Kids Planet Waterfront

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Leaders and staff use the learning environment well to implement the curriculum. The outdoor learning environment particularly provides children with rich and varied play experiences that help them practise their skills and apply their knowledge in different situations. Children sustain their interest for extended time as they mix paint with water and fill a variety of containers. They make links with their own experiences in the mud kitchen and recreate familiar roles with their friends. Practitioners enable mark making in a variety of ways, such as drawing with sticks in Chinese spices and fine sand. All children progress well.

Leaders and staff make use of the indoor and outdoor environment to support children to manage their feelings. They have noticed that some children self-regulate particularly well outdoors and so make full use of the space when children need a distraction. Children recognise their feelings and independently take themselves to a quiet space where they can take time to readjust. Leaders have recently created a partition between the preschool room and toddler room to support the younger children with their emotional security. Children behave well. Staff help children to understand about good choices and use a red and green colour system. Children show they feel happy and content with staff.

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

• Leaders reflect well on the quality of the provision and make strategic changes that benefit children. They have recently focused on improving the learning opportunities for children outdoors including upskilling staff. The views of children and parents are considered as part of the self-evaluation process. Pre-school children can share their ideas as part of the pre-school committee.
• Leaders carefully monitor the quality of teaching and learning. They frequently observe how staff plan for and deliver the curriculum. Practitioners benefit from having professional development goals. Leaders provide staff with ongoing training and coaching to extend their knowledge of child development and teaching skills. Recent training has focused on helping staff to concentrate on the learning value of the activities they plan for children.
• Leaders and staff have designed and effectively implemented a curriculum that is well balanced and provides rich and varied skill development. The communication language and personal development curriculum are particularly well mapped out. Although the physical development curriculum provides some clear challenge especially for the babies, leaders have not sequenced the progression as precisely as possible for the older children.
• Parent partnerships are effective in helping to support children's continued learning at home. In the morning, parents drop their children off at the door where they are greeted by a senior member of staff. When they collect their children, they can go into their child's room and engage with their key person. Staff also share information about children via the online app and parents' evenings. They support children's learning at home.
• Staff know all children well, especially their interests and targets for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. They complete ongoing assessment of children's achievements and identify specific next steps for their learning. Planning focuses predominantly on how staff can use children's interests to deliver the learning. They do not precisely consider how the activities and learning experiences will support individual children in working towards their next steps. This means that children are not fully supported in making the best possible progress.
• Teaching is good and staff are well deployed around the nursery. Staff position themselves in key areas where they skilfully enhance children's play with their positive interactions. For example, they seek to engage children who are more reluctant to join in and ask children if they want to build a tower with them. Staff use every opportunity to support children's love of reading, communication and language and relationship building. Children frequently choose to sit with staff to read books. Babies can explore props to help them to make connections with the books they enjoy. Staff successfully motivate children to play and make new discoveries. Children learn to share and take turns as they play.
• Leaders and staff support children's social skills effectively. For example, at mealtimes, older children talk to their friends about the ingredients they will find in their meals. Staff set the table to include samples of the raw ingredients that will be included in the meals that day, such as uncooked pasta and dried parsley.
• Children's health is well supported throughout the nursery. This includes having conversations and exploring equipment relating to oral health and nutritiously balanced meals and drinks provided throughout the day. Children learn about managing their own hygiene including the importance of washing their hands. Staff maintain effective hygiene practices throughout the nursery.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• enhance the curriculum for physical development to establish a progression of knowledge and skills that further supports children's ongoing progress
• plan precisely for each child's learning needs to help them to make accelerated progress.