Oak Hill Community Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are keen to attend the nursery and arrive happy. They enjoy spending time at this fun and nurturing nursery. Staff provide children with a warm welcome on arrival, which helps them to settle quickly and feel safe and secure. Staff speak to parents and check on their children's well-being. This helps staff to be attentive to children's needs. Staff encourage children's independence from an early age. Children take off their coats and shoes and wash their hands on arrival, which promotes good hygiene routines.

Children make choices and enjoy the range of resources available. Older children use water wheels and magnetic letters. Staff challenge their thinking when letters get stuck and encourage children to problem solve. Younger children show good concentration skills as they use shape sorters and make marks with chalk. Children fill containers with sand, which helps to extend their fine motor skills. They show excitement as they make sandcastles and knock them down.

Staff have high expectations for all children. They role model the behaviour they expect and provide gentle reminders when needed. Children understand the nursery's agreement and follow instructions. They share resources, take turns, use good manners and behave well. Children regularly receive praise and encouragement, which raises their self-esteem.

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

• Staff provide a broad and exciting curriculum which focuses on children's interests. They build on children's previous knowledge and skills with teaching moments. Staff sequence children's learning and prepare them for the next stage. They use observations and focus weeks to identify children's next steps in learning. Staff make regular assessments to ensure that all children make good progress in their learning.
• Staff promote children's communication and language skills effectively. They babble with babies and repeat words. Staff ask questions and give children time to think and answer. Staff introduce new vocabulary to help children to form and extend their sentences. Children enjoy singing and listening to stories, which increases their love of books and builds on their literacy knowledge.
• Partnerships with parents are a key strength of this nursery. Parents share their positive experiences of the high-quality care and education their children receive. Staff keep parents up to date on their children's learning. Parents acknowledge their children's good progress, particularly with their communication and independence. Staff share ideas with parents to continue their children's learning at home, which helps to promote continuity.
• Staff recruitment is a current challenge for the nursery. To maintain ratios, managers need to use agency staff on a temporary basis, who work alongside permanent staff with the older children. The majority of staff engage well with children and use opportunities to extend children's learning. However, this is not consistent across all staff when children play, to maintain the high standards that the managers expect.
• Staff promote healthy lifestyles well. Children enjoy a range of nutritious cooked meals and healthy snacks. They use the inside and outside environments to practise and extend their physical skills. Babies enjoy climbing and crawl through tunnels. Older children increase their coordination as they use hoppers. Children learn about the importance of oral health and help to complete safety checks.
• The nursery has embedded a culture of diversity and inclusion, where staff welcome all children in the community. Staff teach children about other cultures and different festivals. Children learn to respect others and value their own uniqueness. The special educational needs coordinator supports children who need additional support and makes swift referrals to ensure that all children get the help they need.
• Children show a positive attitude to their learning. For example, younger children attempt to use scissors and show determination as they make snips in paper. Children count with staff as they set the table and thread cotton reels. However, staff do not consistently use mathematical language and concepts to extend children's skills further.
• The manager and deputy manager are proactive in raising standards. They support staff's well-being and provide regular supervision sessions. Staff are encouraged to access continued professional development to increase their knowledge and skills. Parents and staff contribute their views to help managers and staff evaluate their practice and make plans to address further improvements.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen consistency of staff's interactions to consistently extend children's learning during play activities
• embed children's understanding of mathematical language and concepts, such as shape, space and measures, to increase their knowledge further.