Kids Zone

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Managers and staff greet children and parents enthusiastically as they enter the nursery. Staff encourage parents to send a 'good deed note' which highlights a good deed their child has performed at home. This is often related to the children's learning, for example 'shared well with his sister'. The key person shares the good deed with everyone, and they all show delight in celebrating and praising the children. This supports children to settle in well and helps to build their self-esteem and emotional well-being successfully.

Staff observe and plan exciting activities based on children's interests. For example, staff plan projects such as 'Water' to develop children's interests around rain. They introduce children to vocabulary such as 'cloud' and 'rain drops'. This supports children to develop their communication and language well.

Staff provide children with a wide range of activities and experiences. They plan an array of visits to support children's development of understanding the world around them well. For example, children enjoy visits to the library and the local park. Staff have high expectations of children's learning and behaviour. They act as positive role models and promote children's positive attitudes to learning well. The impact of this is that all children demonstrate good behaviour and achieve positive outcomes in their learning and development.

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

• Staff promote children's positive behaviour well. They encourage children to include others in their play. For example, staff ensure that children form a line and take turns as they climb up the stairs to use the slide. Children allow their friends to go before them in the line when they have already had a turn. This ensures that children behave well and demonstrate a positive attitude to learning. Staff regularly praise the children for sharing well and being considerate of their friends. This helps to develop children's positive behaviour and social skills well.
• Staff provide a wide range of activities and experiences that children enjoy. This is based on what staff know about children and what they can do, also their individual interests and needs. Managers ensure that activities are relevant and based on what children need to learn.
• Staff speak positively about the manager and value the additional staff training they have access to. This helps to develop their practice. Managers are supportive and work well with external professionals to support staff, and children build on their knowledge and skills well. This ensures that all children make good progress.
• Partnership with parents is strong. Parents are complimentary about the support they receive to support their children's learning at home. They speak positively about the different events the manager and staff plan to keep them informed about their children's progress and development. For example, parents share that they thoroughly enjoyed attending an event to celebrate their children's achievements.
• Children benefit from activities to support their mathematical understanding. Staff successfully prioritise children's number and counting skills. They skilfully plan opportunities, through their daily routines, to support children to learn about numbers. For example, children are encouraged to count the number of steps as they climb up and down.
• Staff plan lots of opportunities to help children to develop their physical skills. Children enjoy their time outdoors, where they take part in balancing activities and complete obstacle courses, developing their core muscle and coordination skills well. Staff also plan activities where children thread mini hoops on a spaghetti tower to develop the small muscles in their hands.
• Staff support children to develop a love for books. Children benefit from weekly visits to the library. This helps to develop children's vocabulary and understanding well.
• Overall, children benefit from some good opportunities to practise doing things for themselves. However, some staff, at times, step in and offer support as children try to master practical skills such as pouring their own drink. At these times, some children do not always benefit from having the time and encouragement they need to fully develop their independence.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• provide more opportunities for children to try to do things for themselves to support their developing independence skills even further.