Smartees Day Care Nursery Ltd

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The sensitive settling-in procedures and strong key-person system ensure that children soon become emotionally secure. They quickly settle and are eager to engage in the activities. Leaders and staff have developed a small nurturing group for toddlers. They have their own area that overlooks the pre-school, exposing them to the environment from the safety of their own space. They watch the older children, building their confidence so they move up happy when they are ready.

Leaders and staff plan an ambitious curriculum and an effective environment, which enable children to become active learners. For example, outdoors, children explore rolling different-sized balls down a drainpipe. They see which size fits best and rolls the fastest. Staff provide effective support, asking good open-ended questions to promote children's critical thinking. For example, when a ball is too big to fit through the hole of the stand holding the pipe, staff ask children what they could do. Children consider moving the pipe down the stand and discover through trial and error what works best. Staff introduce mathematical concepts from a young age, such as counting one to three and noticing that filling a watering-can makes it heavy. Hence, by pre-school, children can place items in order of size and count with confidence.

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

• Staff plan successfully, and using their meaningful observations, they know what children can do and what they need to learn next. They provide good interactions with all children, focusing appropriately on embedding their prime areas of development. Staff identify any gaps, and those responsible for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities plan specifically for them to catch up.
• Leaders are strong role models for the quality of teaching. For example, they keep children engaged, focused and thoroughly enjoying their learning. Staff work well as a team and there is a strong emphasis placed on professional development. Through training, staff in the baby room have implemented a curriculum that meets babies' specific needs, and pre-school staff have introduced a children's council, involving them in what they want at the setting.
• Staff use a core range of well-known books throughout the nursery, enabling children to remember the sequence of stories to extend their knowledge and vocabulary. For example, babies' eyes trace the book as staff make it flap like a butterfly, and toddlers name items in the pictures. Pre-school children explain how the caterpillar makes a cocoon around itself, hangs it from a tree to keep safe and appears as a butterfly.
• Overall, staff provide good support for children's communication and language skills. Babies communicate their ideas through gestures, and staff respond well.
• For example, they indicate the song they want to sing through props. Staff use words with signs and actions and add vocabulary. However, staff do not always give babies enough time to babble in turn-taking conversation, and they do not narrate what toddlers do to extend their vocabulary and understanding even more.
• Staff support children's independence well. For example, they help children to put on their coat, step by step, until they can manage. Older children cut up fruit, use a juicer, choose their cereal and pour their milk. Young children cooperate with nappy changing and wash their hands before eating because of the sensitive interactions from staff. Eventually, children manage their personal needs for themselves and develop a good understanding of a healthy lifestyle.
• Children have warm relationships with staff. Staff are gentle and kind with babies, and care routines ensure that young children feel safe and secure. Staff have high expectations for behaviour, such as children respecting others. From a young age, children learn to share and use 'kind hands'. Staff help older children to understand their emotions, manage conflict and behave well. Children are eager to join in with activities, developing a positive attitude to learning, preparing them well for school.
• Parents are incredibly positive about the setting and comment particularly on their children's confidence. Following the last inspection, leaders and staff have increased their support for children's learning at home. Parents confirm the important sharing of information, including resources for children and for parents with English as an additional language.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• improve staff techniques further on talking with younger children, to develop their speech and understanding even more.