Joel Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy and confident in the setting. Staff greet them warmly upon arrival, ensuring every child feels welcomed. Children eagerly and independently choose activities to join. Staff engage with enthusiasm, smiling and laughing as they share experiences. Children enjoy a wide variety of learning opportunities. Staff focus on helping children become confident communicators. They encourage varied spoken language, read aloud, sing rhymes and use Makaton signs alongside speech to support understanding. Children develop strong language skills. For example, staff read familiar books, prompting children to join in and repeat known phrases. Toddlers copy song actions, sign key words and sing some lyrics, while older children use complex sentences, initiate conversations and confidently combine speech with signs to express ideas.

Staff provide rich learning experiences that support children's progress across all areas of development. Children display a passion for learning, often spending long periods absorbed in activities. When needed, staff gently prompt children to focus by using their names to regain attention, which enables everyone to participate. Staff also support children's well-being by encouraging rest and reflection. After a busy morning, children are guided to take deep breaths, relax and listen to surrounding sounds. Staff nurture kindness and praise children when they share or help others independently. This approach fosters a positive, respectful and inclusive learning environment for all.

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

• Staff promote children's mathematical development extremely well. Across activities, they support children in using and understanding mathematical language, including for counting. Children confidently recognise and count numbers in the environment, such as during hide-and-seek games in the garden. Staff also encourage them to solve simple problems, for example by comparing the number of legs on spiders and ladybirds.
• Children enjoy freshly prepared meals cooked on site daily. Staff encourage children's awareness of foods that are good for their bodies and discuss what children like and enjoy eating at home. Children's health and well-being are supported through fresh air and time in the nursery garden. They enjoy being physically active. Staff remind them to drink to stay hydrated in warm weather and take steps to prevent outdoor play during the hottest part of the day to keep them safe in the sun.
• Staff support children to gain a good understanding of other people and countries from around the world and outside of their own communities. For instance, children learn about different cultures, races and religions using books and purposeful discussions.
• Children show a keen interest in mark making. Staff encourage the children to spend long periods drawing different images. This supports early writing skills and promotes school readiness.
• Staff support children with special educational needs and/or disabilities well. They work closely with other professionals and offer targeted support to ensure all children make good progress from their starting points.
• Parents describe the setting as 'wonderful' and feel their children are thriving and well cared for. They value the vital support for both children and themselves in learning and early intervention. Staff offer plenty of information and activity ideas to help parents support learning at home. Consequently, children make continuous progress.
• Staff support children to develop their independence skills. Young children are encouraged to feed themselves at mealtimes. In the toddler and pre-school rooms, children make choices about when they want their food and delight in serving themselves and pouring their own drinks.
• Staff have good knowledge of the curriculum and assess children's development to understand their abilities. They plan activities that generally support new skill development. However, the connection between the intended learning goals and the delivery of activities is sometimes unclear, which means children do not always receive the full support needed to build on what they already know.
• Staff have a clear expectation of the children's behaviour. They communicate rules and explain routines clearly and consistently, so children behave well. Staff use simple chants to reinforce their key messages, while explaining why rules are in place and how they help to keep children safe. Staff and children show respect and care towards each other.
• Staff collaborate effectively, holding regular meetings to reflect on practice and improve children's learning experiences. Leaders use supervision sessions well to support staff well-being and have a clear understanding of their roles. Targeted staff training could be further enhanced to enrich teaching quality. While leaders meet regularly with staff to discuss good practice and training needs, their self-evaluation systems tend to highlight strengths more than areas for growth, which may reduce opportunities to continually refine provision quality.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• develop clearer links between the intent and delivery of activities to shape these to the learning needs of each child
• increase targeted training in key teaching areas and adjust self-evaluation to equally identify strengths and improvement needs, ensuring consistent enhancement of provision quality.