Sarratt Ducklings Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children who attend this highly inclusive and welcoming pre-school receive the very best start to their education. They are consistently taught the skills needed to help them prepare for their life ahead. Children are compassionate towards others and demonstrate the skills needed for forming long-lasting friendships. Children confidently tell staff that they are working as a team when digging in mud to find buried worms, and have great fun making up stories together in role-play situations.

Children and staff have formed very secure attachments that give them a strong sense of belonging. Children happily talk about home life. They confidently discuss different subjects, such as the weather and seasons, with staff at snack time. This is used very effectively as a time to encourage children's social skills and language development. Children behave very well. They receive lots of meaningful praise for their achievements, which helps to build high levels of self-esteem and confidence. These achievements are purposefully shared with other children and staff. Staff tell children how proud they are of them, and their work is displayed for all to admire.

Children's own ideas and thoughts are given high consideration when planning the learning environment. Children help to design their own fairy and dinosaur gardens to develop their imaginative play. Staff follow children's interests as they happen. For example, they make and fly paper kites in the wind.

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

• Staff are highly skilled and experienced in childcare. They are motivating and enthusiastic in all activities that they support. This positive attitude excites children and makes them want to learn and have a go. Staff know the children they care for very well. The curriculum is carefully sequenced to ensure that staff are consistently building on what they know children can do and what they need to learn next.
• The management team has high expectations of all staff. They offer clear support and meaningful professional development opportunities that enable them to fulfil their roles to a high standard and consistently improve children's experiences. Staff well-being is high on the management's agenda, and staff feel truly supported and valued.
• Staff provide children with a language-rich environment. They skilfully build children's communication skills. Children have excellent opportunities to engage in meaningful conversations with staff, who consistently show a genuine interest in what they have to say. Children are confident to ask questions and staff give them time to think and resolve problems, such as how they can get dry mud to form a castle shape from a bucket. They enjoy a range of stories that are read to them with enthusiasm, and eagerly choose the songs they want to sing.
• Children's mathematical development is given a high priority and is carefully weaved into activities by confident staff. Children learn to sort and match by colour and object, deciding themselves how they are going to group the hidden toy bugs they find in the mud. Older children confidently count and recognise numbers beyond 20. Children use mathematical language as they play, describing whether they have found 'more' or 'less' bugs than their friends.
• There are very strong links in place with the local community, which helps children to gain a strong sense of the immediate world around them. For example, children have taken part in the local horticultural show and made an Easter display for the village shop's window. They visited the car garage when learning about different methods of transport. Children use the host school's facilities for baking and physical education lessons in preparation for school life. Children learn about the wider world through a range of activities and books.
• Parents' excellent support for the setting is unwavering. They help to contribute to their children's pre-school life in a variety of ways, such as building a mud kitchen and bringing in a live chicken as part of children's learning about farm animals. Parents feel they are very well informed about all aspects of the setting and that nothing is too much trouble for the staff.
• Staff are extremely quick to identify and put appropriate plans in place where children require extra support in their learning and development. They work very closely with parents to meet children's needs. Parents' opinions are highly valued, and they are fully consulted with when deciding how to spend any additional funds that will help to improve outcomes for their children.