Highnam Day Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy and enjoy their time at nursery. Staff are friendly and kind. They eagerly welcome children and their parents when they arrive. The managers and staff have high expectations for all children. They provide a welcoming and interesting environment and children confidently make their own choices about what they would like to play with. Staff deploy themselves well so that they are readily on hand to support children's play and learning. Babies enjoy listening to familiar stories. They eagerly find plastic animals to match what they see in the story, and they excitedly copy the sounds that the animals make. The oldest children have good friendships in the nursery. They enjoy playing imaginatively together. They create maps and work together to follow their maps using magnifying glasses to find the treasure.

Leaders and staff have good procedures in place to keep children safe. For instance, staff recognise that the garden can be too hot for children at certain times of the day, so they carefully consider when it is safe to take children outdoors to play. Children behave well. They listen and follow the rules in the nursery and staff set clear and consistent boundaries to help children know what is expected of them.

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

• The nursery benefits from a strong management team. Staff have good support both personally and professionally from the manager to help them to carry out their jobs effectively. Staff benefit from regular training and supervision to develop their practice and improve experiences for children. The team has created a new curriculum which focuses on helping children to be curious, independent and resilient. Overall, staff support children's learning well. However, the manager needs to provide more support for staff in implementing their new curriculum, as some staff lack confidence during times when there are no adult-led activities. This is particularly so in the older baby and toddler rooms.
• The support in place for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) is strong. The manager works closely with the special educational needs coordinator (SENCo) to access training and support from other professionals. The SENCo ensures that children have targeted plans in place and provides children with the support and adjustments that they need to help them to make progress in their learning.
• Staff know the children well. They observe children and accurately assess their progress to identify gaps and to target their support effectively. Staff follow children's interests to extend their learning. Children happily engage staff in their games and enjoy exploring the activities set out for them.
• Staff provide children with opportunities to be physical and to test their physical abilities. They eagerly encourage the youngest children to develop their early walking skills as they hold their hands and provide them with resources to hold and push. The oldest children giggle and jump around as they move to music to wake their bodies up ready to play.
• Staff support children's communication and language development well. Staff working with the younger children model language, encourage children to copy sounds and support children to learn new words through songs and stories. Staff working with the older children introduce more complex words and encourage children to have conversations and to share their ideas. Staff support the children with delays in their language development to communicate their needs through different methods, such as signs and gestures. Children of all ages learn to be confident at communicating their needs and interests.
• Overall, partnerships with parents are strong and well established. Parents say that they are well informed about their children's progress, and they enjoy visiting for stay-and-play sessions to see their children play. Staff take time to speak to parents when they arrive to collect their children, to share information about their child's day. Staff working with the youngest children gather key information to help them to support children to settle in and to feel safe and secure. However, staff working with the older children do not gather the same detailed information to help children with settling in as they first start at the nursery.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• continue to develop the implementation of the curriculum, particularly in the older babies and toddler rooms
• further develop the good partnerships with parents, to gather more information and help the older children to settle when they first attend the nursery.