Little Engineers Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy and secure, forming strong friendships with their peers as they play together harmoniously. Staff teach children good routines, which children have learned and respond positively to. For example, during the morning, children sit in a group to sing the 'welcome song' and say hello to each of their friends. Staff ask children how they are feeling. Some children can express themselves with confidence. This helps children to develop their emotional intelligence from a young age. The key-person system ensures that staff get to know families and children well. Staff ask parents to share information on arrival at nursery that may impact on their child's day. Staff ensure this is noted so that teaching can be adapted to support the children's individual needs. Babies and young children are nurtured with lots of cuddles of reassurance during the day to help them feel safe and secure.

Staff guide children to develop their communication and language skills. Throughout the day, staff speak to children and encourage two-way communication. Children learn vocabulary and its meaning through the nursery golden rules, such as 'kind words', 'good listening' and 'inside walking'. Babies and children hear nursery rhymes and begin to follow the actions. Staff are positive role models and teach children behaviour expectations. Children demonstrate good attitudes to their learning and behave very well. Staff offer children a rich range of learning experiences both indoors and outdoors. Children make choices throughout the day, which helps to build their independence and confidence. Leaders oversee the curriculum to ensure that children reach their full potential.

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

• Leaders are ambitious for every child to make good progress. The curriculum is sequenced so that children learn in steps based on what they know now and what they need to learn next. Children make good progress from their starting points.
• Leaders support staff to plan for children based around their interests. However, sometimes the curriculum intent is not fully established consistently during all activities to support children's next steps in their learning. Leaders have an action plan in place, which is working to support the curriculum even further to ensure that children are provided with the best learning opportunities.
• Leaders ensure staff are supported through regular training opportunities and supervision. However, the monitoring of teaching is not yet robustly measured to ensure that learning opportunities for children are always of the highest quality.
• Staff provide children with lots of unrestricted access to outdoor play, where they build their physical skills well. Children learn to balance and climb on equipment such as planks and small slides. They practise their hand-eye coordination by filling and pouring sand into containers. Staff provide young children with sensory experiences, where they explore paint with their hands as they swirl the colours between their fingers and strengthen their small finger muscles.
• Staff support babies and young children to build their independence skills. Babies learn how to use cutlery to feed themselves at mealtimes. Children wash their hands before meals and learn to put on and take off their coats. This helps children to learn to be independent and how to keep their bodies healthy and maintain good hygiene routines.
• Staff provide lots of opportunities for children to develop a love of books. Groups of children listen with intent to stories and recall familiar parts of the story. Staff expertly ask children questions about the story and help children use their own experiences to make links to the story. This helps to bring stories alive for children.
• Staff introduce young children to mathematics from a young age. Babies and young children listen to the counting of resources through fun everyday play. Older children compare numbers to quantities as they begin to learn the meaning of numbers in relation to objects. Children learn about shapes and can recall various shapes from previous learning through the 'shape of the week' focus.
• Parents share their appreciation for the settling-in process that reassures them their children are safe. They say that daily verbal communication and updates online help them to understand their child's day and what they are learning each week.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen planning further to link more closely with the curriculum intent and children's next steps in learning
• develop teaching skills to ensure all staff make the most of all opportunities to extend children's learning to the highest possible level.