Tadley Under Fives Pre-school

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children feel safe and secure at this welcoming, home-from-home pre-school. Leaders and staff support new children to settle quickly. They offer a personalised process which helps children build close and warm bonds with staff. Children arrive happily. They swiftly engage in the interesting activities on offer. Children freely choose activities that interest them and staff sensitively observe and support them. For example, children who love dinosaurs, decide to decorate a large model with paint. Staff skilfully instruct them to explore the textures of paint and notice where they apply it. In this way, staff introduce names for each part of the dinosaur for children to learn and apply.

Leaders and staff set up an inviting learning environment, indoors and outdoors, that ignites children's natural curiosity. Children are motivated to explore and investigate, showing good levels of concentration. Staff provide ample opportunities for children to be independent, confident and resilient. This helps to successfully prepare children for future learning. For instance, children persevere at doing up their own zips on their coats. Children look after their own needs and demonstrate pride in their achievements. They are confident to ask for assistance, but always have a go first. Children are sociable and respectful. In general, they show an understanding of the rules and boundaries expected of them. Staff remind children to be kind and considerate if a minor disagreement occurs, for example, when other children want the same resource.

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

• The experienced and capable manager demonstrates a clear insight into the pre-school's strengths and areas of development. For instance, she seeks children's, parents' and staff's ideas to further enhance the existing outdoor area. Children suggest a 'fairy garden' and staff help them to create this in a recycled bath tub with appropriate small world resources. This is a popular activity that helps children develop their imaginations as they tell each other their made-up stories.
• Staff actively support children to practise their physical skills. For example, children love to splash in puddles. Staff encourage them to make even bigger and smaller jumps. They skilfully support children to spot what happens between each splash they make. Children show good control as they run, jump and balance on outdoor equipment. They love to participate in morning yoga sessions. Children build elements of trust and respect as they listen carefully to staff's instructions and work together to make different poses. They show increasing manual dexterity as they pour sand from one container to another, without spilling any. This helps to strengthen the small muscles in their hands.
• Staff support children's communication and language skills well. For instance, they regularly share books with children, who listen attentively and relate the story events to their own experiences. Staff ask appropriate questions to assess what children understand and remember. This helps to widen children's vocabulary. Children connect previous learning to new situations they encounter. This is evident when they sing familiar songs, such as 'Rain, rain, go away' to stop it raining when they are outside.
• Each staff member is at different stages of implementing the manager's new curriculum fully. The manager provides specific training, coaching and mentoring to support all staff, especially the new members. On the whole, staff's positive interactions support children's further development and critical thinking skills. For example, some staff encourage children to consider solutions to a problem they face in their play. However, this practice is not yet fully embedded. At times, staff are too quick to offer solutions and do not carefully consider what each child already knows and can do to then build on their learning further.
• In general, children behave well. However, some older children struggle to solve minor disputes. Staff intervene quickly to help children overcome altercations. This does not fully support these children to develop the skills to resolve minor conflicts themselves. As a result, staff regularly have to stop their quality interactions with other children to deal with these disagreements. At these times, other children, especially the more quieter, less confident ones, do not benefit from specific time with these staff to develop their confidence or raise their self-esteem.
• Parents speak very highly of the manager, staff and the experiences on offer for their children. They comment on the good communication and their valued involvement when discussing their children's needs and progress. Staff share many ideas for activities they can do at home. This helps children to experience consistency in their development.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen all staff's ability to adapt their teaching skills to challenge and extend all children's learning based on their existing knowledge and skills
• build further on the support for children to learn how to resolve minor disputes between themselves.