Compton Pre-School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The provision is outstanding

Compton Pre-School is a welcoming and nurturing provision. Children are thoroughly absorbed in their play and work as the curriculum is inspirational and developed around the children's interests. Children's ideas and questions, and staff observations of their play, are used to create further learning opportunities.

For example, children are observed by the staff using the computer keyboard in the role-play area and pretending to sell clothes online. The children ask to develop the role-play area into a clothes shop and staff support the children to set this up. Children play cooperatively in the shop and act out what th...ey know, while staff model and extend their play.

High-quality staff interactions enhance children's knowledge and skills through their play, including writing lists and messages in the shop, counting and learning letter sounds and numbers as the children weigh ingredients for cooking. Such activities enable the children to build secure foundations for their future learning. The children sustain high levels of concentration and keep on trying to overcome challenges.

For example, children explore cutting with scissors and different textured papers. Children who initially find this challenging persevere and delight in their success, creating pictures showing their progress.Children behave extremely well and have high levels of respect for others.

They quickly learn to listen and respond calmly to requests. The manager and staff team are passionate about promoting good manners and a caring environment, modelling these for the children who, in turn, demonstrate these in their play and routines.

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

Parents feel their children's progress has been accelerated by the broad range of experiences and activities the pre-school offers.

Parents feel they are kept well informed of learning and progress, enabling them to support their children's learning at home. Parents speak highly of the pre-school staff's commitment and how their children are eager to attend. They feel the pre-school listens and acts on their views.

A recent example of this is where the manager has introduced an electronic system for the children's learning journals as a result of parent requests.Children develop a love of books, as staff share books and stories the children have chosen in a fun and interactive way. Staff skilfully develop children's language, by modelling and extending their vocabulary.

They use props and real experiences from stories to support children's understanding. For example, the children choose a story about a gingerbread man. Children make gingerbread biscuits and share their ideas about how the story might end.

They greet their parents excitedly at the end of the session and recall the story and how they made the gingerbread.Staff understand and fully include children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. This is a strength of the pre-school.

Funding is used appropriately to enhance staff skills and resources. Children are identified early and the coordinator ensures all professional advice is implemented. This enables children to make good progress from their starting points.

Children learn about their local community and the diverse world around them. For example, there are exceptional community links with the local residential home. The children talk with delight about their visits; they have built strong relationships with the residents.

The shared use of the facilities, for the care home and pre-school, brings different generations together, who learn about different life experiences from each other.The manager and her team reflect on the children's curriculum and undertake training to enhance their practice. A recent example of this is where all staff have accessed speech and language training to support early identification and intervention.

Children have their needs identified at the earliest point, and activities are put in place to build on children's vocabulary and understanding. As a result, children make rapid progress in developing language skills.Staff skills are used to share management responsibilities and enhance learning in the classroom.

This helps to reduce staff workloads and support staff well-being.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.The manager and staff have attended safeguarding training and have a secure understanding of how to keep children safe from harm.

They are robust in their systems and have recently updated their policy to reflect the most recent changes to legislation. The manager follows up any concerns swiftly and works well with external agencies to keep children safe.Children are well supervised and any potential risks are minimised.

Children are taught to think about risks in their environment and to keep themselves safe. For example, when children are outside they are made aware of different surfaces and being careful when it is wet. Recent training and support to keep children safe online is shared with parents.

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