Lechlade Little Learners

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

All children thrive at this group, achieving exceptionally well in their learning and development. They all have excellent relationships with the staff, who show genuine warmth and kindness to them. Children are settled, happy and very confident. They welcome visitors and are excited to tell them about activities. For example, they avidly describe how to affect change on foam with their hands and tools. They encourage them to join their adventure to the 'mountains', and to spot birds and insects attracted to the garden area using the readily available binoculars.

Children are highly motivated to learn. Staff are excellent role models and support children to develop confident social skills, independence and impeccable behaviour. The children of different ages play exceptionally well together. Children gain excellent independence skills and are fully prepared to move on to school.

Full of smiles, children explore the carefully planned, inspiring indoor and outdoor learning environments. They relish outdoor play. They develop their agility as they dig, chase bubbles, climb, slide and balance across the challenging obstacle course. Together with staff, they express themselves while playing musical instruments with great gusto. Staff encourage children to explore sounds. They burst into lively singing, and children join in with great enthusiasm. Children gain an impressive understanding of the world. For example, they discover where food comes from as they grow fruit and vegetables, feed chickens and collect eggs, which they use to bake with.

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

• The staff are all highly enthusiastic in their roles. They work with a passion to ensure that every child has the very best learning experiences at the group. Staff have an in-depth understanding of children's needs, interests and abilities, and an excellent overview of where every child is in their learning. They plan and implement an exciting curriculum that takes full account of what each child needs to learn next. They instinctively offer the encouragement and support the children need to foster their all-round learning. Staff know when to play an active role in children's learning and when to stand back and let them play freely.
• Staff use every opportunity to foster children's self-esteem. Children receive high praise for their achievements, and staff show genuine pride and excitement when children achieve. For example, when young children manage to put their coats on unaided, they beam with delight as staff tell them how proud they are.
• Staff instinctively challenge children to develop their language and thinking. They provide a narrative to children's play and use visual prompts and basic sign language to help children who find verbal communication more difficult. Children chat avidly about the things they observe, what they are doing and have done. Staff skilfully introduce new words and ask questions to promote conversations. They also make excellent use of books, songs and rhymes to promote children's language skills further.
• Staff actively develop children's mathematical awareness. They encourage children to count, do simple calculations and solve problems. Children recognise shapes and numerals, confidently count the number of staff and children present, and show their understanding of size and positional language.
• Staff ensure all children are fully included in the activities and learning opportunities. Staff know instinctively when children need extra help to deal with their feelings and frustrations and provide just the right support to foster their learning and independence. Staff seek outside professional support without delay to ensure that children receive the extra help they need to maximise their learning.
• The manager and committee provide excellent staff support and work proactively to evaluate the effectiveness of the provision and to drive continuous improvement. Funding is used highly effectively to provide extra staff support and resources and to broaden children's life experiences. For example, all children experience outings to places of interest and explore the local community. They regularly visit a local charity shop, where they learn to use money to buy extra toys and about people who are less fortunate than themselves.
• Parents describe the staff as 'fantastic, friendly, welcoming, and highly supportive'. They state that the provision exceeds their expectations and that their children thoroughly enjoy all that they do at the group. Parents feel extremely well informed about their children's experiences and attribute their children's significant progress to the support the children receive from staff.