Woolaston Under Fives

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

Children eagerly enter this friendly setting, where caring and enthusiastic staff greet them at the door. Staff foster a warm and welcoming environment for all children and treat them with kindness and respect. Staff give children plenty of attention and praise and promote an inclusive environment, where every child feels valued. This helps the children feel secure and builds on their confidence and emotional well-being.

The setting actively broadens children's knowledge, sparks their curiosity, and fosters a strong connection to the world around them by engaging with their individual interests. Leaders regularly reflect on the curriculum and use observation and their understanding of child development to guide improvements and prepare children for the next stage in their learning. This helps to ensure that all children make good progress from their starting points.

Children make choices as to where they play and move freely between indoors and outdoors, all year round. Staff recognise the importance of providing children with daily fresh air and exercise for their health and well-being. Children make good progress in their physical development. For example, they use funnels, measuring jugs and tubes to transfer coloured water from one receptacle to the other. They carefully squeeze pipettes, replace stoppers on bottles and explore capacity while using their imaginations to make potions, '20, 30, 40, and this is a potion, and this is going into the pot'.

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

• Staff and children form positive relationships, and children feel safe and secure in their learning environment. Children confidently share their thoughts, listen to others and express their ideas. Staff create a calm, supportive environment and quickly identify children who need help with managing their emotions. However, staff miss opportunities to teach children emotional language, which means children are not always fully supported to understand how they feel.
• Staff work closely with the host school to help children progress into school seamlessly. For example, they meet with teachers and reflect on how the children have transitioned and discuss the changing needs of children year on year. Staff have developed close working partnerships with external professionals to ensure the continuity of care for children, including those in receipt of additional funding.
• Children are eager learners with strong communication skills. Staff introduce new vocabulary and help children understand it through context. For example, they explore the life cycle of a chicken. Staff hide eggs in a nest, and children eagerly gather around when they find them. They examine the egg and wonder about how it got there. Staff explain that the chick starts as an embryo and grows into a chick before hatching, using reference books to show the process. Children gently hold the egg and wrap it in a blanket to keep it warm. Staff allow children the time to put into practice what they have learned and demonstrate their new vocabulary.
• Staff create fun activities to engage children, like burying screws and coins in the sand for them to find with magnets. While some children enjoy this, not all staff consistently implement the intended learning goals. Children who need more challenge do not consistently get the same quality of teaching, causing them to lose interest. Additional coaching and mentoring for staff would help them better understand the intent and implement the curriculum, to raise outcomes for children even higher.
• Staff have high expectations for children's behaviour. Staff role model good manners and children behave very well at this setting. For example, when passing items during mealtimes, children ask politely, 'please may you pass that to me, thank you'. Children recall simple rules during group times and explain why they need to listen and sit quietly.
• Parents are valued as partners in their child's education and receive regular updates about their child's progress and developmental targets. Parents are particularly complimentary about the bespoke transition arrangements between the school and setting and how this boosts children confidence.
• Children benefit from trips in the local community and wider afield, supporting them to learn more about the world around them. Staff seek information from parents about languages spoken at home and their cultural heritage. They plan experiences to support children to learn about customs and traditions celebrated by different families. This helps children learn about the similarities and differences that exist between them.

What the setting must and should do next

The provider should:

• develop the curriculum for emotional literacy further, so that all staff know how to help children share their feelings and emotions
• strengthen systems for staff coaching and mentoring to ensure they implement the curriculum precisely and consistently challenge and extend all children's learning.