Talbot Woods Day Nursery and Nursery School

Inclusion: Strong standard

Leaders and staff form highly effective working relationships with parents and carers from the start. They closely assess children's learning to quickly identify any delay or barriers to their development. Staff have high expectations of children's achievements and create specific targeted activities to support them in reaching their potential. Children with language delays benefit from skilled interactions to help them learn new words and to communicate more confidently. Staff learn and use words in children's home languages to reflect their individuality and support their understanding of English. They rigorously assess the progress children make to identify any further intervention or adaptations needed. This includes quickly seeking specialist guidance from external agencies.

Leaders work in close partnership with other professionals involved in the care of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) and barriers to their learning. They monitor the use of additional funding to ensure this has the desired impact on their development. Staff are well trained and continuously build on their knowledge and skills to meet the changing needs of children. This includes specific training to support children with SEND at mealtimes to ensure they are fully included and to meet their emotional and health needs.

Curriculum and teaching: Expected standard

Leaders have sound oversight of the curriculum delivery, the needs of the children and quality of staff interactions. Leaders and staff work together to plan, review and deliver an ambitious curriculum to ensure children's development is supported well. They assess children's progress well, making immediate adaptations for disadvantaged children and those with special educational needs and/or disabilities and barriers to their learning, for instance.

Leaders and staff prioritise nurturing children's emotional wellbeing, confidence and resilience. This helps to ensure they feel safe, secure and able to flourish from the youngest age. Staff encourage children's interests, skilfully creating activities to motivate them to learn. For example, in response to a child's desire to throw things indoors, staff create an exciting game for children to compete throwing paper balls into a basket. They encourage children's coordination and turn-taking and incorporate some mathematical learning.

Staff help children to learn new words, such as through discussions, reading books and exploring natural resources. They support children's mathematical development well overall, helping them to learn about numbers, shape and size. However, this is not consistent in helping all children build on their knowledge further, such as when they find mathematical challenges too easy.

Achievement: Expected standard

Children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities and barriers to their learning, make appropriate progress from the start. They communicate well and learn how to express themselves. Babies babble and laugh with delight. Toddlers learn new words exploring natural resources and tell stories as they play. They proudly tell others what 'spiky' and 'sharp' mean. Older children learn more complex words, such as what 'infusion' means when creating pretend herbal tea.

Children gain the skills they need for their future learning and starting school. From a young age, they develop independence, managing more tasks for themselves as they transition through the nursery. Older children show resilience and persevere to overcome challenges. This contributes to children's high levels of confidence in managing self-care tasks efficiently for themselves.

Behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines: Expected standard

Children develop positive attitudes and social skills. They benefit from kind and caring staff role models who have high expectations for behaviour. Staff manage any occasional issues through consistent and gentle guidance. They provide developmentally appropriate support for younger children to learn to share, take turns and listen. Older children are kind, show consideration and respect and learn to work together to manage any disagreements. Children enjoy staff's praise. They take pride in their achievements, celebrating what they have learned, such as telling others, 'I did it,' when they overcome a challenge.

Leaders work closely with parents and carers to monitor and encourage children's attendance and punctuality. Staff support children as they transition through the day, following their own routines and the changes in activities to ensure they feel secure. They create positive environments in which children have space to explore and be creative, spaces for calm reflection and time for active play. This includes quiet spaces where children with barriers to their learning engage well in focused one-to-one activities. However, during some group activities, when the room becomes noisy, some quieter children are not heard, and some lose concentration. This does not help to further enhance their engagement.

Children's welfare and wellbeing: Strong standard

Leaders and staff know children extremely well. The highly effective key-person system ensures staff build successful working relationships with parents and carers from the start. This enables staff to gain a comprehensive understanding of every child's needs and the adaptations needed to include them fully. Staff maintain close communication with parents to ensure changes to care routines and needs are met consistently and that they are aware of changes in children's lives.

Children develop extremely close and trusting bonds with staff. Leaders and staff prioritise children's welfare, emotional wellbeing and sense of security. This is thoroughly embedded throughout the nursery. Staff help children to understand, express and manage their feelings and emotions. Babies feel secure in their own routines, and older children enjoy taking turns holding the soft toy, 'Candyfloss', to talk about and process their feelings with staff and friends.

Staff nurture children's health and physical development extremely well. Babies enjoy safe, open spaces to crawl and cruise. Staff sequence children's learning skilfully with exciting activities to encourage their large- and small-muscle development. For example, older children join in with a dough-disco activity and large nature-based painting projects, and they use small tools in creative play. Children benefit from nutritious food at sociable mealtimes during which they eat well and learn about where healthy foods come from.

Leadership and governance: Expected standard

Leaders have made significant improvements since the last inspection. They have sought specialist support to improve the environment, curriculum and staff interactions with children. Staff embrace training and professional development. For example, they use skills gained from nurture training to understand how to help children feel secure and to flourish in their development. Ongoing support for staff will help to enhance how they encourage children's engagement and mathematical development even further. Leaders have enhanced their knowledge of healthy eating to build further on supporting children's healthy lifestyles. Leaders provide tailored training to help staff meet the needs of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and barriers to their learning.

Leaders have a detailed oversight of strengths and areas for development. They work collaboratively with the dedicated staff to create further improvements to maintain high standards and strive for excellence. Leaders work closely with parents and carers to ensure they understand the needs of the families, including how to use any additional funding responsibly. Parents share extremely positive feedback regarding the staff and care of their children. Staff wellbeing is prioritised. Leaders provide wellbeing days and individual support for any challenges staff experience in their lives. Members of the long-established and well-qualified staff team feel valued and supported in their roles.