St Tudy Preschool

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children show they feel safe and secure on arrival. They come in smiling and happily go to their key person to play. Children develop a strong sense of who they are. They dress up in familiar costumes linked to their families, such as a farmer. Other children dress up as 'a mummy'. Children have a 'can-do' attitude. They persist to put dressing-up clothes on themselves. Children proudly show their friends who and what they are. All children develop good levels of self-esteem and know what makes them unique.

Staff have a clear understanding of what they want children to learn and successfully build on what children know and need to do next. They support children's personal, social and emotional development effectively. For example, staff remind children about 'golden rules' during the day, such as sharing and using 'kind hands' with their friends. Children respond positively to these. They are respectful, polite and say 'please' and 'thank you' often.

Partnership with parents is good. Staff keep parents informed about their children's development. Parents praise the advice from staff on potty training and healthy eating. They feel their children have made good progress in their overall learning and development. Parents comment that their children 'thrive' in the setting.

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

• Staff support children with special educational needs and/or disabilities effectively. They use strategies to help children respond to instructions. For example, staff show them a traffic light sign when they need them to stop what they are doing and gain their attention. Children then stop, look and listen when it is time to do something different.
• Pre-school-age children enjoy making a salad in the role-play kitchen. They use wooden spoons to mix peppers and tomatoes. They look at a recipe book and weigh their ingredients on scales. However, staff do not always support children to be more independent, to persevere and achieve in what they set out to do. For example, when some children struggle to cut up the vegetables, staff do not help them. The children lose interest and move on to something else.
• Staff broaden the pre-school-age children's understanding of size and positional language. They play a game together and talk about what items in the game are big or small. Children are kind and patient as they take turns. Other pre-school children play with trains and tracks. Staff talk to them about the train going 'over' or 'under' the bridge. This expands children's knowledge of mathematical concepts.
• Toddlers love to sing songs. Staff develop toddler's communication and language skills effectively. They help them to hear and learn new words. Staff speak slowly and encourage toddlers to repeat the names of fruit at snack time. However, staff do not always give the pre-school-age children enough time to process their thoughts and answer questions. For example, sometimes, staff do not leave sufficient time for children to respond to a question before asking a variation of the question or pre-empting an answer.
• Children learn how to solve problems. For example, pre-school-age children run out of water in a container they are using, and they ask for more. Staff follow the children's interests and help them find a solution. Together, they talk about how they can use a syringe to suck up water from another tray and pour it into their container. This captures the children's curiosity and they confidently move the water from one container to another using the syringe. This gives them a sense of achievement.
• Children explore the world around them. They smell mint in the garden picked from their nearby allotment where they grow herbs and vegetables. Children go on outings and broaden their knowledge of the local community. For example, leaders organise a visit to the local shop where all children listen to a story from the shopkeeper. They pick apples from their apple tree in the village and eat them together.
• Staff well-being is high. The manager supports staff's professional development. Following recent training on effective provision for two-year-olds, staff have created a calm and open space for toddlers to explore.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• support children to become more independent, so they can persevere and achieve in what they set out to do
• develop communication and language strategies further with pre-school children, so they have time to process their thoughts and respond to questions.