Oakengates United Church Pre-school

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children arrive happily and understand the routine to follow when staff greet them at the door. Children hang up their coats independently and use their early reading skills to identify their name. They thoroughly enjoy the company of the staff who are friendly and nurturing. Staff encourage children to develop confidence in their own abilities and children seek staff out for hugs, and high fives when they are pleased with their accomplishments.

All children gain a wide range of useful skills that prepare them well for the next stage of their learning and their move to school. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) make good progress based on their starting points. Children develop good communication skills. They particularly enjoy sharing their favourite books with staff where they talk about the illustrations and express their opinions. For example, children access non-fiction books, such as cookery books and talk about the food they like, and dislike.

Staff have high expectations for children. Children behave well and respond to the gentle reminders from staff about the rules. Two-year-old children learn that there are times that they need to wait for what they want and understand that they must join a short queue so they can pour their own drink.

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

• The manager and staff have taken effective steps to address the actions raised at the last inspection to keep children safe and improve the quality of their education.
• The manager monitors the quality of teaching carefully and has a clear understanding of staff strengths and areas where they can further develop their professional skills. She uses this information well to provide staff with coaching and training to extend their teaching skills. Recent training has helped them to reflect and enhance the communication and language curriculum.
• The manager and staff have made effective changes to ensure that children can make choices and lead their play, and learning. Children are motivated to play and learn. They decide which resources they wish to play with and staff use children's play interests skilfully to help them to build on what they already know and can do. Staff make good use of their observations and assessments of children's progress to focus their teaching on children's learning targets.
• The special educational needs coordinator has a comprehensive understanding of the progress that children make. She works closely with parents and outside agencies, such as health visitors and speech and language therapists to ensure that children receive additional support. Staff provide children with one-to-one teaching to help them to work towards their development milestones.
• The manager and staff speak daily with parents and grandparents to provide them with information about their children's day. Parents state that their children are well cared for by the staff. Parents and carers of children with SEND receive comprehensive information about the plans in place to support their children's learning. However, staff do not keep all parents fully informed about what they are doing to help their children to build on what they already know and can do. This means that some parents do not have all the information they need to support their child's continued learning at home.
• The manager has developed a well-sequenced curriculum. Overall, staff support children's physical development effectively. They provide children with a wide range of opportunities to practise their smaller-muscle movements, such as using a variety of tools to chop and then serve fruit and vegetables. Two-year-old children concentrate as they negotiate their way along a low-level balance beam. However, staff do not plan the learning environment as well as possible to provide older children with additional challenge to build strength and control in their larger-muscle movements.
• Staff support children's health well. Children know that they wash their hands when they have used the toilet and before eating. Children access drinking water for themselves throughout the day.
• Staff provide children with good opportunities to be independent. They supervise children when they use the toilets, so they are safe and also provide them with the space and privacy to manage their personal care routines independently.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• enhance the partnership working with parents so they have all the information they need to further support children's learning at home
• extend the learning environment to provide older children with ambitious experiences that further extend their physical development.