The Manor Preschool Nursery

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The ethos of this nursery places children's safety, care and learning at the centre. The close partnerships established with parents, as well as the effective key-person system, mean that children's needs are well known and understood. This, in turn, creates trusting relationships between children and staff that help children to feel safe and secure. On arrival, children bound into nursery, confidently leaving their parents and carers at the door. Staff promote friendships well as they encourage children to play collaboratively with one another. When children do have minor disagreements, staff react swiftly and calmly, using consistent strategies that help to reinforce the nursery rules and curriculum intentions.

The manager's well-defined curriculum intent values the differing needs and diversity of the children and their families. This is clearly understood by staff who are advocates for all children becoming effective learners. Staff are ambitious for children's achievements. They use their secure knowledge of children, and the skills and knowledge they need to learn next, to inform their plans to support children's development. All children, including those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), progress well in their learning.

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

• The manager has clear intentions for children's learning. In the main, staff have a good understanding of what this means for their practice and work together to embed the curriculum goals. This means that children are frequently exposed to learning that promotes good development.
• Overall, the curriculum is very well designed to ensure that children are able to consolidate their learning before moving on. For example, staff carefully select books at story time. They choose books for younger children that offer lots of repetition of words to help embed vocabulary before moving on to stories that are focused on broadening children's word knowledge. Children develop secure foundations for all later learning.
• There is excellent support for children with SEND. Staff ensure that adjustments are made so that all children can fully access the environment, resources and learning opportunities. For example, staff make use of visual aids that are placed in every part of the environment and consistently apply agreed communication methods. Children with SEND benefit from the strong practice from staff as they quickly become effective learners.
• The manager and staff prioritise establishing strong relationships between children and their key person. For example, staff incorporate key-group activities into the daily routine. This gives staff daily opportunities to spend time with their key children in small groups, embedding strong bonds and secure attachments. This provides children with firm foundations for their confidence to play, explore and learn.
• In the main, the curriculum is highly effective in promoting children's love of learning. The carefully considered routine of the day ensures that children have maximum time for uninterrupted and independent play. This helps children to learn to persevere as they take their time to fit jigsaw pieces together. Once complete, they give a thumbs up to show the pride in their achievement. Children spend the morning enthusiastically gathering items from the richly resourced environment to bring their ideas to life. They develop excellent attitudes to learning and are curious and motivated in all they do.
• The manager is ambitious for the success of the nursery and is committed to reflecting on where improvements can be made. While this has led to many positive changes to the provision, some gaps in practice remain. Arrangements for performance management are not fully embedded to give the manager precise and in-depth evaluations of practice. As a result, there are minor gaps in some aspects of staff practice and the curriculum, which occasionally impact on children's learning experiences.
• Overall, staff are supported well to develop their knowledge and skills. The manager ensures that training is planned collaboratively with staff with a focus on the needs of the children. However, professional development is not fully effective in supporting staff to gain a secure grounding or to deepen their knowledge over time. This means that, occasionally, the curriculum is not implemented as effectively to promote learning intentions for children.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• sharpen the focus for performance management of staff to provide more in-depth evaluations of practice that better inform plans for improvements
• build on the current programme of professional development, to promote practice and subject knowledge of staff that continually builds and improves.