Jigsaw @ St John's Preschool

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children eagerly enter the pre-school and greet staff. They have built good bonds with staff. Children demonstrate a positive attitude to learning, they eagerly participate in activities that follow their interests. For example, staff use children's enjoyment of finger painting to build on their awareness of numbers, shapes and colours. They cover tables with paper and provide paint and brushes for children to make their marks on. Children enjoy painting toy animals' feet, making 'paw prints' and counting them. They compare the size of their fingers and handprints to those of the staff.

Children enjoy exploring the pre-school environment and happily interact with adults, sharing what they like doing and including them in their play. Staff make good use of these interactions to build on children's communication and language. For example, while children make chalk maps on the tarmac outside, they talk about treasure and ask 'where is the x that marks the spot'. Staff build on this by asking them to share how they will find the treasure, share what the treasure will be and what it might be hidden in. Children build on their problem-solving skills, mark making, counting and language as they discuss their play.

Children enjoy their interactions with each other and the enthusiastic staff and are developing a positive attitude to learning. They behave well and receive clear and consistent messages on what is expected of them.

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

• Management shares how the new staff team is developing their teamwork and identifying how to best plan for the children present. They currently work 'in the moment' to encourage children to build on their existing skills and to incorporate activities that build on children's interests. Staff interact with the children well, using what they know of children and their teaching skills well to engage them in their learning. Management targets the use of additional funding to best support the needs of the children who receive it.
• Management and staff share how they talk about the curriculum and that a display board is developing to support the sharing of key learning information between staff. However, the system for sharing children's next steps in learning with other staff is not yet fully embedded into practice. For example, at inspection, although staff interacted well with children and their teaching was building on what children knew, they could not precisely focus on a couple of children's next steps in learning, as this information was unexpectedly off site.
• Children with emerging needs and special educational needs are supported well by staff. They engage them in activities and know what they like and can do. Staff use their teaching knowledge to support children to build on their existing skills. The newly appointed special educational needs and/or disabilities coordinator (SENCo) works with staff to identify and implement individual educational plans. They work in partnership with parents and other agencies to support children to make the best possible progress.
• Staff use what children are doing to build on their learning in all areas. They use children's interests to adapt activities and fully engage them. For example, when children started making paper aeroplanes, staff started discussions on how these were constructed, the marks they had made, the shape of their planes and how they worked. Staff encouraged children to go outside to experimentally fly them and predict how far they would fly.
• The management team and staff keep all the required documentation for their registration available for inspection. Robust recruitment processes are in place to ensure that no unvetted person has access to the children. Complaints receive appropriate responses, and the management maintain the correct child-to-staff ratios, keep records about the children secure and use supervision and monitoring to support staff practice.
• Children receive encouragement to live healthy lifestyles. They learn about healthy foods, enjoy fresh air and physical exercise daily and gain an awareness of how to recognise their emotions and manage their behaviour.
• Staff provide opportunities for children to learn about religious and cultural festivals during the year to help develop their awareness of the wider world. However, currently, they do not make consistent use of their knowledge around children's home languages and their cultural backgrounds to increase children's awareness of their own uniqueness and the differences they have with their friends.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• embed the systems for sharing children's next steps in learning between staff to enable these to be precisely implemented when their key staff are unavailable
• make more consistent use of knowledge around children's home languages and their cultural backgrounds to increase their awareness of the uniqueness of their community and the wider world.