The Cabin Childcare Centre, YMCA

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children settle quickly and are keen to explore the stimulating learning environment. Staff interact positively with children, showing them warmth and kindness. Children respond affectionately and snuggle up with staff in a blanket as they share stories together. Children feel comfort and a sense of security. Staff help children to learn about their emotions and provide quiet spaces where children can feel safe. Children sing songs about how they feel using different voice tones. They confidently link their feelings to actions to support their emotional development.

Children enjoy the free choice between indoor and outdoor play. They show curiosity and a positive attitude to learning. Staff provide children with opportunities to help develop their physical skills. They place items of interest high up in trees to encourage children to stretch and strengthen their muscles. Children enjoy navigating the uneven ground. They persevere when climbing up the small hill mounds and relish shouting to their peers from the top, which aids their communication.

Leaders use additional funding to employ more staff to support children's individual needs. They also provide all children with extra activities to enhance their knowledge about the world around them. For instance, children learn about and hold a variety of insects provided by an outside professional.

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

• Staff support children's communication well. They use signs to support speech and use new vocabulary with children as they play. For example, as children play with dough, staff pat, pinch, twist and stretch it using the accompanying words. This helps children to make the connection between actions and language.
• Children enjoy exploring nature and learning about growth. They talk about finding an ant and try to find a safe place for it, such as in some leaves. They show pride with the different minibeasts they have collected in their pot. Children have access to the on-site allotment. They dig in the soil and grow their own fruit and vegetables, including strawberries, beans and rhubarb. Staff also take children on woodland walks to embrace their love of the natural world.
• Staff embrace children's love of 'superheroes'. During story time, children and staff dress up and choose their favourite hero toy. As staff read stories around this topic, they encourage children to use their toy figures to act out parts of the story, supporting their imagination and early reading skills.
• Children have free access to both the indoor and outdoor area. They confidently choose which activities they enjoy, such as using tape to join cardboard boxes together to make a pretend castle. However, staff do not always provide children with consistent guidance to help them find answers to their questions to enable them to solve problems independently.
• Leaders evaluate their setting and identify areas to improve to benefit children. For instance, they have created a role-play classroom, where children learn about complex shapes and recognise their name in preparation for their move to school. However, leaders do not always identify and report significant changes to Ofsted as required, including updated information about the setting's operating times and contact details.
• Parents comment on how well their children have settled. They report on how their children's social and language skills have developed since starting. Leaders and staff provide fun opportunities for parents at the setting. Parents enjoy 'afternoon tea' and 'den building' activities to further strengthen partnerships between home and the setting.
• Staff work with other educational providers to offer children additional learning activities. Children enjoy interactive music sessions. They sing and play musical instruments with peers and staff to encourage their confidence and communication. However, staff do not always build on children's existing skills to further their development. For example, although staff know what children need to learn next, the planning and implementation of whole-group activities does not consistently consider all children's needs.
• Children learn about local artists as well as historic ones, such as Picasso. They create 'transient art', which is made from moveable pieces, such as natural resources. Staff encourage children to create and explore materials rather than focusing on a finished product to encourage children's own ideas.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• encourage children to find answers to their questions to help them to solve problems independently
• plan and implement whole-group times more effectively to help every child build on what they already know and can do.