Little Birds Forest Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

All children benefit from a rich and nurturing, forest school learning environment which is wholly focused on the individual needs and abilities of each child. Management and practitioners organise an exciting, thought-provoking curriculum, which they implement extremely well. This enables children of all abilities to achieve the best possible progress.

Children happily arrive at the nursery and receive a very warm welcome from practitioners. They demonstrate they feel safe, as they enthusiastically join in the range of activities on offer and quickly become totally absorbed in their play. They show huge excitement as they use shovels to spread the arrival of new bark chippings in outdoor play. Children think critically and persist when difficulties arise. For example, they become totally engrossed as they work out the pulley system for lifting small baskets which they have filled with natural resources, such as leaves and twigs.

Children behave impeccably. They play extremely well together and show exceptional care for their friends. For instance, when a child took a tumble, they showed great care and concern towards their friend. Children respond very positively when they receive meaningful praise from practitioners for their concern and kindness. This promotes children's emotional and social well-being extremely well.

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

• The provider and manager work exceptionally well together. They have high expectations for all practitioners and apprentices, empowering them to continually develop their skills and knowledge. This creates a culture of mutual respect where morale is high. This enables children to receive the best possible early years experience.
• The highly qualified practitioners provide an inspiring curriculum that builds on children's interests and makes learning fun. For instance, children enjoy learning about a range of traditional crafts by visiting a blacksmith. Practitioners expand on children's interests by exploring how the forge was used to shoe the horses and mend carts. Experiences of this type very successfully extend children's understanding of the world.
• Children understand the risks in their environment. For example, they are aware of their safety around the fire in the community area. Practitioners create a wonderful sense of excitement as they ask children to blow dragon's breath to develop the fire. Children use a range of tools safely when chopping kindling. In addition, children enjoy a fire-cooked snack of gnocchi with pesto and tomatoes as part of a healthy eating programme.
• Children's communication and language development is exceptionally well supported. When walking in woodlands, children use cameras to capture what they discover. Practitioners take this opportunity to ask children to describe and recall what they discovered. In addition, they listen intently to children when they notice the twisted bark of a tree or bugs under logs and question their habitat.
• Practitioners provide excellent opportunities for children to develop their literacy skills. They support children in writing and illustrate their own story books, such as 'Lava Monster'. As a result, children become extremely confident and effective communicators.
• Practitioners ensure children wear appropriate clothing when exploring outdoors. Children have great fun mixing earth with water and concentrate for prolong periods of time given their young age. Older children use a range of materials to weave and create patterns and find sticks to make marks in mud. This helps to support their mathematical and early writing skills.
• There is exceptional support for those children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. The special educational needs coordinator is extremely dedicated and implements agreed strategies with parents and other early years professionals. There is an exceptional focus on teaching children resilience. For instance, strategies include allowing children time to understand their feelings and move away from others to gather their thoughts when they chose to.
• Parents comment very positively about the nursery. They enjoy being able to view the online application on their child's progress and the individual videos of their children participating in an amazing range of forest school activities. They welcome being able to share home events that relate to their children's heritage and culture, such as Australia Day, and share recipes from Poland. This helps children understand the world around them and prepares them for life in modern Britain.