Highnam Under Fives, Highnam Under Fives After School Club

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children display a strong sense of belonging at this welcoming and friendly setting. They learn to recognise their name as they self-register when they arrive each morning. Children form strong bonds with the caring staff, who know them well. They lead their own learning and choose from a wide range of play activities, both indoors and outdoors. Children are eager to begin their play.

Children develop independence skills from a young age. They know that they need to collect their coat from their peg when they would like to play outside. Children remember that they need to put their wellingtons on for outdoor play. This means that they are equipped to enter all areas of the garden when outside, including the setting's muddy 'wild area', where children can further develop their physical skills and understanding of the world.

Children are curious and resilient learners. They explore arctic animals and large blocks of ice. Children use their imagination as they play with animal figures. They demonstrate problem-solving skills and are eager to share their ideas about how to melt the ice. Children suggest that they could 'smash it' or 'wait for it to melt'. They make links to previous learning experiences and introduce phrases from familiar stories into their play. Children move a polar bear up and down and pretend that it is walking on blocks of ice. They excitedly state, 'we are going on a bear hunt.'

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

• Children behave well. Staff are consistent in their approach and remind children to be kind to each other and share the resources. There are good strategies in place to support children's understanding of staff expectations for their behaviour. For example, staff suggest that children use a sand timer to help recognise when it is time for someone else to have a turn.
• The manager and staff build effective partnerships with the host school to support children's learning. In the term before children move on to school, staff organise physical activity sessions in the school. This helps children to become familiar with the environment and practise self-care skills, such as changing their clothes independently.
• Staff support children's communication and language skills well. They lead daily small-group activities, where children sing familiar songs and action rhymes together. Staff ask children questions to enhance their levels of engagement. However, at times, staff do not always make the most of these opportunities, to fully support and extend children's learning to the highest level.
• Staff support children to adopt a healthy and balanced lifestyle. They recently completed a healthy eating week, where children learned about healthy and unhealthy foods and the impact these have on their bodies. Children demonstrate their understanding of this during their play. For example, they pretend to make a lunch box with make-believe food. They identify the best order to eat the 'lunch' they have prepared. Children explain that they will eat the healthy food first and will leave the 'doughnut' until last.
• Staff support children's early writing skills well. They provide children with a range of activities to support them to develop their finger muscles and strength in their hands. For example, children scrunch pieces of crepe paper and stick them down with glue to create a snowman. Staff support children to use scissors to cut out a piece of foam for the 'snowman's hat'.
• Overall, partnerships with parents are strong. Parents speak highly of the care and education provided for children by the staff team. They value the warm and friendly ethos of the setting and comment on how well staff know the children and how they meet their individual needs. Although staff use a range of methods to communicate with parents, they are yet to encourage parents to share enough information about children's ongoing interests, learning and development at home to fully extend and complement this in the setting.
• The staff team work very well together. They are committed to extending their knowledge and skills and make ongoing improvements to their setting to support children to make the best levels of progress. The manager recently made changes to the outdoor environment to enable children to access equipment independently. Resources to support children's physical skills, such as bicycles, hula hoops, balls and bean bags, are now stored in an open shed so children can see them and use them at all times.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support staff to strengthen their interactions with children, to make the most of conversations and extend children's learning to the highest level
• consider further ways to encourage parents to share more information about children's ongoing interests, learning and development at home to fully promote consistency and help children to make even more progress.