Granby House Nursery

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The provision is good

Children arrive happily at the nursery and choose from the wide variety of stimulating activities available for all ages. Staff know children very well and identify the things that motivate and engage them. They use children's interests to further develop their knowledge, skills and understanding.

Staff build extremely positive relationships with children and their families. Babies and children feel very safe and secure as a result. Parents are very appreciative of all the nursery does for their children and typically feel that staff 'go above and beyond'.

Children behave well and have very positive attitudes. They lea...rn to cooperate well with others and share their ideas. For example, older children work together with wooden blocks to create their own race game.

This helps to develop their understanding of mathematical concepts, such as length and speed. However, there are fewer resources for children to extend their modern technology skills. Staff use effective questioning and commentary of children's play to enhance their learning, overall.

They strongly build children's speaking skills and vocabulary. However, very occasionally, staff do not fully extend children's thinking and reasoning. The well-qualified and experienced managers provide clear, passionate and purposeful leadership.

There are well-established procedures to evaluate and improve the nursery, particularly the quality of teaching.

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

Staff very ably support children's speech and language development. Children know and sing many songs and rhymes together.

Babies love looking closely at staff's expressive faces as they sing nursery rhymes and action songs to them. In this way, they learn to imitate different sounds, form words and vary tone and volume. Children access a wide variety of books and stories which they enjoy sharing with one another.

Staff embed advice from speech and language therapists and other professionals to address any delay in children's language development.The managers work very closely with staff to promote their professional development and help them manage their workload. Staff speak very highly of the care and support they receive from the managers to help them to achieve their best.

The managers make very good use of a breadth of training opportunities, including supporting several staff to obtain qualifications to degree level. This has contributed to many aspects of developing experiences for children. For instance, safe sleeping for babies, mathematical development and projects to address delayed communication skills.

Staff closely monitor children's progress. They accurately assess the stages children are at and use this knowledge to plan future learning. Staff who work with children know the next steps they are aiming for.

This ensures they can interact promptly to support children's development. However, occasionally, staff do not fully challenge children to think more deeply and develop their reasoning and understanding.The cook prepares meals for children which are healthy, nutritious and balanced.

Children who have special dietary needs are catered for effectively. There are frequent opportunities for children to be physically active indoors and outdoors. Staff further promote children's health and well-being through action songs, dancing and yoga activities.

Children are well behaved. Staff positively reinforce good behaviour through purposeful praise. They distract children who may otherwise demonstrate unwanted behaviour.

Children are involved in setting and supporting the rules for the nursery.Staff support children with special educational needs and/or disabilities well. They use any additional funding well.

Staff work closely with other professionals to plan programmes that help children achieve key skills for their future learning. They are well trained to support many different aspects of children's specific learning needs.The nursery is a bright, stimulating and welcoming environment.

Staff make sure that children can access many different activities. They merge resources to extend their experience and enjoyment. For example, children make very good use of natural woodland resources, such as twigs and pine cones, to shape, mould and make marks with play dough.

This contributes to their physical skills and early writing. However, there are limited resources for children to routinely access to extend their skills in controlling technology.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

Staff and leaders have a good understanding of how to keep children safe. They know how to recognise the signs that a child might be at risk of harm. There are clear procedures implemented to record any concerns staff have about children's welfare, and the manager carefully monitors these.

Managers understand how to recruit staff safely and make sure they are suitable to work with children. They know how to respond if an allegation is made against a member of staff.

What does the setting need to do to improve?

To further improve the quality of the early years provision, the provider should: build on the staff's interaction with children to further deepen their understanding and extend their thinking skills nincrease the range of resources readily available to support and enrich children's experiences with technology.