Marcham Pre-School Playgroup

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are confident and happy and feel secure in the pre-school. Staff provide appropriate support to help them adjust to changes in their environment and routines. Children respond positively to this and explore different spaces, playing with familiar toys and equipment. Children have good social skills, happily talking to others about the volcanoes they are making.

Children benefit from the high expectations that staff have for them. For example, staff know each individual child well and plan focused opportunities to help them with their next steps in learning. Staff support children's physical development particularly well, such as when children learn to step along obstacles. After repeated opportunities to do this with support, children gradually build the confidence and balance to do this on their own.

Children demonstrate good levels of concentration and enjoyment during their play. For instance, they persevere to connect building blocks to make their own house. They explain why they have constructed their model in a particular way to those playing with them and go on to act out storylines in their play. Children enjoy learning about the world around them. For example, when exploring their 'wild patch', staff help them to learn the names of birds, leaves and flowers in their environment.

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

• Staff support children's language development well. For example, they find out about the languages children speak when they start attending. They use simple words in children's home languages to help them communicate their needs. Staff sequence the curriculum well and provide regular opportunities to listen to stories in English and sing songs and rhymes. This builds children's vocabulary.
• The manager ensures that the pre-school curriculum is ambitious and includes opportunities that enrich children's experiences. For instance, children learn about differences between themselves and others. Staff help to raise awareness about disabilities. Through planned activities, children learn to appreciate what life might be like for a wheelchair user in their building.
• Children behave well, and staff promote positive behaviour effectively. For instance, they provide gentle guidance and support to help children begin to resolve problems for themselves. This helps children learn how to show kindness, respect and tolerance towards others.
• Staff provide a range of opportunities for children to be active and make choices in their play. However, at times, they are not fully effective at helping children to explore their thinking further to help embed essential knowledge for their future learning. For example, when children make large models, they push construction blocks onto the floor. Staff are not fully effective at exploring with children how this could impact others playing around them. Children develop their large-muscle movements in activities such as 'wake up, shake up'. However, staff do not recognise how to extend children's thinking and routinely explore the impact and benefits of exercise with children to help them develop an early understanding of the positive impact of exercise on their health.
• Staff develop good relationships with schools that children go on to attend. For example, the pre-school is based in a school site and children become familiar with the building and the teacher who will go on to teach them. Staff actively seek opportunities to share transfer information and ask questions about expectations for children before they move on. This helps to ensure that children's move to school is successful.
• The manager uses additional funding effectively. For instance, she ensures that all children have access to the resources they need while they attend pre-school. Staff also complete appropriate professional development to help them to support children's communication and language needs. This is helping to close gaps in children's learning.
• Staff ensure that they offer an inclusive service. For example, they find out relevant information about children's health and dietary needs and have robust procedures in place to meet these. Support for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities is highly effective. For instance, staff discuss children's needs with parents as early as possible and share information. They plan and implement strategies to enable children to adapt to the pre-school routine and make good progress.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• use opportunities more effectively to extend children's understanding and help them develop essential knowledge and skills to apply to their future learning.