Highfield Road Pre-school

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Staff at the pre-school warmly welcome all children and families. Staff provide an environment where children feel safe, enjoy freely exploring activities, and begin learning how to form positive friendships. Staff support children to settle by, for example, offering a hand as they dance to morning music or holding them in their arms as they sing. Children smile and offer cuddles, ready to start their day.

Staff talk to children about good behaviours and rules to keep them safe. Generally, children respond well to these. They treat their friends with kindness when blowing bubbles for them to pop. They say 'Yes' when their friends confidently ask, 'Can I play?'. Children carefully put snails back under the plants to keep them cool from the sun. Staff play alongside children, promoting good discussions and asking questions to deepen children's focus and interest in their learning.

Staff plan well to provide different learning opportunities based around the children's interests and termly topics. They provide appropriate challenges for children to make good progress. Older children enjoy using water and measuring cylinders to learn about adding and subtracting. Younger children are praised as they learn what features to give their chalk drawings of people.

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

• Staff focus well on promoting children's communication and language skills. They have identified this as an area where children have fallen behind as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Staff model good language and introduce new words, such as 'wriggle' and 'slither', when looking at bugs. They speak clearly and repeat words often, encouraging children to copy and remember them. Staff support children to engage in conversations, talking about their imaginary butterflies, thinking about what they look like and where they fly to.
• Staff monitor all children's progress closely. They are quick to recognise when a child may need extra support in their learning and development and are prompt to contact other relevant professionals. However, they are not fully confident in how to support these children until coordinated personalised plans are in place. There are occasions when some children are not included as well as possible in activities.
• Staff have well-embedded routines to support children to understand what is expected of them and their behaviour. Staff use regular group activities to help children cope with transition times and feel more settled. Staff lead singing and stories to provide a calm period between activities. Most children enjoy these activities and join in well, clapping and copying actions. However, group activities are not always planned well enough. Sometimes, children lose engagement, facing the wrong way or chatting to their friends throughout. This does not help to maximise their learning.
• Staff provide activities to engage children of different ages. Children focus for long periods of time, showing enjoyment in their learning. Children delight in demonstrating how they use their new magnifying glasses to search for hidden treasure. Others proudly show staff their carefully stencilled numbers.
• Children have good opportunities to learn to respect and value others. Staff help children to understand the different faiths and cultures of the children attending the pre-school. They celebrate different festivals relating to the individual children, such as Eid, where the children enjoy showing their friends their henna designs. Parents are invited to support their children's learning, such as by providing traditional party foods for all to share.
• The manager is constantly evaluative of the pre-school and the care and education it offers. She uses both professional and parent feedback to improve the provision. The manager actively seeks further training for herself and her staff to better support the children. For example, staff have recently furthered their skills in supporting two-year-old children.
• Partnerships with parents are strong. The manager is genuinely passionate about caring for every child and their family. The manager ensures that she supports parents in addition to children and adapts methods of working to best suit everyone. Parents speak highly of the pre-school, commenting particularly on the communication and support for home learning. They say the staff are compassionate, attentive and always make time for them.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support staff to plan and organise group activities more effectively
• support and coach staff to gain confidence to include and engage children who may require extra help more effectively.