Ventnor Community Early Years Centre Ltd

Inclusion: Exceptional

The setting is at the forefront of inclusive practice in early education. Leaders have an exemplary attitude to providing innovative education for children who face barriers to their learning. They quickly identify when children require additional support to improve their opportunities for learning and wellbeing. Leaders' meticulous oversight of children's progress, which includes regular review and swift adjustment of support, ensures that even the smallest changes in children's development are identified and used to secure transformational impact. Staff are trained to the very highest level, which helps to ensure that their knowledge and skills precisely support the needs of all children, particularly children who are disadvantaged or those with special educational needs and/or disabilities. Leaders work tirelessly as advocates for children to secure additional support, which includes funding to enhance children's lives. This enables them to make significant progress in securing children's future education beyond the setting. Leaders lead by example, not only in their immediate community but also beyond by providing an impressive range of training opportunities and information to other early years professionals. As a result, their extremely effective and inspiring approach has an impressive and marked impact on the lives of children and families beyond their own provision.

Staff are highly focused and are committed to investing their time towards providing positive outcomes for children. They work hard to give children the best possible start and are extremely responsive when finding solutions to complex challenges that families face. Leaders know that an innovative environment can significantly enhance children's emotional resilience and cognitive development. They constantly seek out new ways to encourage individual children to build on their developing social skills, curiosity and problem-solving and use this information so that it can be applied to all children.

Children of all abilities and stages of development have access to an accelerated learning programme that promotes active participation and supports children who are at risk of falling behind.

Curriculum and teaching: Strong standard

Children enthusiastically strive to achieve the goals that staff set for them. Children have the freedom to lead their own learning and have access to a large range of impressive resources that support imaginative play and curiosity. Children are encouraged to ask questions and work collaboratively during activities and routines. For example, children are taught to take turns and share resources. They learn that it is important to listen to what others have to say and to offer help to those who need it, such as when pouring drinks and putting on and taking off coats.

Babies are provided with an individualised and highly sequenced curriculum that identifies any gaps in learning and what they need to be learning next. Staff use story time, signing and singing and focus their interactions on babies' emotional wellbeing. Leaders continually strive to bring about improvements in the curriculum, particularly to benefit those children who are the most disadvantaged, such as children with special educational needs and/or disabilities.

Staff skilfully introduce several areas of learning while they play with children. They support older children's understanding of mathematics as they discuss quantity, volume and size. Activities, such as using play dough, are purposefully used to support children's storytelling, imagination and vocabulary as children make 'squirrels with indentations for eyes'. Babies enthusiastically take part in rhymes and songs that include counting and numbers.

Achievement: Strong standard

Children are well prepared for the next stage in their learning, such as starting school. They develop the skills they need for future learning, such as persevering during activities and independence in their own self-care. Children are highly motivated and demonstrate high levels of concentration, both during adult-led activities and their own self-initiated play. They develop a love of books and are keen to explore the pictures during story time and discuss the characters in the story and what might happen next. Even the very youngest of children excel in their communication and literacy skills and feel safe and secure. Babies turn the pages of books and show their delight when they recognise a story or identify a familiar character. This strongly supports children's progress in communication and language.

All children persevere during activities, such as when shredding malleable dough through a mincing machine. They are confident to approach their friends to ask for help and to work alongside others to achieve a goal. All children, including children who face barriers to their learning, make significant improvements in their learning.

Behaviour, attitudes and establishing routines: Strong standard

Staff are respectful and consistently kind and calm. This has a positive impact on the way children treat each other and the resources. Children and staff build positive and purposeful relationships with each other, and this contributes to the setting's excellent nurturing environment. Staff lead by example and set very high expectations for children's behaviour. They have established firm routines and boundaries in the setting that positively impact children's understanding of what will happen next. Staff have formed highly sensitive bonds with babies, and this gives excellent support during transitions.

Children have a firm understanding of the behavioural boundaries, and, consequently, their behaviour is extremely positive. This significantly contributes to the calm and focused learning environment. Children of all ages demonstrate an excellent attitude to their own learning. They arrive with high expectations of an exciting day of learning and enjoyment and are actively encouraged to ask questions and contribute to meaningful discussions with staff and other children. Staff's enthusiasm and impactful teaching contribute to children's enjoyment and focused interest at all times.

Leaders work alongside families to identify barriers to regular attendance. They actively promote children's punctuality and attendance at the setting, and this results in very positive improvement to children's attendance and, consequently, their future outcomes.

Children's welfare and wellbeing: Strong standard

Children develop a strong sense of wellbeing and belonging at the setting. Staff foster strong, meaningful bonds with children and are highly responsive to their needs. Parents mention that staff are supportive and extremely nurturing, which contributes to a consistently good approach for their children. Staff are very skilled at encouraging children to make their own decisions and to persevere during activities, such as pouring a drink for the first time. They offer praise and reassurance, which supports children's confidence and growing self-esteem. Children learn the language of feelings through resources, such as hand puppets, and discussions with staff. They begin to effectively link these words to their own emotions. This is crucial for building healthy relationships, improving their own self-regulation and building on children's social skills.

The skilled staff team use routines such as feeding, weaning and sleeping to meet children's individual needs. They use these times to supervise children closely and find out more about them. Consequently, children and adults have established loving and positives bonds. Staff have implemented a high level of physical activity in the daily routine. Children have access to a large variety of outside experiences, such as woodland play. These opportunities help to build children's balance and stamina effectively, providing secure foundations for mastering more challenging physical movements in the future. Staff use these experiences to teach children how to play alongside others in a safe way.

Leadership and governance: Exceptional

Leaders are exceptional in their approach and vision. They centre their provision on the unique and changing needs of each child. They continuously strive for perfection in their practice and share their extremely high standards with other early years providers. Leaders ensure that through continuous research and professional development, staff are delivering a highly impressive curriculum, particularly to those children who face a disadvantage or who have special educational needs and/or disabilities.

Parents offer extremely positive feedback on the strength of partnerships with families, which have enabled their children to thrive. Leaders constantly strive to secure additional funding, and this has an extremely positive effect on the learning opportunities for children. Consequently, this can give a transformational impact on children's futures. Leaders model empathy and lead by example. This enables staff to grow significantly in their roles and continue to seek and commit to their own professional development. For example, leaders provide weekly opportunities for self-reflection time and opportunities for research and professional development. Staff positively embrace the chance to work alongside the innovative and highly impressive leaders. They say they are encouraged to share ideas and engage in peer-to-peer mentorship. Staff feed back that it is extremely rewarding to see and contribute to such a transformational difference in the lives of children.

Leaders demonstrate an impressive attitude to ensure exemplary collaborative relationships with families and outside agencies. They provide highly inspirational coaching opportunities to other settings to empower other professionals to build on their skills and take positive initiatives in their own provision.