Mother Goose Day Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The dedicated staff are caring and kind. They nurture every child, to help them to feel happy, settled and secure during their time at the nursery. Babies and children are given time to form a special connection with their preferred member of staff before a key person is assigned. This helps to ensure that relationships between staff and children are positive.

Staff promote children's learning and development well. They encourage children to be confident, curious and independent learners. Babies are very determined and persevere when developing new skills, such as using a fork to eat their lunch. Younger children are confident to ask appropriate questions to find out information. For example, they say to staff, 'What are these?' Older children build with a purpose in mind. They source a range of large materials to create a 'tractor' and use mathematical language, such as 'big', to accurately describe the size of the wheels. Children who speak English as an additional language enjoy using their home languages during play. They use gestures to make their needs known and are confident to say some words, such as 'hello', in English.

Children understand the expectations for behaviour. They listen and respond to staff and willingly help with tasks such as tidying up. Children are caring and considerate to others. They offer kind gestures to their friends, such as a hug, a hand shake or a 'high five', to welcome them into the nursery each day. This helps all children to feel included and valued.

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

• Leaders ensure that staff receive regular supervision sessions. They prioritise staff's well-being. They provide them with tools to help them to overcome any challenges, such as a 'survival kit' containing motivational quotes. This contributes towards staff's increased positive energy and enthusiasm within the nursery. The collective support offered to the nursery apprentices is helping them to become confident and competent practitioners.
• Staff spend quality time engaging with children to find out about what they know and enjoy. They use this knowledge to shape children's learning experiences. For example, to extend on children's play with cars, staff present books that feature a variety of transport vehicles. They introduce new words, such as 'dump truck' and 'container truck', to build on children's good range of vocabulary. Furthermore, staff explain the purpose of each vehicle, to enhance children's knowledge and understanding of the world around them.
• Partnerships with parents are good. Staff invite parents to share information about their children's learning from home. They extend on these skills within the nursery. For instance, to link in with children's interest in construction, staff encourage children to use real-life tools, such as a hammer and screwdriver, to break up ice. This helps to build on children's good physical skills.
• Staff work together with parents and other professionals to ensure that children receive the early help and support that they need. Additional funding is used well to close any gaps in children's learning. The new 'welcome sessions' are helping children to become more confident around others and to develop skills such as good listening, patience and the ability to take turns.
• Children show respect for one another during play. They demonstrate helpful attitudes and happily take on responsible tasks, such as washing the dishes after snack. Staff remind children to be careful, such as when handling China plates. They quickly explain that spillages need to be mopped up from the floor. However, staff do not consistently teach children about the reasons why they need to do this, to help to further extend on their good knowledge of how to keep themselves and others safe.
• Staff provide exciting experiences that inspire babies' natural curiosity. Babies are very eager to explore various materials, such as jelly, using their senses. They are intrigued when staff shake the jelly through a colander to create a 'rain effect' and reach out to catch this using their hands. Babies remember what has been learned and later attempt to recreate the same effects independently.
• The well-qualified staff complete a broad range of training to promote children's safety and welfare. Leaders have recently put plans in place to support staff to extend their good knowledge and understanding of the curriculum. However, this is in the very early stages and requires embedding to enhance staff's good teaching skills further.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• embed the plans for professional development and focus on enhancing staff's knowledge and understanding of the early years curriculum, to help to build further on their good teaching skills
• support staff to consistently extend on children's awareness of how to identify and manage risks, to help to build on their good knowledge of how to keep themselves and others safe.