The Southwater Day Nursery & Pre-School

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children arrive and settle quickly with the offer of warm, welcoming support from staff. Children behave well and have positive relationships with their friends and the staff that care for them. When there are minor disagreements over sharing toys, staff offer sensitive support to help children overcome any upset.

Each child has a key person, who considers their individual learning needs and interests. The staff use this knowledge to plan and deliver experiences to build on what children already know and can do. Furthermore, staff introduce new ideas to help children make connections in their learning. For example, children show interest in the changes they notice in the seasons. Staff plan planting activities to teach children about changes over time in the natural world. Children are curious and show a real keenness to use trowels to fill plant pots with soil. Staff help to extend children's vocabulary by introducing new words linked to the planting activity. This includes words such as 'bulb' and 'growth'.

Very young children show confidence to join in the music and movement group time. They are curious as they explore sounds made by different musical instruments. Staff provide scarves and model different movements to Latin music. Very young children delight as they jiggle and wave their scarves up and down and side to side. This helps contribute towards building physical skills and moving in a variety of ways.

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

• Leaders and managers self-evaluate to reflect on their strengths, as well as take action to address weaker practice. As such, the manager has worked closely with senior leaders to take steps that contribute toward driving continuous improvement. As a result, there is a good oversight for the quality of provision provided to children and families. Leaders recognise more needs be done so that older children have experiences that promote large physical play more regularly. Furthermore, the manager monitors staff to check the impact of training they receive. This gives staff confidence so they can fulfil their role and responsibilities to meet the needs of children.
• Staff are clear about what they intend for children to learn. They plan and implement activities to build on past experiences. This is to ensure that children have a secure understanding before staff introduce new ideas. However, very occasionally, some staff do not model to children how to use tools correctly when learning a new skill and ask children multiple questions during activities. This does not ensure that know how to handle tools the right way or allow sufficient time for children to think and respond to questions asked of them. Despite this, children demonstrate that they are making good progress in their learning and are eager to be involved in a variety of learning opportunities.
• Children have opportunities to develop and extend their communication and language skills. This includes regular singing time as well as group story sessions. Staff support children to listen to stories and ask them questions to actively encourage engagement. However, there are times when stories can be disrupted, with children being asked to go to the toilet or having clothes changed. This can occasionally make it harder for children to concentrate. Nevertheless, children enjoy being read to and demonstrate they can use recall to make comments about much loved stories.
• Staff support children to behave well, offering sensitive guidance with simple language to help children understand expectations. As a result, minor squabbles are overcome swiftly and children continue to play harmoniously with their friends.
• The manager, who is also the special educational needs coordinator, works closely with her staff. She ensures that children who have delays in their learning and development receive the interventions they need to help them catch up. Staff work in partnership with parents and external professionals. They use advice and strategies to form targets so children have regular, tailored support at the nursery. This contributes towards narrowing the gaps of attainment.
• Parents comment on how partnership arrangements allow them to have real insight into their child's experiences at nursery. Parents are positive about the good levels of communication and how they receive information about the progress their children are making.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• deliver additional opportunities to ensure that older children can develop their gross motor skills even further
• continue to build and develop staff's teaching practice, with particular regard to modelling skills to children and ensuring that they have time to think and respond when staff ask questions
• organise the daily routine and associated tasks even better so that story times have minimal disruptions to children's learning.