Small Talk Nurseries

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Staff provide parents with daily information about their children during drop-off and collection times. Children arrive happy and settle quickly. The entrance area displays information about the nursery and its procedures. It provides a space for parents to sit and read with their children and enjoy books.

The staff are kind and caring. They form close relationships with the children they care for. This supports children's emotional security and well-being. Staff role model good behaviour and are quick to address any minor upset in a calm and reassuring manner. This encourages children to behave well and begin to think about how their behaviour affects others. Staff praise children for their good work, and children develop good levels of self-esteem.

The curriculum is ambitious and designed to teach all children the skills that they will need to be successful in their next stage of learning. When children begin their placement, the staff work in partnership with parents to gather information about each child. This captures what children know and can do. An assessment of each child identifies their next steps and informs the planning for activities to help all children to make good progress.

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

• Leadership and management are good. The leadership team has a clear vision about what it wants children to learn and how this will be delivered for children of different ages and stages of development. The wider organisation provides support to the leadership team. All staff receive support, training and induction to enable them to undertake their roles and responsibilities. Currently, the children are cared for on the ground floor of the premises. Staff have arranged the environment to provide separate spaces for the different age ranges.
• Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities receive good support. Staff work with parents' other agencies to identify any additional support that is required to meet the needs of the children attending.
• Staff use children's interests to engage them in learning. They respond well to children's emerging curiosity and help them to build on what they know and enjoy. This supports children to initiate their own ideas. However, on occasion, the environment can be too busy. This leads to children moving between activities too quickly, and they can disengage from active learning.
• Outdoors, children use their imagination as they perform on the stage, dancing and singing. Staff introduce new words as children play in the water. Children fill empty egg moulds and 'scoop up' the water. Staff provide good support for younger children outdoors as they sit in the sand tray and explore the texture, feeling the sand running through their fingers. The children laugh as they watch the ball roll towards and away from them, reaching out to hold it. Older children follow simple instructions. They negotiate running between cones and moving their bodies with increasing skill.
• Staff focus on children's speech and language development and constantly talk to the children during play. However, there are times, when staff do not always seize on what they know to help children make the most rapid progress in their speech.
• Older children begin to develop an interest in books and use them as a point of reference. Children recognise people in different communities and make links to their own family. Younger children explore books. They smile and gesture as they turn the pages and touch the different surfaces. All children enjoy action rhymes. Staff introduce simple mathematics as they teach children to count the ducks swimming.
• Good hygiene practice teaches children how to keep themselves healthy. Staff manage younger children's personal care needs sensitively. Older children become independent in managing their own personal care, such as toileting and dressing/undressing for outdoor play. The nursery menu includes a range of healthy meals for the children. Staff monitor what children eat to ensure this is sufficient to keep them well.
• Staff establish good partnerships with parents. Parents say that they are happy with the care and education their children receive at the nursery. Staff listen to any concerns they may have. Parents say that their children are happy at the nursery, as everyday they are involved in activities that they talk about at home. Parents feel that the nursery cares about the children.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support staff to embed the curriculum so that activities fully engage the children and focus their learning to build on their existing skills
• improve teaching so that it precisely targets children's speech to help them make rapid progress.