Blendon Preschool

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The provision is good

Managers and staff warmly welcome children as they happily arrive to start their day. Children are encouraged to be independent from the start. They learn to recognise their name to self-register and find their pegs to hang up their coats.

Children have strong attachments to their key person and have cuddles before choosing where they would like to play. Children settle well and invite their friends to play with them. They show a sense of belonging and enjoy their time at nursery.

Staff plan and provide a broad range of fun and challenging activities for children to extend their learning. Children eagerly explore the e...nvironment and demonstrate their good concentration skills. For example, they build towers with large bricks to match their own height.

Children enjoy measuring themselves and problem-solve to find out if they need to add more bricks or remove some to match their friends' heights. The pre-school is an active part of the community. It has developed strong links with local schools to support children with transitions.

Children enjoy visits to the park, shops and library and benefit from the visitors to pre-school. This supports them to learn about people who help others and the wider community.

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

Staff are motivated and provide high-quality care and education.

They understand how children learn and build on children's existing knowledge to extend their skills further. Staff use observations well and show children are making good progress. However, the new system for monitoring progress is not fully embedded, and, on occasions, gaps are not always identified swiftly.

Staff are caring and kind and support children's individual needs. They are positive role models and ooze enthusiasm with the children. They engage fully with them and make learning fun.

Children listen and behave well. They take pride in being rewarded for their positive behaviour with praise and stickers. This helps to raise self-esteem and reinforce what is expected.

Parents are extremely happy with the pre-school. They state their children enjoy attending and their confidence levels have soared. Staff keep parents updated on their children's progress and share next steps and ideas to continue learning at home.

However, some parents feedback verbally they do not all contribute to their children's learning to promote partnership working.Children benefit from their interactions with staff. Staff ask questions and use meaningful discussions to engage children in conversations.

New words are introduced to extend children's vocabulary and help them to increase their sentences. For example, children learn words to describe a spider's web, including 'invisible', 'entwine' and 'delicate'.Opportunities are used effectively to extend children's understanding, through role play, about people who help us.

Children pretend to be a vet or a doctor.They discuss the uniforms they need to wear and understand the role of a paramedic. Children use the equipment and know that a stethoscope is used to listen to the heart.

They enjoy making the animals better, adding bandages to their poorly limbs. They extend their imaginations by ordering medicine and writing prescriptions.Staff skilfully weave mathematical language and concepts into routines and play experiences.

For example, children count and learn colours as they set the table for snack time. They cut out different shapes to create pictures of dogs and count spots on ladybirds and legs on spiders in the garden. They learn positional language while building and listening to stories.

Children are encouraged to adopt healthy lifestyles. They understand the importance of washing their hands. Children help staff to prepare healthy snacks that include fruit and vegetables.

Children access the garden daily and use the equipment safely to increase their balance and physical skills.The managers have been guided by the local authority to support them in making improvements. They are passionate and have incorporated changes to benefit the staff and children.

They monitor practice and staff receive regular supervision. This has supported them to raise the quality of teaching. Staff regularly attend training to increase their knowledge and learn new skills.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.All staff have completed safeguarding training and keep their knowledge updated. They can provide examples of issues that would cause them concern about a child's welfare, including radicalisation.

Staff know the procedures to follow and professionals to contact if they need to make a referral. Staff complete daily checks to ensure the environment is safe and minimise any hazards. The managers deploy staff effectively to ensure ratios are maintained inside and outside.

Staff support children to manage risks as they use climbing equipment, bounce on the trampoline and cut with scissors. Children practise evacuation procedures so they know what to do in an emergency.

What does the setting need to do to improve?

To further improve the quality of the early years provision, the provider should: fully embed recent improvements to the system for monitoring children's progress, to ensure any gaps are identified as quickly as possible build on ways to encourage parents to contribute to their children's development to promote a shared care approach to their ongoing learning.