Potter's House Preschool

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children arrive happy and eager to start their busy day at pre-school. They settle quickly to self-chosen activities, which supports their play ideas. For example, children giggle and delight in using a variety of resources for mixing, including fir leaves, mud and water, and they pretend to make popcorn. They use recall to talk about past experiences from home of watching a film and eating popcorn with family members, weaving this into their play ideas.

Children behave well and show courtesy towards friends by working together to take turns on the tree swing. They demonstrate that they have secure relationships with their friends and the adults caring for them. Children show a strong sense of belonging as they find their photo and display it on the self-registration wall. They display good levels of language as they select pictures from the registration wall and fondly talk about who their friends are. Children confidently share and talk about the plot in their favourite stories, showing good levels of vocabulary to express ideas.

Children learn how to look after themselves, which contributes to their well-being. For example, they observe and comment on the wet weather and state they need wellies and coats to go outside. Children show persistence as they independently dress themselves. Furthermore, children explain that they need to wash their hands to 'take away the germs' and practise using tools to cut their own apples for snack time.

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

• Leaders demonstrate a clear curriculum intent for the pre-school. Staff plan purposeful experiences to support children's learning. This reflects their interests and builds on what they already know and can do. For example, children are fascinated by the new houses being built opposite their pre-school. Staff note this interest and provide children with the resources they need to re-enact what they saw. They wear hard hats and use blocks and planks to build playhouses. Children then use these with great enthusiasm to play imaginatively and practise their turn taking and sharing skills.
• Leaders have been effective in raising the quality of teaching since the last inspection. Generally, there is very effective support for staff, and this leads to good-quality teaching overall. However, the initial support for staff new to the setting is not fully effective in helping them understand the curriculum intent or in identifying any gaps in their knowledge about how children learn. This leads to some inconsistencies in the quality of their teaching.
• Staff make good use of finding out about parents and weave this into learning opportunities for children to find out about the wider community. For example, children show curiosity and talk about each other's families. Staff arrange for parents to visit the children and talk about their jobs. This includes a paramedic, who talks to the children about their role helping others, and they learn about using a stethoscope.
• Children have positive attitudes to learning. They are highly engaged when staff teach them simple ways to contribute towards looking after the environment. For example, children take on the roles of water and litter monitor. Children comment that as the water monitor, they need to ensure that everyone turns the taps off, so as not to waste water. This shows that children are learning how they have an impact on the world around them.
• Parents speak highly of the staff and the support on offer to their children. They comment positively on the communication they receive about their children and how they can support learning at home.
• Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and those who need extra help receive good levels of support. Leaders notice the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on children and have used funding to good effect to address speech and language delays. This is so staff can receive the guidance from a professional to plan effective strategies. In turn, this helps children who are waiting for external assessments to take place.
• Staff offer effective support to children who speak English as an additional language to learn and use words in English. They offer some opportunities for these children to hear words in their home language. However, staff do not ensure these words are closely matched to helping children express their needs or make links with their experience at nursery, to best help children feel involved in the daily routines of pre-school life.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• focus on identifying gaps in the knowledge of new staff, to help improve their understanding of the curriculum intent and further develop their teaching skills
• consider ways to further support children who speak English as an additional language to expand how they can share their ideas and express their choices.