Bright Horizons Beacon Road Day Nursery

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The provision is outstanding

The babies and toddlers attending this nursery show that they are highly settled and confident in their surroundings.

They form excellent attachments with staff in an extremely nurturing environment. Babies show that they feel completely happy and safe. They know that their key person is close by and is someone that they can go to for a cuddle, to play with, or to look at a book together.

Babies are often seen with their key person, excitedly waving with them through the low glass panels of their room as toddlers walk by. Staff are remarkably sensitive to children's needs and skilfully create a warm and calm but... very busy learning environment. Toddlers develop excellent levels of independence and self-assurance for their ages, as they prepare to move on to a linked setting, for older children, nearby.

They very confidently follow routines, such as using soap to wash their hands, then rinsing and drying them before sitting at the table for lunch. Staff interactions with children are outstanding. Staff ensure that children can easily follow their interests and choose what they want to play with.

Leaders and staff meticulously review children's development and plan purposeful next steps in their learning. Children show intense concentration and perseverance for their ages and explore freely as they quickly learn and master new skills.

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

The manager demonstrates her unquestionable passion and high expectations for what children can achieve, through working very closely with her staff team.

She is extremely mindful of the main pressures on the team and works hard to alleviate these so that staff remain fully effective in their roles. The manager is exceptionally reflective and constantly networks with senior managers, staff and parents to improve practice and meet children's needs. She leads a highly efficient staff team to plan and implement an excellent curriculum that focuses on the children's early development and learning.

Staff use ongoing professional development opportunities to continually improve their teaching skills. They know the children and their developmental needs exceptionally well. Babies who are just learning to walk show complete trust in the staff and the excellent support they provide as they experiment with new ways of moving around.

For example, this is evident as babies take tentative steps and try to push a wheeled toy backwards at the same time. Staff confidently allow them to take controlled risks, offer exemplary reassurance and encourage babies to keep trying so that they are safe but develop resilience to any minor setbacks.Staff help children, including those for whom English is an additional language, to develop excellent early communication and language skills.

They model language tremendously well. For example, they help toddlers learn new words such as 'parsnip' and 'potato' as they water vegetables. Staff repeat words such as 'splash, splash, splash', as children jump in puddles.

They read to children with extremely good expression, and even babies help to turn the pages of books as they show great delight in listening to stories. All children show a love of traditional songs and rhymes, as they clap, jump, dance and copy actions. Staff create simple but remarkably effective opportunities for children to develop a sense of wonder.

For instance, they build an atmosphere of great anticipation as they blow bubbles for babies. The babies eagerly reach up towards the bubbles, then gasp and smile with delight when they pop.Staff supervise children very closely.

They help them to learn about sharing and taking turns, without affecting children's motivation to explore. Children have highly positive attitudes to joining in and they develop an excellent early awareness of themselves and others. They show unquestionably secure levels of emotional and physical well-being.

The manager and staff share a wealth of information with parents, for example on potty training and how children form emotional attachments with adults. They actively encourage parents to extend their children's learning at home. Parents say that they greatly value the lending-library scheme which has really helped them to understand how to encourage their children's early enjoyment of books.

Parents say that they appreciate how swiftly staff help children to settle and how they extend their experiences from home. Staff liaise exceptionally well with other professionals who also care for the children. They ensure that children receive seamless care and education through meticulous information sharing.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.The manager and her staff team have an extremely good understanding of how to safeguard children. The management team ensures that all staff remain suitable to be in their roles and that they keep their safeguarding knowledge current.

Staff are fully aware of the signs and symptoms of abuse and know exactly what to do if they are worried about a child's welfare. They are highly confident about the procedures to follow in the event of concerns about a child or the behaviour of any adults that they work with. There is a highly effective culture of vigilance in place that helps to keep children safe.