Little Adventures Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are confident in this nurturing and engaging setting. Staff know children well and create a warm, welcoming environment where they feel safe and ready to learn. Babies enjoy sensory experiences filled with natural materials like herbs, cucumbers and lemons, encouraging curiosity and exploration through touch, smell and taste. Creative activities such as painting bubble wrap with flowers help babies sustain their concentration. Young children take part in exciting activities like potion making, where they use their emerging writing skills to record recipes and explore a wide range of materials. They scoop, pour and mix using fine motor skills, while staff model language and encourage problem-solving and imaginative thinking. Older children enjoy using their skills to draw treasure maps and seek out hidden letters in the outdoor space.

Children enjoy home-cooked food while staff sit alongside them, encouraging independence, helping children serve themselves and share with others. Staff use these moments to promote conversation and turn-taking. Throughout the day, staff prioritise children's well-being, offering reassurance and gentle guidance. Children are supported to express their feelings and build trusting relationships with staff, helping them feel secure and ready to explore the world around them.

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

• Children benefit from a curriculum that is ambitious, well structured and clearly aligned with the provider's vision to nurture confident, capable learners of the future. The provider leads with their core values, accountability, reliability, care and honesty, which shapes a warm and supportive environment where children develop independence and self-belief.
• Staff use assessments accurately to identify children's starting points and plan for their progress during term time. The curriculum is thoughtfully sequenced and underpinned by developmental goals used by staff to support children to make progress in learning, close gaps in development and prepare them for their next stage of learning. However, occasionally during holiday periods, some staff do not consistently identify children's next steps to support children's individual needs, so children do not make as much progress during these periods.
• The provider has high expectations for children's behaviour, and children show a positive attitude to learning. Babies are curious and explore the sensory resources that staff provide. Young children listen to instructions as they prepare to go on trips to the park. Older children engage in activities with enthusiasm and excitement. Staff value children's ideas and encourage their active participation in stories, which they become immersed in. Overall, staff manage behaviour well, speaking calmly to children and helping redirect behaviours that do not meet their high expectations. However, occasionally, some staff do not consistently make these expectations clear, and when this happens, children do not fully understand how their actions affect others.
• Children form secure attachments with staff who know them well and respond sensitively to them. Across the setting, children grow in confidence and are supported to develop the language they need to express their feelings. Staff interactions with babies are warm, nurturing and attentive. They notice when babies are unsettled and respond quickly to reassure them, helping them to relax and re-engage with activities. Babies settle quickly and participate successfully in the experiences provided.
• Children benefit from good partnerships between staff and parents. They arrive to a warm welcome, with staff taking time to speak with parents and ease children's transitions into the nursery. Staff keep parents informed about their child's progress. They regularly share ideas for activities that families can try at home, helping children build on their learning beyond the setting. When children move rooms, leaders and staff work together to maintain important relationships, such as by ensuring a familiar key person continues to support them. This approach helps children settle quickly and feel confident.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen staff's delivery of the curriculum so that children's individual needs and next steps are consistently supported, including during holiday periods, to ensure that all children continue to make good progress
• enhance staff teaching strategies to consistently support children in understanding how their behaviour affects others, ensuring that high expectations are reinforced in all situations.