Little Orchard Nursery And Pre School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children enter this welcoming nursery and pre-school with excitement, and staff greet them warmly. Children take off their shoes and place them on the rack before independently putting on their slippers. They find their name on their designated pegs and self-register, to support name recognition.

Staff design the curriculum with children's needs at the forefront. The planning of activities aims to support their development and interests to help them make strong progress from their starting points. The use of funding helps to ensure a full staff team, enabling them to provide individual support to children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities. Specific activities help children to develop their social and communication skills effectively.

All children have a positive attitude to learning and behave well. They enjoy the good range of activities available. Younger children enjoy posting shapes into a metal coffee tin through slots in the plastic lid, supporting their hand-to-eye coordination. Staff role model this activity to capture children's curiosity. Children take pleasure in hearing the sound when it drops into the bottom of the tin. Older children attend the setting's 'gardening club', where they have good opportunities to grow, plant and tend to living things, such as strawberries, within the onsite polytunnel.

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

• Children learn about oral hygiene. A large 'mouth model' and oversized plastic toothbrushes enable children to explore these during play. Mirrors and a timer enable children to look inside their mouth and to develop an understanding of how long to brush their teeth for. Accompanying toothbrushing charts help to support healthcare at home.
• Younger children enjoy a good range of songs and rhymes. Staff plan activities around these to extend children's learning. For example, following children's interest in the song 'Down in the Jungle', staff create a pretend river with toy animals. Children discuss their ideas about how the animals will get across the 'river'. Children develop their problem-solving skills by exploring different ideas. They count out wooden log slices to use as 'stepping stones', and staff support them to use their fingers to represent numbers.
• Older children take part in the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds Garden Birdwatch scheme. Children play with large, coloured feathers in play dough to create their own birds. They also make their own binoculars at home from toilet rolls and bring these into the setting to observe birds in the pre-school garden. However, home learning is not personalised to every child's individual needs, to help them make even more progress in their development. Additionally, staff do not consistently share information between the rooms for different age groups so they can relay the children's day accurately to parents.
• Staff provide a visual display so that children know which snacks they are having on which day. Older children make these for their friends, such as buttering oatcakes, slicing banana and selecting the right number of cups for their peers to support their independence skills. Staff talk to children about getting all the butter out of the pot and explain what 'scraping' means, to extend their vocabulary.
• Outside, older children engage in 'potion making', using fresh rosemary from the garden, food colouring and water. Children use their forefinger and thumb to squeeze water into the pipettes and transfer this into their concoctions. Younger children enjoy hanging up dolls' clothes onto a washing line using pegs. All children develop good physical skills.
• Staff support children's language skills effectively. For example, during free-play activities, children go on a 'camping trip' and talk about how they will cook marshmallows and make cookies. Staff talk to children about how they are going to make these and the ingredients they will use. Additionally, the setting brings in outside professionals to teach the children Spanish, to extend their understanding of other cultures and languages.
• Children develop the skills to understand and manage their emotions. Dedicated spaces equipped with fairy lights, stories and visual displays, coupled with staff support, help children to be aware of their feelings.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• provide further opportunities to support children's individual learning at home
• further develop the communication between staff when children move between rooms for different age groups to provide a consistent two-way flow of information.