Seedlings

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are immensely valued by deeply nurturing staff, who have very high expectations of them all. As a result, all children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities, make very rapid progress. Staff have an excellent understanding of what each child knows and needs to learn next. They use this information to plan exciting activities that engage and inspire the children. Settling-in arrangements are very flexible and individual to children's and parents' needs. Children are extremely confident and self-assured in the setting.

The setting offers a welcoming and engaging environment, where children thrive and become deeply involved in their learning. Children display high levels of respect for others and their environment. Children have secure and close relationships with staff. Children demonstrate that they feel safe at nursery. They behave exceedingly well and form respectful relationships. Staff sensitively help children to express their feelings. Their support to each individual child and family is exceptional. Consequently, this helps to support children and their families' emotional well-being, which staff consider to be fundamental to making excellent progress. Parents are welcomed into the setting and have positive and highly effective relationships with staff. Children are enthusiastic learners.

Children flourish despite the challenges presented to the setting and families by the COVID-19 pandemic. Parents are highly appreciative of the quality of care and support that they and their children receive.

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

• The dedicated management team and staff work superbly together and are committed to meeting the specific needs of individual families. Staff work tirelessly to seek out the services and funding to help children make the best progress. Staff's enthusiasm and passion for working with children is infectious.
• All children who attend this nursery have special educational needs and/or disabilities, and staff have high expectations for all children to achieve and do well. Staff treat each child as an individual and provide an inclusive environment.
• The ambitious curriculum for all children is interesting and exciting. Staff provide excellent learning opportunities for children to develop their listening and attention skills. This enables children to broaden their experiences and build secure foundations for their future learning.
• Staff support children exceptionally well. They are very knowledgeable about the children's individual needs. Highly effective strategies are in place to ensure staff swiftly identify potential delays in children's development. The highly qualified manager and staff take action to provide intervention at the earliest opportunity. Staff use funding to support the children's development. For example, they have developed an interactive sensory room for children to explore and where they can relax.
• Staff successfully plan the environment, so that all children can freely access activities of their choice. For example, staff encourage children to sing songs, listen to stories and nursery rhymes and to express their own thoughts. Consequently, children use new words and develop their independence and confidence to express themselves.
• The inspirational manager has embedded a rigorous system to support and monitor the development of staff. The manager takes pride in her team. She coaches and mentors them to help them confidently perform to their full potential. She observes staff teaching, and strives for excellence for children. The manager and staff team make excellent use of self-evaluation. They clearly identify areas to improve and value input from parents and other professionals. This helps them to maintain the quality of the provision.
• Parents speak highly of the nursery. Partnerships with parents are highly effective. Parents are closely involved in the care that their children receive. A collaborative and cohesive approach is used very successfully to build fully on children's learning. Parents describe the setting as 'amazing' and leaders and staff as 'exceptional'. They add that staff go above and beyond to support their children with their learning.
• Children delight in being outdoors and use this area well. For example, children are provided with excellent opportunities to help develop their physical and exploratory skills.
• Staff make extremely good use of opportunities to review the learning environment and to provide activities that focus on children's individual needs. For example, they provide scented play dough to help children to explore, using their senses. A member of staff is always close by to join in to help drive activities forward. Staff use resources to stimulate young children's impulse to explore. Staff's excellent use of sign language helps children to further extend their communication and language skills.