Orpington Day Nursery 2

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Leaders and staff create a safe and welcoming space, where children's well-being and safety are prioritised. Staff are calm and friendly, and this helps children to settle easily and become confident to explore and learn. Children demonstrate they are happy, content and ready to learn as they arrive at the setting.

Leaders and staff implement a well-designed curriculum with a sharp focus on supporting children's communication and language development. Staff create many opportunities for children to hear new words and practise speaking. Children show a keen interest in books, and staff share many stories with them. Staff adapt their teaching and use visual cards to communicate with children with speech and language delay. These strategies ensure that all children, including children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), make good progress in their communication and language development.

Staff are good role models and use a gentle approach to manage children's behaviour. They teach children to be kind to one another and encourage them to share and take turns. In addition, staff offer regular praise during activities to boost children's self-esteem. This contributes positively to children's personal, social and emotional development.

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

• The setting's curriculum is inclusive and sequenced well to help children build on their existing knowledge and skills. Staff get to know children well and regularly observe and assess children's progress. This helps them to identify any gaps in learning and organise extra support to help close the gaps. However, on a few occasions, staff's assessment of children's progress and development is not accurate and reflective of what children can do and what they need to learn next.
• Staff provide numerous opportunities for all children to sing songs, listen to stories and have conversations with each other. Children benefit from regularly hearing new words, which broadens their vocabulary. Staff enhance children's thinking and speaking skills by asking questions and allowing children time to think and respond. Staff are responsive to babies' needs and use age-appropriate strategies to communicate with them. All children, including those who speak English as an additional language, make good progress in their communication and language development.
• Supervision and training arrangements to monitor staff practice are effective. Staff benefit from good training opportunities and mentoring to help them extend and develop their skills. The staff work closely together to evaluate and identify where they can improve to help ensure better outcomes for children.
• Partnerships with parents are good. Parents value the positive contribution that leaders and staff make to their children's lives and the progress they have made. Staff provide regular updates on children's progress and information on what children are learning and their next steps. The staff work closely with parents and other professionals to implement agreed strategies to ensure that children with SEND can access the curriculum to the best of their abilities.
• Overall, children have good opportunities to build on their fine motor skills. For instance, staff plan lots of messy play activities for children to explore different textures and ignite their curiosity. In addition, staff teach toddlers how to use scissors and encourage them to practise mark making. This helps to support children's hand-eye coordination and manual dexterity skills. However, children have fewer opportunities to engage in robust physical play to take age-appropriate risks to further build on their gross motor development.
• Staff support children to develop their independence and self-care skills. Children are encouraged to tidy up after play and serve themselves during mealtimes. They make choices in their own play and independently access resources. These skills help to prepare children well for their next stage in learning.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• improve staff's understanding of observations and assessments to ensure that they identify and set realistic next steps for children's learning to help them make secure progress
• review and improve the curriculum for physical development to help ensure that children have many opportunities to develop and build on their gross motor skills.