St Barnabas Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children are happy to attend this setting. They are friendly, settled and display a positive attitude to learning. Children form warm and strong relationships with the staff, who support their emotional well-being and resilience. For example, children have an amazing time learning about different emotions when exploring a book about 'Colour Monsters'. They listen to the story with curiosity, and this helps to support their early reading skills. In addition, staff encourage children to talk about how they are feeling, to help them boost their self-esteem and self-regulation.

Children navigate around the setting with great enthusiasm, choosing activities that spark their interest and excitement. Staff often use visual prompts and cues to support children who speak English as an additional language and children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). Children enjoy pretending to be vets in the home corner. They use their previous experiences to engage in role play with their peers, which helps them to strengthen their social interactions. Children talk about what makes animals sick and learn care and affection towards them. This supports children's understanding of the world they live in. Children also enjoy exploring play dough to build on their fine motor skills, control and manipulation.

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

• Staff offer a rich environment with plenty of meaningful learning opportunities. Children choose the activities they would like to explore. They learn to share and take turns with confidence. For example, children have great fun building a large train track for their trains and cars. They follow instructions to move the cars along the track and build on their hand-to-eye coordination.
• Staff model language well and engage in conversations with the children. Staff use open-ended questions and introduce new vocabulary such as 'fear'. However, staff do not use all opportunities to encourage younger children, or children requiring further support, to repeat new words to secure their knowledge.
• Children enjoy books and develop a passion for reading. For example, a small group of children have a great time looking at a book with their favourite character Bertie who is 'a bit dirty'. They point at pictures with excitement and recall main events from the story, smiling and giggling. Children also enjoy listening to the Goldilocks story. They concentrate intently and engage in discussions about the characters. This helps support their literacy, listening and attention skills.
• Children have good opportunities to stay active and build on their gross motor skills. For example, in the garden, they explore resources and apparatus with great control and confidence. Children learn to walk on large beams to support their balance, coordination and stamina.
• Children have opportunities to develop their mathematical skills. For example, they count along to 20 while clapping to the rhythm of the music. In addition, children have access to various puzzles and loose resources. This helps them build on their spatial awareness and hand-to-eye coordination.
• Staff have good knowledge of children's learning. They understand what children need to learn next and use information from their observations of children to guide their planning. However, on occasions, staff do not identify when children need more challenge to extend their learning further.
• The leaders' vision and ethos for their setting is ambitious. They continuously strive to improve the quality of care and education to benefit all children. This includes working in close partnership with external agencies and offering additional support to children with SEND. Leaders value their team's career growth and well-being. They organise regular meetings and training to ensure they keep their knowledge current. Staff report that they are very happy to work at this setting.
• Partnership with parents is effective. Parents praise the flexibility and inclusiveness of leaders and staff. Staff and leaders also organise home visits to establish sound relationships with the parents and provide continuity of care and education. Parents feel supported and involved in their children's learning and development and appreciate the progress they make.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• provide opportunities for children to hear and learn a wider range of new words to extend their vocabulary, particularly for younger children and those who require extra support
• strengthen the quality of teaching and education to ensure that all children are suitably challenged and benefit from extensive learning opportunities.