Snapdragons Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children build strong bonds with staff. Staff are attentive to young children's care needs, quickly fulfilling these to ensure that their well-being remains high. Parents comment on the very personal approach that staff offer their children. New babies thrive on this, settling in quickly. They eagerly put their arms out to their key person as she welcomes them on arrival.

Each child's key person follows the nursery's strong processes for assessing their development and outlining children's next steps and form a clear curriculum from these. Staff work to build babies' and toddlers' communication and confidence. They use books and rhymes to engage young children. Staff model speech so children hear the correct pronunciations. They wait patiently for children to respond, either verbally, with gestures or signs. Children are learning that communication is a two-way process and that their voices are important. Older children confidently hold more complex conversations and have good vocabulary. Children's language skills develop well, and this includes those who speak more than one language. Children who have special educational needs and/or disabilities are closely supported. The manager liaises with staff, parents and other professionals to ensure that children get the help they need. All children make good progress, including funded two-year-old and older children in receipt of additional funding.

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

• Older children enjoy risky play out in the challenging terrain of the woodland area of the garden. They navigate steep slopes confidently. They are mindful of their friends and other obstacles around them, recognising risks and taking turns well. Toddlers eagerly hunt for bugs and staff encourage their concentration and suitable behaviour when children get overexcited. They support children's use of the climbing frame and children keep trying to achieve their goal. Children develop their physical skills well, learn to adapt their behaviour and gain positive attitudes to challenges they encounter.
• Children show good levels of independence and learn how to keep themselves healthy. Staff teach toddlers how to use knives to cut their potatoes and encourage them to use their forks to eat with. Older children serve themselves lunch, carefully spooning items onto their plates. Staff follow good hygiene routines and promote these values in children too. They follow children's dietary requirements and preferences, and children eat well. However, staff do not always organise the routines of the day as effectively as possible, particularly mealtimes. On occasion, children have to wait for periods of time, they become frustrated and their skills do not develop as much as possible.
• Managers and staff build strong links within the local area, developing children's awareness of the community and the world around them. Children create artwork for the local art festival. Families donate much needed items for local food banks. There are good partnerships with other settings children attend and local schools that children move on to, fostering a consistent approach for children.
• Staff lead a suitable balance of child-led and adult-led activities. Older children build models with small building bricks. Staff effectively help children to persevere and solve the problems they encounter. Children enjoy cooking activities and carefully chop fruit. Staff support them to count items and work out how many more they will need. However, occasionally pre-school staff do not adapt their teaching to focus on the individual needs of all the children, making sure children can get the most out of planned activities.
• Parents are full of praise for the dedicated staff and the wealth of information that is shared with them about their child's time at the nursery. Parents say staff are so supportive. They use thoughtful resources, such as the nursery's lending library and activity bags to help parents support children's learning at home.
• The company's area managers and directors, and the nursery managers closely support the staff team. The manager undertakes supervision meetings with staff and regularly discusses their professional development, workloads and supports staff's mental health. The team's regular meetings and discussions, help them gain ideas to continue to analyse and enhance practice.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• enhance the arrangements and support staff offer children during the routines of the day, particularly around mealtimes, to reduce waiting time and develop children's skills as much as possible
• help staff to flexibly adapt their teaching, consistently focusing on the individual needs of the all the children and make sure they can get the most out of planned activities.