The Little Wendy House Day Nursery Ltd

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Plenty of time and consideration goes into building positive relationships with children. For instance, on arrival, key persons warmly greet children with objects of interest. They help those who need support to self-soothe, such as by holding their hands and gently rocking with them until they feel safe and emotionally ready to start their day.

Staff's interactions are highly focused on helping children to manage their feelings and behaviour. For example, they teach children to talk one at a time, and praise them when they demonstrate kindness towards others, such as when helping their peers to find their own resources. Children demonstrate high levels of respect for others.

Staff instinctively follow children's cues. For instance, they notice when non-verbal children need help to access resources and assist them to set up the learning environment. Staff use visual prompts to help children to make personal choices for their self-care needs. For instance, they show children a handwashing picture and ask, 'would you like to wash your hands?'. These first-class experiences ensure that children think for themselves, and actively contribute towards their happiness.

The curriculum intent and implementation are securely embedded across the setting. Everything that staff introduce to children is purposeful, including the vocabulary that they want children to learn, such as 'ready, steady' to promote young children's attention skills. All rooms implement a 'song of the week', which highly motivates even the youngest of children to remember language.

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

• Staff place great emphasis on supporting children's early communication skills, including mathematical language. They skilfully observe children and use screening tools to assess what children know in order to create personalised next steps for their learning. For example, staff purposefully teach children plural nouns, such as 'legs'. This helps children to express quantity when identifying that insects have more than one leg.
• Teaching sharply focuses on the skills that children need to acquire before transitioning into the next room. For example, staff intentionally roll balls away from babies to strengthen the core muscles they need to walk at a later stage. Additionally, staff attend purposeful training and collaborate with external professionals, such as physiotherapists, to ensure that all children successfully develop a wide range of physical skills.
• Secure procedures for staff recruitment, induction, and supervisions are in place to ensure that the best possible staff work in the setting. As a result, all children benefit from high-quality learning experiences. Staff highly praise the manager, who actively supports their well-being and continuous professional development.
• Parents and carers can fluidly discuss the content of the curriculum because staff frequently engage them in conversations about their children's care and learning and give them details of activities they can do at home. For example, parents partake in a 'first words together' programme to encourage early communication. Their involvement actively contributes to children making exceptional progress from their starting points.
• The manager rigorously evaluates children's experiences to develop focused improvement plans. For instance, there are plans in place to further expand on the abundant opportunities that parents already have to engage in their children's learning. This includes more opportunities for parents to observe staff's teaching.
• Parents positively report on the in-depth procedures in place to settle children. They appreciate that new key persons introduce themselves and already know everything about their child. This is because key persons work exceptionally well together to discuss children's needs at every stage of the child's transition.
• Staff deliver a strong curriculum, which promotes children's inclusion. For example, children learn about cultures and beliefs during mark-making activities, where they create their own henna designs that represent the unique events that families celebrate at home. Additionally, children's questions about the world significantly enhance their learning as staff provide them with hands-on experiences to investigate the answers, such as exploring how shadows work.
• Children develop wonderful knowledge of the world around them through various mediums. For instance, they learn about a caterpillar's life cycle through imaginative play, and make their own interpretations of insects out of play dough. Children say 'it is turning into a cocoon' as they cover their pretend caterpillar, which demonstrates what they have learned about the natural world. Furthermore, in each room, children have an opportunity to look after real caterpillars. They enjoy using a magnifying glass to examine real insects.
• Staff demonstrate their extensive knowledge of how to support children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. They identify children's needs early and act quickly to put strategies in place to improve children's outcomes. Any additional funding received is used well to bridge developmental gaps and prepare children for the future. For example, children from disadvantaged backgrounds largely benefit from additional sessions during the holidays to create further continuity in their routine.