Milnrow pre-school CIC

Inclusion: Expected standard

Leaders identify children's individual needs promptly. They use assessment tools effectively to spot emerging delays and ensure staff target children's gaps in learning quickly. For example, they use assessment tools to identify children who are not meeting age-related expectations with regards to communication and language and initiate swift interventions to help them to progress.

Leaders work in partnership with external professionals. They act on their advice to shape children's support, opportunities and experiences. For example, they seek guidance and support from physiotherapists to purchase additional resources to support children's physical skills, where needed. This has been effective in helping children to achieve their next steps.

Leaders use additional funding purposefully. They invest in targeted resources and interventions that improve children's outcomes. For example, they have introduced a dedicated sensory room. Leaders use the space specifically to help children with special educational needs and/or disabilities to ensure that they have a quiet space to explore freely.

Leaders maintain a strong focus on children known to social care. They ensure that staff understand their circumstances and provide consistent, sensitive support that promotes their emotional wellbeing. For example, staff use stories that focus on emotions and encourage children to express their feelings during difficult circumstances.

Curriculum and teaching: Expected standard

Leaders have an accurate understanding of the curriculum and the quality of teaching. They use assessment information well to identify weaknesses and take decisive action. For example, when mathematics emerged as an area requiring support, leaders strengthened the curriculum sequence and ensured that staff delivered focused teaching aspects, such as number, pattern and early problem-solving. This is evident in what is being taught.

Practitioners prioritise children's communication and language development. They model precise vocabulary, introduce new language in context and use stories, songs and small-group sessions to extend children's speaking, listening and understanding.

Children's physical development is promoted well through regular opportunities to strengthen fine and gross motor skills. For example, staff provide children with cooked spaghetti and tweezers, which they use to collect and fill their bowls during play. Children enjoy the outdoor mud kitchen where they fill and empty containers with water and mud, helping to build on their strength and coordination.

Staff support children's personal, social and emotional development effectively. They help children to recognise, label and talk about their feelings. For example, they use the 'Colour Monster' storybook to help children recognise a range of feelings that the characters represent.

Children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities and those known to social care, make sustained progress from their individual starting points. They are fully included in all aspects of the setting, and staff skilfully adapt activities and routines so that every child can participate and succeed. For example, they plan to include characters that children have a special interest in to help them engage in activities.

Achievement: Expected standard

Children develop the knowledge and skills they need for their move to school. Children demonstrate increasing independence in managing their own self-care, such as using the toilet, washing their hands and putting on their outdoor clothing.

Children communicate effectively with adults and their peers. They use new vocabulary with growing confidence and enjoy recalling familiar stories, including inventing playful 'alien' words during group reading sessions. Children follow instructions well and are developing early literacy skills, such as holding pencils with control and recognising initial sounds.

Children's mathematical understanding is developing well. They identify and continue patterns during focused activities, showing care and precision as they cut out images and extend sequences.

Behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines: Needs attention

Leaders have established appropriate expectations for children's behaviour. They introduce simple rules, such as not running indoors, which children understand. However, leaders do not ensure that staff respond to negative behaviour consistently. Although staff intervene when disagreements occur, they do not consistently help children to understand why their behaviour is unacceptable. This limits children's ability to learn from these situations. Staff model respectful interactions and encourage turn-taking and sharing. However, this practice is not applied consistently across the team, which sometimes leads to conflicts that are not fully resolved.

Staff build warm, trusting relationships with children. They greet them with genuine warmth, helping them to settle quickly and feel secure. Children arrive confidently, and overall they engage positively with staff throughout the session.

Leaders work effectively with families to promote children's regular attendance and punctuality. They offer flexible session arrangements and follow clear procedures, including welfare checks, when children do not attend. This helps to keep children safe.

Children respond well to established routines. For instance, they arrive and use self-registration as they proudly find their photo and place it on the board. They settle quickly into circle time and enjoy helping with tidy-up time. This contributes to a generally calm and well-organised environment.

Children's welfare and wellbeing: Expected standard

Staff meet children's individual care needs effectively. They understand each child well and respond quickly when children need comfort, reassurance or additional support. Staff provide targeted small-group and one-to-one interactions for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. They remain alert to the needs of children, for example those known to social care and those who face wider barriers to learning or wellbeing.

Children show confidence with familiar adults and seek them out for support, even when their key person is not present. This demonstrates that staff establish consistent and responsive attachments across the team.

Staff teach children how to keep themselves healthy and safe. They show children when to wash their hands, offer nutritious food choices at snack time and ensure children drink water throughout the day. Staff take children outdoors daily, where they climb, run and explore. This helps them understand how physical activity supports their wellbeing.

Staff help to promote children's emotional development. They use stories, visual prompts and shared language to help children recognise, label and express their feelings. Children generally tell staff how they feel and use familiar resources, such as the 'Colour Monster' characters, to communicate their emotions.

Leadership and governance: Needs attention

Since the last inspection, leaders have taken purposeful action to address the weaknesses identified. They understand the setting's strengths and the areas that still require further support. Although they have improved many aspects of practice, staff use inconsistent behaviour management strategies, which leaders now need to address. Leaders have strengthened curriculum planning and delivery through training, coaching and supervision. However, they have not provided staff with enough guidance on how to respond to children's behaviour appropriately. This results in inconsistent messages for children and disputes that are not always resolved effectively.

Leaders work positively with families. For example, they invite them to attend stay-and-play sessions and send regular group communications. However, they do not consistently share important information about individual children's care and learning. This limits parents' understanding of their child's daily experiences and progress.

Leaders make decisions in the best interests of children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). They use additional funding appropriately to ensure that children with SEND receive the support they need. Leaders also consider staff wellbeing and workload when making decisions. For example, they deploy more staff than legally required so that children benefit from increased one-to-one support. Staff report that leaders support them well and that they enjoy coming to work.