Rainbow Nursery School - Holy Trinity

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Staff show passion for ensuring children feel emotionally secure at nursery. They work closely with children and their families so that children are happy and settled in this home-from-home environment. Staff know children well and quickly adapt activities to ensure they meet the needs of individual learners and maintain their interest and excitement in their chosen play. The experienced staff plan a varied curriculum for children, and their thorough assessments ensure children are ready for their next stage in learning, including starting school.

Children behave well and staff talk to them calmly and gently when reminding them of behaviour expectations. Staff praise children for good sitting, waiting and turn taking. Children help to set the table for snack time and show respect for each other as they thank their friends as they share the different foods

Children are supported well as they embark on their journey towards reading. They take age-appropriate reading books home to share with their families and learn individual letter sounds in a fun and engaging way. For example, children enjoy explaining why they have brought different objects in from home for the 's' sound tray at nursery. Children learn the new vocabulary of sushi, soft, squishy and square as they describe the different objects.

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

• Staff support children well to develop their small-muscle skills in preparation for writing. Children enjoy manipulating play dough with cutters, filling and emptying different sized pots with sand, mark-making with chalks and using magnetic pencils to navigate beads around a puzzle board. Children are further supported by staff during snack time as they learn to use knives to spread butter on bread and to chop and peel different fruits.
• Staff use effective strategies to teach children about the importance of sharing and turn taking. They use sand timers and offer children high praise as they wait their turn when playing board games with their friends. Children follow instructions given by staff for good sitting and listening during whole-group-time sessions.
• Children enjoy the many opportunities on offer for being imaginative. Staff support them to keep their play going as they role play being a doctor, dressing up and using a stethoscope. In addition, children enjoy acting out making delicious food in the outside kitchen area. Although staff do model new vocabulary during these times, opportunities to extend and challenge children within the area of communication and language in other activities are sometimes missed. This is particularly evident when supporting children to describe the different textures during messy play activities and when exploring and naming the different minibeasts when examining them with magnifying glasses.
• The regular daily music sessions on offer give children opportunities to be expressive and learn a range of familiar songs. Children join in by clapping, wiggling and jumping as they pretend to be 'jelly on a plate'. They enjoy tapping tambourines and shaking shakers fast and slow in time to the music.
• Children are supported to be physically active as they free flow into the outside garden. They are challenged to climb and slide down slides, kick small balls and build tracks to support them to practise their balancing.
• Despite the high adult-to-child ratio, staff are not always consistently clear on how best to deploy themselves effectively to ensure all children are getting the most from the planned learning opportunities on offer. For example, on occasion, there are times when more than one adult is supporting a small number of children when they would be better placed elsewhere.
• Leaders show passion for continuous improvement. Staff are given regular supervision meetings and have opportunities for further professional training during inset days, morning meetings and online training. The nursery makes effective use of a range of external agencies to ensure all children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities, achieve the best possible outcomes.
• Parents are extremely happy with the level of care and nurture the staff offer their children. They are welcomed into nursery regularly to see what activities are on offer and to discuss how their children are progressing. They enjoy seeing their children's individual learning journeys termly and seeing how their children's work is celebrated by the nursery.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• ensure staff are consistently introducing children to new vocabulary to support them further within the area of communication and language
• ensure adults are always appropriately deployed so children always get the most from the planned learning opportunities on offer.