Tops Exeter

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children enter this welcoming nursery happily. They show great excitement seeing a friend arrive and greet them warmly. Staff are caring, and children go to them easily. For example, babies and toddlers wake up from their sleep gradually and staff cuddle them until they are ready to go and play, showing they feel safe in their care. Children benefit from the frequent praise and encouragement staff provide and show pride in their achievements. They learn to share toys with their friends and to be helpful. For example, children see when a friend's sun hat has fallen off and pick it up and give it back to them. Children play cooperatively with their friends.

Leaders and staff have clear expectations for children. They provide a broad, balanced curriculum that gives a clear focus to supporting children's learning through their interests and free choices of play. This helps children to make good progress and develop positive attitudes to learning. For example, staff see that the younger pre-school children like playing with the toy vehicles. Staff skilfully build on this interest. They help children use their imaginations and develop their hand-eye coordination skills while building pretend sheds and garages for their toy cars and trucks. Toddlers show an interest in toy animals. Staff extend this involvement well to encourage the toddlers to name the animals and repeat the noises each animal makes.

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

• Leaders have clear procedures in place to support staff well in their roles. They provide good opportunities for staff to build on their understanding of ways to promote children's development. They review their practice to make continual improvements, such as introducing a self-service system at mealtimes to encourage children's independence skills further. For example, pre-school children are keen to have a go at serving themselves their food, and they learn to do so carefully.
• Children develop their self-care skills well from a young age. For example, babies start to feed themselves using small spoons. Children learn about the importance of cleaning their teeth. Staff organise the outdoor play areas well to promote children's good health and physical development. Pre-school children excitedly climb up onto a large wooden frame and confidently jump off, landing with two feet together. Babies start to cruise confidently around the sturdy wooden furniture. Toddlers clamber over soft-play equipment and begin to gain their balance as they climb or walk across different surfaces.
• Staff provide a calm, reassuring approach and act as good role models. They keep clear routines to help children know what happens next and feel secure. For example, babies and toddlers recognise when it is time for them to have a sleep. They go happily with staff to find their bedding and comfort toys and settle comfortably to sleep. Staff support pre-school children well to learn to sit and listen in their group circle times to help prepare them for school.
• Staff get to know children well and identify what they need to learn next. They recognise children's enjoyment of water play and plan purposeful related activities to support their early mathematical awareness and understanding of the world. For example, pre-school children become engrossed emptying and filling a large teapot with water. They use small pipettes to fill different-sized containers. Staff provide small, magnetic fishing rods for children to 'catch' the colourful fish hidden in the water tray. Children count the different fish and learn their names, such as an 'angelfish'. Babies explore the colourful activity centres and find out how things work. They push buttons and smile with delight as this activates music or lights. Toddlers enjoy exploring paint with their fingers and brushes. However, occasionally, staff do not fully support all children's next steps of development as well as possible, for example in helping the quieter children gain confidence and interacting more readily with their peers.
• Parents speak highly of staff and feel their children are making good progress. They state that staff keep them well informed about their children's activities. However, staff do not always liaise consistently well with all other providers children attend. This does not promote a continuous approach for all children's care and learning as well as possible.
• Staff encourage children's communication well in their play. They reinforce the sounds and words babies and toddlers make and praise them as they ask for 'more' fruit at snack time. Children in the toddler's room listen well to a favourite story about a bear and begin to recognise the repeated refrains and actions. They know the end words of familiar phrases, such as when to say, 'We've got to go through it!'

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• strengthen the liaison with other settings children attend to promote continuity for their care and learning needs
• improve staff interactions further to focus teaching more precisely on all children's next steps of learning, particularly for the quieter children.