Honey Bees Staff Day Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are confident and happy in this extremely nurturing environment. The home-from-home feel and the strong relationships children have with staff help them to thrive at nursery and feel emotionally secure.

Staff carefully plan a wide range of exciting and stimulating activities for children. Their thorough assessment procedures ensure children meet milestones and achieve next steps. Staff ensure there are smooth transitions as children move through the nursery rooms. They fully prepare them for their next stages in learning, including starting school.

Children keep on trying even when they find things tricky. Staff offer them lots of praise and encouragement to find solutions to problems. For example, children respond well to staff as they guide and support them in navigating the space in the garden. As a result, children can practise running safely whilst playing a team game.

Staff support children's language well. Babies enjoy learning the names and noises of different wild animal puppets. Children enjoy the game of 'What's in the box'. Staff model language well and ask questions to encourage children to develop their vocabulary. This encouragement, repetition, and extension of language ensures children remain interested and attentive as they learn new words.

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

• There are many opportunities for children to develop their independence. Staff support children in changing into slippers from their outdoor shoes. Younger children practise drinking from open cups with handles. They roll up their sleeves and put on aprons for painting. Older children hang up coats, undo zips, and wash and dry their hands for mealtimes.
• Children enjoy the range of activities on offer to support them in developing their large-muscle skills. Babies enjoy the large space available to practise crawling and pulling themselves up on walkers. The well-equipped garden area provides a space for children to climb, crawl through tunnels and balance on tyres. Staff support children to challenge themselves to jump and land in a range of ways as they navigate an assault course.
• Children behave well. They sit during group times and wait for their turn. Staff remind them of the importance of sharing and using their 'kind hands and words'. Children respond well to staff as they model using 'please' and 'thank you.' Children help to tidy the garden after playtime and wait patiently in the line for lunch.
• Staff plan meaningful activities for children with clear learning intentions. However, some staff need further support to ensure that their planned activities are always sufficiently challenging and appropriately paced, so that children stay focussed on activities for longer periods of time and achieve better outcomes.
• Parents are extremely happy with the level of nurture the staff offer their children and their families. They receive regular daily updates and ideas of how to support their children at home, particularly with behaviour strategies and potty training. They feel their children's confidence has developed since starting nursery, which they know is due to the emotional support provided by this dedicated staff team.
• Leadership is a real strength of the nursery. Staff feel extremely well supported by the experienced manager, both professionally and emotionally. Following supervision meetings, she ensures staff have regular opportunities for further training. The manager and special educational needs coordinator liaise with a range of external agencies to ensure staff receive relevant training and children have access to any interventions they may need. Leaders show passion for ensuring all children make expected progress, regardless of their starting points.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• further support some staff to ensure that their planned activities are sufficiently challenging and appropriately paced.