at times, staff do not use what they know about children's next steps in their teaching. This means that there are some inconsistencies in the implementation of the intended curriculum.
• Partnership with parents is good at the pre-school. Managers actively seek the views of parents, and any feedback is quickly acted on. Parents feel fully included in their children's learning at every stage. They are aware of their children's next steps, and staff help parents to extend their children's learning at home.
• Staff know children well. They understand child development and make sure that learning activities reflect children's interests. There is scope to improve the learning environment to fully support the ambitious curriculum intent. This is particularly in relation to building on staff's knowledge of the characteristics of effective teaching and learning. For example, children delight in the building activity, cheerfully making creations. However, children do not have time to extend their experience of this activity because staff tidy it away, calling them to another activity or change in routine.
• Children are provided with a wide range of activities and experiences, which they are keen to get involved with. Children develop their physical skills as they ride bikes. They experiment with sand by moving it through containers and explore the texture with their hands.
• Staff engage with children well. They use effective strategies to encourage communication, such as asking open-ended questions, expressing and listening to opinions, and asking children to describe recent experiences. Staff further extend children's learning by providing opportunities to practise early writing skills. For example, children have a go at using stencils and drawing with chalks outside.
• Staff state that they feel supported and benefit from ongoing training and support. They adapt learning from courses to the specific needs of children. For example, they used recent training to support children with positive behaviour.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support staff to develop the already good-quality teaching and to extend children's learning during the implementation of the curriculum to the highest level
• review the structure and routines of the day to allow children time to consolidate and deepen their knowledge through uninterrupted play.