Littleways Daisy Bank

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy and settled in this well-resourced nursery. Babies move around the room, exploring the resources on offer. This helps them to develop confidence in their capabilities. Children maintain focus for long periods. For example, as toddlers explore ice sculptures during play, they gasp in awe as they touch and explore the ice. They are developing high levels of curiosity as they begin to learn about how things change over time.

Children's communication and language skills are well supported. In the baby room, younger babies use gestures, which staff respond to. This encourages them to feel confident with their communication styles. Toddlers are learning to develop an understanding of new words. For example, staff introduce words such as 'melt' and 'crush' as the children explore the ice. This helps to widen their vocabulary.

Children learn how to care for living things. They feed the resident chickens and collect their eggs each day. This helps them to build a connection with the world around them. Children also enjoy a healthy and varied vegetarian menu. They talk about how certain foods help to develop their brain. These meaningful experiences help children to understand about healthy lifestyles from an early age.

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

• Partnerships with parents are strong. Parents state that their children are happy and settled at the nursery. Children take books and story sacks home to share with their parents. This helps parents feel involved in their children's learning.
• Managers work closely with parents so that children with additional needs get the correct support. They champion children's rights. This ensures that all children, regardless of their needs, make good progress.
• There are many opportunities for children to develop their vocabulary and understanding of language. For example, staff talk to babies about what they can see in the garden. Pre-school children have back-and-forth conversations with staff as they decide how to build a den. However, staff sometimes ask children too many questions. This does not give children the opportunity to process what has been said to them.
• Children learn how to express their thoughts and feelings towards others. For example, children recently learned about the story of 'Rosa Parks' and discussed how this made them feel. These experiences also help children to develop positive attitudes about the differences between people.
• Children's independence is supported well throughout the nursery. Babies have access to a range of resources to support them to stand, crawl and balance. They have coracles to sleep in, which they can climb in and out of by themselves. This helps them to become eager explorers.
• The large outdoor areas have a range of open-ended resources for the children to explore. Children are supported to use these resources independently to develop their physical skills. For example, they develop their core strength and coordination skills as they use poles and pieces of tarpaulin to make dens.
• Children are learning about healthy lifestyles. The vegetarian menu on offer is popular with the children. They tell the inspector how tasty the food is at nursery, and that they like to have healthy food at home.
• The leadership team has a strong focus on staff well-being. A member of staff works closely with the manager to identify any worries within the team. As a result, staff feel supported and enjoy coming to work. This has a positive impact on children's care and learning.
• Performance management systems are in place to support staff to enhance the quality of their teaching. However, staff do not focus on supporting children to develop the progression of skills that they need. For example, some children are being taught to formulate letters, but they do not yet have the skills needed to hold a pencil correctly. This does not help children to develop their skills in the right order.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• ensure all aspects of the curriculum support children's individualised learning
• utilise performance management systems to ensure staff teaching is strong enough to support children's progressive skills effectively.