Partou Little Dragons Day Nursery & Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children benefit from a wide range of exciting experiences at this well-organised setting. They have strong opportunities to explore with their senses. For example, children take part in activities using mud, wood, shells and pine cones. They decorate dough with petals and seeds and take turns to smell herbs and fruit. Staff are caring, nurturing and fun. They build strong bonds and good relationships with children. Staff provide good support for children's personal, social and emotional development. They plan activities that encourage children to explore their emotions. For example, children play a game in which they identify happy or sad faces. Children register themselves into the nursery. This helps them to feel a sense of belonging.

Children share and play cooperatively together. They benefit from secure daily routines and regular mindfulness sessions. This helps them to feel happy, safe and secure. Staff support children's growing independence well. They encourage children to serve their own food and pour their own drinks at mealtimes. Children learn about good hygiene routines, such as when staff teach them to wash their hands and how to clean their teeth. Staff clearly praise and encourage children's efforts. This helps to boost children's confidence and self-esteem.

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

• Staff plan stimulating activities that they know will interest children and extend their learning. They model new skills and language. Staff leave gaps in rhymes for children to fill, and they repeat children's words back to them. This helps children to feel valued and understood.
• Children benefit daily from good opportunities for fresh air and exercise in the enclosed garden. They build their strength, balance and coordination as they kick balls, ride on bicycles and balance on beams. Staff encourage babies to reach and stretch while on their tummies in order to develop their core strength.
• Children explore different ways of using their hands as they fill and pour with water. They develop smaller muscles and hand control, such as when they explore with sand and knead dough.
• Overall, staff provide strong support for children's communication skills using singing, stories and sign language. However, staff do not always support children to be able to express and explore speech sounds. For example, they do not consistently encourage children to remove dummies from their mouths when they speak.
• There is a strong emphasis throughout the nursery on children's early literacy. Staff invite parents to use the setting's lending library so they can share stories with their children at home. The manager uses additional funding that the setting receives to buy books and props to encourage children to interactively join in with familiar stories.
• Children enjoy group time and independent play. However, during group times, staff do not always limit distractions around children in order to support their listening and attention skills.
• Children benefit from healthy, balanced and nutritious home-cooked meals. They take part in baking sessions with the nursery cook where they bake healthy options, such as courgette and coconut cake. The cook adapts the setting's menu to meet the needs of children with allergies or specific dietary requirements.
• There is strong support in place for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. Staff understand the importance of working with other education and health professionals in order to develop a consistent approach to support children.
• The team has close relationships with parents, who speak highly of the setting and its staff team. They praise the caring staff, the play environment, the range of activities on offer and the strong systems in place for communication.
• The manager is very effective. She provides strong support for her staff team's well-being and continuous professional development. Staff are supported to improve their skills through meetings, training and observations of practice.
• The manager and staff are very reflective and have strong systems in place for gathering the views of children, staff and parents. The manager and her staff team are dedicated and passionate about the quality of the service they provide and the outcomes for children in their care.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• review the use of comforters, such as dummies, to enhance support for younger children's developing speech and communication skills
• reduce distractions during group times in order to further support children's listening and attention skills.