Meanwood Preschool

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children flourish at this pre-school. They enjoy strong, nurturing relationships with staff and feel safe and secure in the setting. Children arrive happy and are eager to begin their day. They immediately immerse themselves into the rich learning environment and choose what they would like to do. Children play cooperatively together and build secure friendships. As children explore a globe, staff skilfully involve them in discussion about different countries, people and animals. From these discussions, children direct their own play and begin making maps that show the world. Children explain that yellow is sand, orange is land, blue is the sea and green is loads of lizards in the desert.

Children enjoy a range of experiences which are well planned and beneficial to their learning. For instance, they enjoy weekly yoga sessions that are aimed at supporting their well-being and at bringing a sense of calm. Children develop comprehensive skills in mathematics led by experienced staff. They enjoy a wide range of books and stories, which helps to support their communication and literacy skills.

Leaders have high ambition for every child to develop a love of learning and achieve exceptionally well. They make sure that all children, irrespective of their starting points, are very well prepared for starting school. Children who missed part of the academic year, due to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic, have readily adjusted to being back in the pre-school and are thriving.

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

• Leaders are ambitious, passionate and inspirational. They ensure that professional development is focused and highly effective. Leaders and staff work closely together to reflect on practice, which translates into improvements in the teaching of the curriculum.
• Staff are extremely experienced and knowledgeable about how children learn and develop. They have developed a clear, well-thought-out and sequenced curriculum that helps children to make high levels of progress. For instance, after independently completing numerous transport jigsaw puzzles, children decide to number these. Children can count the puzzles and identify the numbers, using a number line. Staff expertly guide children to write the numbers on sticky notes to add them to the puzzles. Children are engaged for an astonishing length of time. With a little guidance, they manage to number the puzzles from one to 20.
• Staff expertly reshape activities as they progress so that children are challenged and learn the most from every experience. Children are curious and have a desire to learn more. They ask questions, test out their own ideas and demonstrate an ability to think critically. For example, as children make their own maps, staff provide an atlas for them to use. Children delight in finding different cities and roads, including Leeds. This helps to further support children's understanding about the world around them and their local area.
• Staff provide children with a rich set of experiences to promote an understanding of different people, families and communities. They use children's own experiences and backgrounds to support the whole group. For example, children teach their friends simple words from their home language and are keen to show older children how to write their name too.
• Staff have high expectations for all children. Children are very well behaved and demonstrate high levels of self-control as they take turns and share scooters independently outside. Staff model kindness and care deeply about every child. They quickly settle any minor upsets and do not accept any unkind behaviour.
• Partnerships with parents are outstanding. Parents commend the setting and praise the 'dedicated, caring, supportive and nurturing staff'. Parents say that children enjoy an array of activities that help them to develop physically and socially as well as to grow in confidence and independence. They describe the setting as having excellent communication, especially throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, where staff set up various online platforms for parents to access to support children's learning at home.
• Relationships with other professionals are highly effective and contribute to the outstanding care and progress children make. The excellent partnership working with local schools significantly contributes to children being exceptionally well prepared for their move to school when the time comes.