The Avenue Day Nursery

Inclusion: Strong standard

Staff provide excellent support for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) and their families. Leaders collaborate extremely well with parents and specialist professionals. This helps staff to understand the individual needs of the children in their care. Leaders accompany parents on visits to new schools. This gives families the information they need to support a smooth and well-planned move on to school.

Staff are highly knowledgeable about their key children, including those with SEND. This enables staff to set meaningful targets for children's ongoing development. In addition, leaders devise impactful plans that address specific areas of children's development. For example, staff adapt stories about characters who are able to explore their feelings. As a result, children with SEND and those who face barriers to learning, make rapid progress in their communication and emotional development.

Staff consistently ignite children's curiosity. They successfully motivate all children to participate in activities throughout the day. Skilled staff run well-structured activities which incorporate children's interests. For example, engaging staff use a shared-attention activity to develop the language and social skills of children with SEND. During the activity, staff include pictures of space exploration. This teaching deepens children's engagement, encourages their use of English and helps them to feel included.

Curriculum and teaching: Expected standard

Leaders devise a coherent curriculum that follows children's interests closely. In addition, leaders apply the curriculum to consistently build on what children know and can do. Staff carefully monitor the developing language and physical skills of babies and young children. This ensures that very young children are well prepared for their next stages of development.

Staff across the setting teach children how to develop their independence. For example, staff support very young children to develop the skills needed to feed themselves. Staff sit patiently with children as they guide them to put on their shoes. Staff provide children with opportunities to practise these skills by themselves. This supports children to quickly develop the independence skills they need to progress.

Staff model rich language while reading stories to children. This helps children develop a love of books while supporting their literacy development. Leaders adapt favourite books about emotions to include pictures of individual children. This puts children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) at the centre of stories. This helps children with SEND learn to manage their feelings in context.

Staff generally extend children's thinking. For example, they ask where the fruit in their packed lunch comes from. However, staff's use of mathematical language is not yet consistently embedded across the setting. Leaders have organised training and appointed nominated staff as 'maths champions', although it is too early to evaluate the impact of these developments.

Achievement: Expected standard

Children of all ages develop their fine-motor skills. Older babies flick through the pages of favourite books. Older toddlers show typically developing scissor skills. Pre-school children generally hold pens securely. They move small cars on tracks with precision and purpose.

Children develop a love of books. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities show an increasing ability to talk about what they see and know. For example, they use topic-specific vocabulary, such as 'astronaut', 'rocket' and 'satellite'. They become increasingly confident in ordering cards containing verbs and nouns. Very young children practise speaking by attempting to say words. However, children do not consistently deepen their mathematical understanding because staff do not routinely use mathematical language across the setting.

Children play together safely. They take turns to carefully show their balancing skills when using sports equipment. At each stage, children generally demonstrate greater coordination of their bodies. This supports their readiness for school.

Behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines: Expected standard

Staff are attentive to children's moods and respond sensitively. They remind children to use their quiet indoor voices. Staff use audio and visual cues, such as shaking a tambourine. This helps children focus and prepare for change.

Staff create personalised books based on children's lives. This helps children to understand their feelings in the context of familiar experiences. Staff-led creative approaches like these also help to start conversations between children and their families. They support children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), during new routines. They also help children to attend regularly.

Staff ensure that children follow 'golden rules', both inside and outside the setting, including on trips to the local community. Staff create behaviour plans that help children with SEND explore their emotions. They use calm and effective strategies to help children regulate their behaviour. For example, by giving children quiet spaces to unwind and refocus. This also helps children to maintain positive attitudes to their learning. However, on rare occasions, staff do not take time to examine the cause of disputes between children. This means that sometimes, behaviour is not fully resolved, which impacts on children's confidence.

Leaders run behaviour-focused training sessions for parents. These sessions help parents to understand what children are communicating through their behaviour. Leaders also offer parents guidance on sensory support, redirection and neurodivergence to help them meet children's individual needs.

Children's welfare and wellbeing: Needs attention

Staff do not consistently position themselves effectively at tables where older children are eating. As a result, they do not always recognise when children need further support. For example, older children with allergies sit next to children who struggle to keep food on their plate. This increases the risk of contact with allergens. Staff do not notice when food from lunchboxes is dropped onto the floor. In addition, children who do not yet sit securely sometimes fall from their chairs. This means that children are not consistently supervised at lunchtime, which compromises their welfare.

Leaders have identified challenges with the physical space available in the lunch room. Leaders have introduced changes to maximise the use of space and the coordination of staff. These adjustments have improved the supervision of children on busier days. However, these changes are not applied during quieter periods. As a result, weaknesses remain in how lunch is organised for older children.

Despite this, supervision of babies and young children when eating is secure. Staff follow safer-eating guidelines to reduce risks associated with choking. Outside of lunchtime, staff support older children's wellbeing appropriately through calm routines and clear expectations.

Staff remind children to wash their hands before eating. They encourage children to drink plenty of water. They provide children with healthy, nutritious food. Leaders arrange for extra-curricular activities that involve music, dancing, sports and yoga. This ensures that children receive daily opportunities to exercise, which helps them to develop healthy habits.

Leadership and governance: Expected standard

The registered provider maintains oversight of the setting through an appraisal process that holds leaders to account for improvement. Leaders observe staff's practice and provide feedback to develop staff's teaching skills. Leaders also support children alongside staff on a daily basis. This helps leaders to monitor the quality of teaching closely, while identifying any areas for development. Leaders talk confidently about current priorities for development. These include strengthening the teaching of mathematics through focused staff training. Leaders manage staff workload well. Staff feel valued and supported.

Leaders nurture close partnerships with parents, specialist professionals and safeguarding agencies. This ensures impactful support for children who face barriers to their learning. Leaders also build links with the local community through outings that broaden children's experiences. This helps children to thrive, particularly in relation to their social and emotional wellbeing.

Leaders continue to strengthen the robust support for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). Ongoing training on SEND has strengthened practitioners' inclusive practice for children with additional needs. For example, staff feel more confident to support a wider range of needs.

Leaders ensure that early years pupil premium (EYPP) funding is used effectively. Staff have purchased resources that closely follow children's interests. For example, this includes bikes and indoor play equipment. This supports children's developing physical skills and enables children receiving EYPP to progress.