The Learning Tree Nursery School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children have warm and secure relationships with staff. They and their families receive a warm greeting when they arrive at the setting. Parents are welcome to stay and settle their children into their learning rooms. This supports children's emotional well-being.

Practitioners have high expectations for children's behaviour and conduct. They model well and support children to learn good behaviours. For instance, toddlers push their chairs in at the table after snack time. They do this with little prompting from practitioners. Overall, children communicate kindly with their friends, particularly when sharing and turn-taking. They are confident to speak to practitioners and visitors. This demonstrates that children are developing good social skills.

The managers use additional funding to purchase sensory resources to support the individual learning needs of children. They support practitioners to put an ambitious educational programme in place which has a focus on supporting children's interests and what they need to learn next. For instance, the special educational needs coordinator is efficient in her role. She works well in partnership with outside agencies and parents. This ensures that children who have special educational needs and/or disabilities have educational plans in place to support their individual learning needs and their interests. As a result, all children make good progress from their starting points.

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

• Practitioners promote children's physical development well. Babies and young children have a calm environment for daytime sleeping. They sleep when they need to and wake up naturally from their naps. In addition, the chef and practitioners understand all children's allergies and dietary requirements. Younger children develop their small-muscle skills as they shape and poke play dough, older age child manipulate sand and enjoy painting. Outside, children balance, climb apparatus and splash in the water trays. As a result, all children make good progress in their small- and large-muscle development.
• Practitioners foster the children's love of stories and singing to support the development of their language skills. For instance, they sing to babies as they change their nappies. Babies laugh and use some single words. This demonstrates that children are learning early language skills.
• Practitioners ensure that materials and resources are available for children to use. However, they do not always give them enough time to explore the resources. For instance, during some group sessions, children do not have enough time to think and communicate their own ideas. This does not fully support children's communication, curiosity and problem-solving skills.
• Overall, practitioners implement good hygiene routines, such as handwashing before mealtimes. However, on occasions, younger children have runny noses and staff do not always respond quickly to support them in wiping them or encouraging them to wipe their noses themselves. Children are not learning about the different ways that germs spread.
• Children are learning about healthy eating, as the staff and practitioners promote this well. A market stall is set up with a supply of fruit and children and visitors can take a piece of fruit each day when they leave the setting.
• Managers meet with practitioners to support their knowledge and skills. Practitioners complete mandatory training, such as first-aid courses. In addition, staff have attended other training, such as manual-handling courses. This promotes better care and educational outcomes for children.
• Parents comment that the managers make them feel valued and listened to. They like the settling-in period as it helps them to feel confident and knowledgeable about their children's care and learning.
• Practitioners and managers form good relationships with parents. Children's key persons regularly share information with parents about their children's daily experiences at the setting. In addition, the managers arrange regular events to share ideas about how parents can further support their children's learning at home. This helps children to continue to develop well.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• further develop staff's understanding of how to promote children's communication, curiosity and problem-solving by allowing them the time to explore and test out their ideas as they play
• strengthen self-help hygiene routines, to ensure that children's care needs are consistently met.