Little Waves Daycare

Highlights from Latest Inspection

What is it like to attend this early years setting?

The provision is inadequate

There are significant weaknesses in practice that impact on children's care, learning and development.

Children's welfare is not fully assured. This is because leaders and staff have a weak understanding of how to identify and protect children at risk from harm or abuse, and are unclear on how to respond and report any concerns they may have.There is a broad curriculum for children's learning.

However, this is not understood or followed by staff and does not have the intended impact on children's development. Staff's understanding of child development is weak. Activities are not planned well enough to meet childr...en's needs and assessments are often inaccurate.

Many children are not developing the skills they need to build secure foundations for future learning, particularly in their communication and language development. Although staff identify that some children need more support in their learning, actions have not been taken to help them to make better progress. Arrangements to support children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) are not focused enough to help them to make the best possible progress.

Despite these weaknesses, children show a sense of belonging in nursery and play happily with their friends. Staff are kind and helpful and join in children's play.

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

Leaders and staff have a basic awareness of some indicators that children may be at risk from harm or neglect.

However, overall knowledge of the different types and wide range of symptoms of abuse is weak. This means that children who need help to stay safe may be not be identified and concerns about their welfare may not be reported swiftly.Leaders do not hold all of the information necessary to help them to keep children safe from harm.

They do not seek or share information with other professionals involved in protecting children. They are not aware of the reasons that some families have support from social care services, or of the factors affecting children's welfare outside nursery. There are gaps in the information they hold about some children.

Leaders do not ensure that staff are aware of the procedures to be followed if they are concerned about a colleague's conduct or suitability. They do not know the correct procedures that must be followed should there be an allegation against a member of staff.Teaching does not help children to make good enough progress.

Some activities do not motivate children to learn and children wander around the room as staff miss opportunities to ignite their interest. Despite this, some children show enjoyment in stories and are keen to use the puppets and babies show an interest in sensory play activities. However, on occasion, young children move away from activities due to them being too long or complex to maintain their attention.

Furthermore, not all activities for babies are appropriate for their age. For example, staff encourage them to draw spiders and count their legs.Assessments are cumbersome and fail to identify what children need to learn.

Staff check off what they have seen children do on an electronic system. The information gathered does not always accurately reflect children's abilities. Although there is some awareness of the very low levels of communication and language skills of younger children, plans to help children in this area of learning are weak.

Progress checks are completed at age two. However, they do not identify clear and appropriate aims to help children to learn more.The provision for children with SEND is not organised well enough.

Leaders make referrals to external agencies and welcome support from other professionals. However, they are not aware of individual targets in place for children and the strategies needed to support their development. This means that children are not supported well enough to make good progress.

The key-person arrangements are not embedded. Staff do not have a good enough understanding of the needs of the children they have responsibility for, in order to meet their care and learning needs. Partnerships with parents are not as effective as they could be.

For example, some do not know who their child's key person is or what staff are teaching their children.Although some weaknesses have been identified by leaders, they do not have a comprehensive understanding of the aspects of the provision that need most improvement. The arrangements for monitoring and evaluating the provision lack rigour.

Although there is a new manager in place, information about previous incidents and complaints in order to bring about improvements has not been shared, hampering their ability to bring about improvements. Ofsted has taken enforcement action due to the weaknesses and breaches of the requirements.Staff support children's physical development.

This includes children joining in with outdoor games, such as learning to develop coordination as they carefully walk along balancing beams.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are not effective.There is not an open and positive culture around safeguarding that puts children's interests first.

What does the setting need to do to improve?

The provision is inadequate and Ofsted intends to take enforcement action.

We will issue a Welfare Requirements Notice requiring the provider to: Due date provide specific training for the designated safeguarding leaders in the nursery so they fully understand their role and are aware of the local safeguarding partnership procedures, including how to manage allegation against staff 01/11/2024 develop staff's knowledge and understanding of the safeguarding policies and procedures in the nursey, so they confidently know how to identify, record and report concerns about children and staff if they arise 01/11/2024 improve the provision for children with special educational needs and/or disabilities, and ensure strategies are implemented to close gaps in children's learning 01/11/2024 support leaders and managers to ensure the necessary improvements are made to raise the quality of the provision 01/11/2024 provide staff with effective supervision which promotes opportunities for them to develop their teaching skills.01/11/2024 To meet the requirements of the early years foundation stage, the provider must: Due date improve staff's understanding of assessments, including how to complete the progress check at age two, and ensure that areas of developmental delay are swiftly identified and addressed 01/11/2024 develop the key-person system, to ensure that staff have a deep understanding of children's needs and how to meet them, and to build supportive relationships with parents 01/11/2024 develop the curriculum and help staff to understand how to provide experiences which help children to make good progress, with a specific focus on children's communication and language skills.

01/11/2024

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