Park House Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy and excited to explore the wide range of activities on offer. They eagerly seek out friends to share experiences with. For example, they happily sit together, sharing familiar stories and telling each other what happens next. Children make great friendships and feel safe and secure at the nursery.

Children have a wide vocabulary and articulate what they know and can do. Staff skilfully use everyday routines to support children's communication and language skills. For example, they cheerfully sing about wiping tables from left to right as they clean surfaces. The language-rich environment helps children to learn new words. Older children demonstrate their wide vocabulary well when they talk about why a 'gilet' is different from a 'hoodie'. Children have strong communication and language skills, which they need for future learning.

Staff have high expectations of children's behaviour. They use the nursery's 'golden goals' to help children understand what they expect of them, such as giving others personal space. Staff demonstrate the rules well when they gently remind children to be kind and take turns with creative materials. This helps children to learn about how their actions affect others.

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

• Leaders and staff plan a well-thought-out, sequenced curriculum. They recognise the importance of babies building secure attachments. They explain this helps children to feel emotionally secure so that they can explore new experiences on offer. Consequently, babies receive responsive and sensitive interactions from staff. For instance, staff happily lie on the floor and gain good eye contact to engage babies in play. This helps children to build trusting relationships with those that care for them.
• Children take pride in themselves and know what makes them unique. For example, older children excitedly talk to friends and staff about when the 'travelling ted' came to stay at their homes. They engage for a long period of time, showing their friends photos of their adventures. Children have a secure sense of self and enjoy celebrating this with others.
• Overall, most staff know how children learn and how to teach them. For example, they use technology well to support children's interests, such as searching for images of pufferfish. Children excitedly talk about what they look like and where they live. This helps children to learn new concepts and use them in play. However, some staff do not have consistently high-quality interactions with children. For instance, at times, staff do not fully extend children's language skills while they play alongside them. This means that some children do not fully benefit from all learning opportunities.
• Children know routines and excitedly follow them. This helps children to be independent and ready for school when the time comes. For instance, they enjoy giving out cups and cutlery to their friends at mealtimes. However, some parts of the routines, such as lunchtime and transitioning to the garden, interrupt children's learning, and they sit waiting for long periods of time.
• Children have endearing, positive attitudes to play and are extremely confident. For instance, they enjoy asking visitors questions about who they are and what they do. In return, children excitedly tell them about what they like to do and the pets they have at home. They have the personal and social skills they need to be curious learners.
• Leaders and staff have an ambitious curriculum for all children. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities make good progress in their development. Staff use individual plans to ensure that these children have the support they need to help them reach their full potential. For example, staff expertly introduce new games with a turn-taking element to support children to work collaboratively. As a result, children progress to playing happily alongside others.
• Staff and leaders build positive parent partnerships. Parents say that they appreciate the online updates about their children's learning and development. They say that the nursery offers a friendly home-from-home environment. Parents explain that staff are nurturing and build close bonds with children. This helps children to settle quickly and feel safe.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen staff's skills to ensure all children benefit from consistent high-quality interactions that support their learning
• help staff to better manage periods of transition, such as mealtimes and coming in from the garden, to limit waiting times and reduce interruption to learning.