Just For Kidz

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are very happy, behave well and develop a positive attitude to their learning at this welcoming and friendly nursery. They form positive relationships with their key person and everyone in the staff team, who know children well. Staff are caring and sensitive. They adapt settling-in procedures to meet children's individual needs. Staff work hard to ensure that all children feel valued. For example, they place pictures of children's faces on the countries of their heritage on a map of the world in each room. Staff work hard to provide the necessary support to families of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). Staff signpost parents to additional groups and resources for further support. They ensure that children with SEND receive timetabled one-to-one support in a specially designed sensory room. Parent partnerships are strong, and parents speak very highly of the nursery.

Staff have high expectations of what children can achieve. They support children's learning through an ambitious curriculum that provides them with enriching experiences. Children immerse themselves in their play and sustain their interest in activities for long periods of time. For example, children help to make play dough. They know what ingredients they need, take turns to add the ingredients and stir the mixture. They share the dough once it is made and use a variety of tools to roll, cut and shape it into various shapes. Children then proceed to make food items from the dough that they pretend to sell, which encourages the children's imagination. This enables children to enhance their communication and language skills, improve their fine motor skills and enhance their social skills through turn-taking and role play.

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

• Children have many opportunities to develop their physical skills. For example, staff encourage children to throw balls and exercise in the large garden. Children learn how to make the swings move themselves by moving their legs backwards and forwards with encouragement from staff.
• Children use a variety of resources to make marks. Children in the pre-school room demonstrate how they can write their names using chunky chalks on the pavement in the garden.
• Staff promote children's independence. For instance, they encourage children to put on their own coats and shoes, feed themselves, pour their drinks at snack times and self-serve at lunchtime.
• Staff work hard to promote cultural capital by giving children lots of different enriching experiences. For instance, they take children on visits to the local mosque and local farm and arrange for animals to be brought into the nursery.
• Staff work hard to ensure that children who speak English as an additional language feel included. There are a number of staff who speak more than one language, and staff learn basic words in children's home languages.
• The knowledgeable and dedicated manager has an accurate overview of the nursery. However, while the management team ensures that all staff complete essential training, some staff do not receive training to help them enhance their teaching skills in order to fully extend children's learning. Staff report that their morale is high and that they feel well supported by the management team.
• Babies thrive in a calm and nurturing environment. They have a very strong relationship with their key person. Staff celebrate children's achievements. For example, they demonstrate their delight as babies take their first steps by clapping and cheering.
• Staff place an importance on children's health and oral hygiene. They offer children healthy and well-balanced meals and snacks. Staff hold workshops for parents to support families with healthy eating. They encourage children to brush their teeth in all rooms.
• Staff work hard to promote children's love of reading. They provide a variety of rich texts around the nursery. Children can often be seen enjoying looking at books by themselves, either with staff or enjoying a story as a whole group. Staff use expressive stories while reading and encourage children to join in with the main event in the book to enhance children's communication and language skills.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• target staff's individual training needs, to enhance their teaching skills to extend children's learning.