Muddy Puddles Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Staff build close, warm relationships with children, who settle securely. Staff take care to ensure that babies' preferences and home care routines are followed to support their well-being. They value each child highly and link activities to children's interests. Staff have high expectations of children and manage their behaviour well.

The curriculum is interesting and varied, and all children make good progress. Staff monitor the progress of all children and act promptly to support those who are falling behind in their learning. Staff help children to gain good creative skills. Babies enjoy exploring the texture of flour and cereals. Older children enjoy making patterns using sponge rollers and brightly coloured paint. Staff introduce children to the sounds of different musical instruments, such as drums and shakers. Staff support children's mathematical development effectively. They teach older children how to count securely and to recognise numbers. For instance, children concentrate well as they use tongs to pick up pom-poms to match the number on a plate. Staff sing a wide variety of number songs and rhymes to support children's counting skills. Children explore the different properties of shapes as they handle wooden triangles, squares and circles. These activities support children's learning and help children to gain useful skills in preparation for school.

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

• Staff understand how to seek advice on caring for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. They talk to parents to find out about the child's needs and liaise with professionals to promote best outcomes for children. Staff prepare individual plans, with relevant learning goals, for each child.
• Staff support children's physical development successfully. Children enjoy the challenge of climbing up frames. They learn to balance on low beams and steer wheeled toys carefully around the garden. Babies roll, crawl and learn to pull themselves up on large soft-play cushions. Children gain good physical skills.
• Children learn how to do things for themselves. They serve themselves from communal bowls at lunchtime and pour their own drinks. Staff teach children how to put their shoes and coats on, and all children help to tidy away toys. They share and take turns to use different resources as they take part in pretend play in the home corner.
• Staff have good partnerships with parents and keep them well informed about children's progress and activities. They work closely with parents in areas such as weaning and potty training to support children's development.
• Leaders monitor and support staff in effective ways. They spend time in the nursery room and talk to staff about activities and children's progress. Leaders observe staff's practice and give them feedback to build their skills. They meet with staff regularly and provide opportunities for professional development. For instance, staff attended a course on curriculum development, which led to greater understanding in this area.
• Leaders spend time evaluating all parts of the provision. They devise relevant goals for improvement aimed at promoting the best possible outcomes for children.
• Staff carry out effective work with children to develop their understanding of feelings. Children take delight in uncovering emotion cards buried under rainbow rice in a tray. Staff teach them about different emotions, and children have a good understanding of different feelings.
• Overall, children gain good communication, language and literacy skills. Staff sing songs and rhymes with children, who enjoy browsing through a broad range of interesting stories. During an activity, staff teach children the names of different medical instruments. However, they do not fully open the conversation so that children can talk about their experiences of visiting the doctor's surgery. This means that children sometimes miss out on opportunities to respond to open questions to practise and enhance their understanding and language skills.
• Staff sometimes give children solutions to problems that arise during their play without giving them the chance to solve things for themselves. For instance, during pretend play children say they are going on holiday and need to pack a suitcase. Staff tell them about the things they need to pack without letting children think about what they may need. This means that children sometimes miss out on opportunities to enhance their thinking skills.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• extend knowledge on how to enhance children's communication, language and literacy skills further, particularly in relation to effective questioning
• strengthen the curriculum to develop children's problem-solving skills more consistently.