Maples Day Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy in this nurturing environment. They develop close and trusting relationships with caring staff. Babies demonstrate they feel safe as they snuggle close to staff during story time. Children are sociable and confident. They learn how to resolve conflicts peaceably. For example, during play, a child says to another child, 'I will play with this while you have your turn, then we can swap.'

Children are confident communicators who use a wide range of vocabulary. For example, children talk about the 'edible' statue they will make. Another discusses the 'compromise' they made at breakfast time at home, so they could have 'sugary cereals, not the healthy ones'. Children learn to do things for themselves. All children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), develop a positive attitude towards learning and make good progress from their starting points.

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

• The manager has high expectations of what children can achieve. She aims to prepare children well for the next stage in their learning, including their future move on to school. The manager has devised a rich and well-sequenced curriculum that takes account of the learning needs and interests of those children who attend.
• The manager monitors children's progress. This helps her to identify any gaps in their learning. She provides swift intervention when children need extra help, such as small-group sessions and one-to-one support, to help children to catch up with their peers. The manager works with other professionals, such as speech and language therapists, to put in place targeted support to help close gaps in children's development. Activities are sensitively adapted to ensure inclusion.
• The manager places a strong focus on supporting staff in their professional development. She ensures that all staff have access to ongoing training to develop their knowledge and skills. Overall, the manager monitors staff practice and helps them to identify their strengths and areas for improvement. However, the manager does not use the supervision system in place to its full extent. For example, she does not yet monitor and evaluate the impact of staff training on children's learning, to help to identify occasional minor variations in the quality of some staff's teaching.
• Parents are very happy with the nursery. They say that their children look forward to attending and make good progress in their learning and development.
• Staff manage children's behaviour well. They have a calm approach and use age-appropriate language to clearly explain to children how to share and take turns. Children behave well.
• Staff help children to develop a good awareness of healthy lifestyles. Children learn the importance of washing their hands after using the toilet or before eating. Children talk about foods that are good for them and how they can look after their teeth.
• Staff are aware of the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the development of children's speech. Overall, staff model language well and give children's communication and language development a high priority throughout the setting. However, on occasions, some staff's questioning skills are not as strong as others. Therefore, they do not support children's thinking and communication skills as well as possible. For example, staff do not always give children time to think and respond to questions before asking another or answering themselves. At times, staff ask too many questions that only require a 'yes' or 'no' answer.
• Staff help to build children's awareness of mathematics. For example, throughout the nursery, children learn to count, recognise shapes and numbers and solve simple addition and subtraction problems. Staff discuss size and talk about capacity with children during water play.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• build on supervision arrangements to include monitoring and evaluation of the impact of staff training on children's learning to help to address the occasional minor variations in the quality of teaching, and so, raise the outcomes for children's learning even further
• support staff to strengthen their teaching techniques so that they give children the time they need respond to questions and discussions to fully support their developing language and thinking skills.