Spring Wellsprings

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The children arrive happy and very keen to attend this caring and welcoming setting. Staff are calm and patient and build trusting relationships with all children. Through a carefully planned transition, the youngest children settle in quickly and begin to explore with confidence. Staff encourage a high level of independence in children from a young age, with toddlers feeding, dressing and organising themselves. Children enjoy the café-style lunch table, independently serving and cutting up their food. They also have opportunities to dance, sing and play musical instruments.

Children enjoy a well-balanced curriculum with a range of activities that support their interests and learning. They use their imagination well and enjoy construction, drawing with a range of medium and role play. There are opportunities to develop their gross and fine motor skills throughout all areas, which supports their early handwriting skills. Their problem-solving skills are challenged in the outside environment, and children love to mix, stir and pour in the mud kitchen. Children learn about the wider community by visiting local parks and farms.

Staff are very good role models and continually support the children's mental health and well-being, giving them the necessary language to express feelings and emotions. They develop the children's communication and listening skills through modelling language and rephrasing sentences.

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

• Leaders build strong relationships with children, ensuring all children who are disadvantaged access an ambitious curriculum. The well-established key-person system supports the children's resilience and independence. This is very much celebrated by parents, and they feel that their children are safe and secure.
• The emotional well-being of children underpins the curriculum. The children are confident communicators and can articulate their emotions and feelings well.
• Staff routinely introduce children to new vocabulary that enables them to communicate successfully with each other, taking turns and promoting positive play.
• Language and developing a love of reading, song and rhyme are at the heart of the curriculum. Most children listen attentively when they are being read to and suggest what they think is going to happen next. They join in with familiar stories and rhymes, repeating repetitive phrases and words.
• Leaders support staff in using assessment to plan for children's next steps and build on children's experiences across the curriculum. Children learn to count and recognise numerals, colours and shapes. However, on occasions, staff's skills in consistently engaging and challenging the quieter or less confident learners need developing.
• There is the appropriate balance between the inside and outside play, with leaders making the most of the space available. The children demonstrate good physical skills and are given opportunities to develop their balance and coordination. Staff help children to learn about being safe, while allowing them to take risks.
• Children are well behaved and respond well to the structure and routines of the day. Staff encourage children to be independent in their eating from a young age and to taste new foods they have not tried before.
• Leaders have a good oversight of the setting and a clear ambition for developing the quality of care and learning even further, especially the outdoor provision. They value working in partnership with parents, who provide positive feedback. Parents state, for example, that staff are approachable, patient and engaging. They comment that through the online communication portal they are kept regularly updated about their child's progress and learning.
• The staff work with enthusiasm and take pride in the care and learning they provide. Leaders ensure that staff access a varied professional development programme that builds on their existing knowledge. Staff have a good understanding of their safeguarding roles and responsibilities and the procedures to follow in the event of any concerns about a child in their care.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support staff to include quieter children more effectively during group activities to enhance learning and personal development opportunities.