Dimples Day Nursery Limited

Dimples Day Nursery Green Street, Green Road, Darenth, Kent, DA2 7HT

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Inspection date

Previous inspection date 16/04/2013 11/04/2011

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early years provision

This inspection: 1 Previous inspection: 1 How well the early years provision meets the needs of the range of children who attend The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children 1 The effectiveness of the leadership and management of the early years provision 1

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This provision is outstanding

 The excellent outdoor facilities and space provide children with stimulating learning opportunities in the natural environment.  Highly impressive relationships with parents enable children to experience continuity of care promoting their all-round development.  The fully embedded key person system provides security and familiarity to each child enabling them to flourish in the care of nursery practitioners.  Children's knowledge and understanding of the world is extremely well developed through opportunities to care for the numerous nursery pets and the provision of the forest school learning.

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Information about this inspection

Inspections of registered early years provision are:  scheduled at least once in every inspection cycle – the current cycle ends on 31 July

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Information about this inspection

 scheduled more frequently where Ofsted identifies a need to do so, for example where provision was previously judged inadequate  brought forward in the inspection cycle where Ofsted has received information that suggests the provision may not be meeting the legal requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage or where assessment of the provision identifies a need for early inspection  prioritised where we have received information that the provision is not meeting the requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage and which suggests children may not be safe  scheduled at the completion of an investigation into failure to comply with the requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage.

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Information about this inspection

The provision is also registered on the voluntary and compulsory parts of the Childcare Register. This report includes a judgment about compliance with the requirements of that register.

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Inspection activities

 The majority of the inspection was spent observing children and practitioners in the nursery, both indoors and outside.

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Inspection activities

 A discussion was held regarding leadership and management with the provider and one senior team leader.  Documentation was reviewed including policies and procedures.

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Inspection activities

 Views from parents were obtained through discussion with parents of children from different rooms within the nursery.

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Inspection activities

 Processes for safeguarding children including processes for reporting accidents, incidents and medication were reviewed and discussed.

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Information about the setting

Dimples Day Nursery registered in 2002. It operates from nine rooms in purpose built premises in Darenth, Kent. Children share access to secure enclosed outdoor play areas, including three surrounding fields for outdoor play. The nursery is open each weekday from 7.30am to 6.30pm all year round.

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Information about the setting

The Nursery is registered on the Early Years Register and the compulsory and voluntary parts of the Childcare Register. There are currently 220 children aged from birth to under five years on roll, attending a variety of sessions. The setting receives early education funding for children aged two, three and four years. The nursery currently supports a number of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities, and children who speak English as an additional language.

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Information about the setting

The nursery employs 58 staff, of whom 44 staff, including the manager, hold appropriate early years qualifications. The manager has completed her EYP and degree qualification. There are five staff working towards a qualification to NVQ level 2 and 3. The nursery achieved the Kent Quality Mark in 2012.

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To further improve the quality of the early years provision the provider should:

 strengthen the area of literacy by creating an environment rich in print where children can learn about words, for example using names, signs and posters.

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who attend

Children flourish in the care of the nursery staff, who provide individual opportunities for the children, reflecting their secure knowledge of child development. Each staff member acts as a key person for individual children and all know their children extremely well. Staff encourage all children to lead their own play and make their own choice of the activities to meet their individual interests. Staff carry out regular observations of children's learning. They use this information to plan stimulating, enjoyable activities both indoors and outside which encourage children to make excellent progress. This information is summarised every three months and shared with the child's parents who provide a written comment or further relevant information. This secure process allows all concerned to contribute fully to the learning and development for every child. Children enjoy the opportunity to move freely between indoors and outside, selecting from

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who attend

the wide range of resources and materials. Older children confidently make choices, from digging in the large sand pits, to climbing on the tree trunk to sliding down the grass bank on the sledge. Younger children enjoy sharing the seesaws with friends or learning how to balance as they use the push-a-long toys. Children demonstrate secure, fine physical skills throughout all age groups. Younger children show excellent hand and eye coordination as they feed themselves with spoons. Eighteen month olds use tools with the dough, whilst three year olds show skill pouring jugs of water from one container to another, using the funnels.

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who attend

Adults talk to the children and help develop children's vocabulary and their listening skills well. Children talk confidently and chatter about their play. They ask questions, such as 'why does the bug not fly?', 'why will the gloves not fit?' and receive answers from staff that both answer and encourage further challenge. Staff use simple Makaton signs, such as 'more' and 'thank you' to help younger children with their communication skills. Staff use books to support topic work and link with activities encouraging children to use books as a resource. Children enjoy looking at books and sharing books with a friend. They show excellent listening skills and can retell the story once it is finished. Resources to help children with early writing are numerous, but labels within the nursery are not always used to further extend children's knowledge of word recognition.

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who attend

Children's knowledge and experiences of the natural world are excellent. For example, they use the mud kitchen in the garden to explore and go bug hunting under logs using their magnifying glasses. Younger children explore the grass and sand, learning about the textures. They enjoy walks in their buggies to the park and show interest in the nursery pets, such as the terrapins. The forest school outings extend children's activities, enabling them to take risks and challenge themselves in a controlled environment. Children use the natural world to support their numeracy skills as they measure the girth of the tree trunks and compare how many children can stand round the tree. They talk about long sticks, round stones and the steepness of the hill, learning about gradients as they enjoy speeding down the slope. Numerous resources further support children's number recognition, such as paying for their snack with pennies and learning how many items

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who attend

they can buy with their set amount of coins. Consequently, children use number confidently and show good recognition of numerals and shapes.

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who attend

Children have access to messy play using a wide variety of resources, such as paint, collage materials and junk modelling to explore, build and create. They have access to musical instruments both indoors and outside using numerous resources for sound. Role play resources are accessible in every room and outdoors, although on occasions these areas are not always well planned.

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who attend

Parents are extremely happy with the care their children are receiving and feel staff keep them exceptionally well informed about their children's progress. This excellent partnership with parents enable children to continue their learning at home, through shared discussion and written records. Younger children have their daily care needs recorded to ensure parents can plan around meal and sleep times. There is a parent's forum which parents use to meet other parents and plan activities and events for the whole nursery. They complete regular questionnaires to keep the key person informed about their child's progress and development each time the child changes rooms; therefore, enabling the child's individual needs to be met and care routines kept up to date.

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The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children

Staff demonstrate a caring, sensitive approach to the children in their care and get to know their key children's interests and personalities. They use their excellent knowledge of the children in their care to provide activities and resources to meet their needs. Parents feel secure leaving their children at the nursery because of the well-developed partnership between the key person and the parent.

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The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children

Staff support children exceptionally well in developing a good understanding about being kind to each other and sharing the toys. For example, children show good turn taking when washing hands or patience waiting for their friends to finish eating their lunch. Children show excitement as they play in small groups, showing each other what they are doing or sharing in new experiences. Staff constantly praise and encourage children, supporting them in their development. The older children receive stickers for good behaviour which are put onto a certificate. This goes home with the child to enable parents to share in the good behaviour.

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The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children

Children learn about the importance of living a healthy lifestyle through the exemplary outdoor activities, where children benefit from fresh air and exercise. A well-balanced diet is given to all children through three meals a day and healthy snacks. Children have access to drinks throughout the day and are encouraged to have regular drinks of water during exercise. Personal hygiene is promoted for all children, with emphasis on washing away germs after playing outside. Practitioners continue to provide good role models for hygiene procedures, ensuring nappy changing and food serving areas are cleaned appropriately.

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The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children

Children gain an excellent understanding about keeping themselves safe. They challenge themselves climbing, balancing and crawling using the various natural and man-made resources. Staff offer gentle reminders to children, such as 'use both hands to hold on' or 'don't climb too close to the person in front' to further support children's understanding. Outings are thoroughly risk assessed and measures to keep children safe are extremely well implemented. Each child wears a high-visibility vest and holds onto the hand rings on the rope. Staff take all necessary equipment and talk to children about road safety and dangers within the environment. As a result, children become good at keeping themselves safe.

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The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children

The abundance of resources both indoors and outdoors enables all children to explore and develop in all areas of learning. Children are extremely well-engaged in activities, making choices and selecting resources to move to different areas. Staff follow the children's lead and provide additional toys and equipment if they become aware of different interests to maintain children's engagement. All resources and activities are risk assessed and each room has suitable toys for the age of children attending.

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The contribution of the early years provision to the well-being of children

Moves within the nursery and when children start and leave the nursery are extremely well planned. The staff, led by the experienced management team, show an excellent understanding of the importance of handling and preparing children for moves. Consequently, staff prepare children for each room change and change of key person, involving parents at every stage. As a result, children move easily and confidently through the different rooms as they progress in their development. A transition box has been specifically developed to support those children leaving for school. Items and photographs from local schools are shared with the children, together with visits from reception teachers from the local schools. As a result, children are very well supported in the next stage in their development.

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provision

Safeguarding is given high priority by the management team who implement robust, rigorous recruitment procedures. A thorough process is implemented to ensure all checks and references are received alongside an interview and thorough induction. Ongoing monitoring of each member of staff, through regular supervision, peer observation and bi- annual appraisals, ensures their ongoing suitability. Training is mandatory regarding safeguarding children, both external and in-house. All staff are able to demonstrate a secure knowledge of the procedures to follow should they have any concerns about children in their care. Training to develop staff's levels of qualification and knowledge is fully promoted and encouraged, resulting in well-trained and motivated practitioners.

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provision

The management team work tirelessly with staff to provide stimulating, exciting opportunities for children including visits by the local community, such as the fire brigade. The manager has an excellent understanding about the requirements of promoting learning and development for the children. This is demonstrated through the excellent partnerships with outside agencies, such as speech and language, physiotherapists and local schools, enabling children's individual needs to be met.

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provision

The manager is extremely well motivated and provides inspiration to her team of practitioners to constantly evaluate and monitor the provision. Each room takes responsibility for delivering the Early Years Foundation Stage and promoting all areas of learning. Regular team meetings provide a forum for the sharing of ideas and suggestions in addition to the views from parents and the parent's forum. The excellent monitoring and evaluation enables practitioners to constantly develop, adapt and implement new ideas, promoting continuous improvement.

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The Childcare Register

The requirements for the compulsory part of the Childcare Register are Met The requirements for the voluntary part of the Childcare Register are Met

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Grade Judgement Description

Grade 1 Outstanding Outstanding provision is highly effective in meeting the needs of all children exceptionally well. This ensures that children are very well prepared for the next stage of their learning. Grade 2 Good Good provision is effective in delivering provision that meets the needs of all children well. This ensures children are ready for the next stage of their learning. Grade 3 Satisfactory Satisfactory provision is performing less well than expectations in one or more of the key areas. It requires improvement in order to be good. Grade 4 Inadequate Provision that is inadequate requires significant improvement and/or enforcement action. The provision is failing to give children an acceptable standard of early years education and/or is not meeting the safeguarding and welfare requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage. It will be inspected again within 12 months of the date of this inspection.

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Grade Judgement Description

Met The provision has no children on roll. The inspection judgement is that the provider continues to meet the requirements for registration. Not met The provision has no children on roll. The inspection judgement is that the provider does not meet the requirements for registration.

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Inspection

This inspection was carried out by Ofsted under sections 49 and 50 of the Childcare Act 2006 on the quality and standards of provision that is registered on the Early Years Register. The registered person must ensure that this provision complies with the statutory framework for children’s learning, development and care, known as the Early Years Foundation Stage.

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Setting details

Unique reference number EY229801 Local authority Kent Inspection number 910192

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Type of provision

Registration category Childcare - Non-Domestic Age range of children 0 - 8 Total number of places 174 Number of children on roll 220 Name of provider Dimples Day Nursery Limited Date of previous inspection 11/04/2011 Telephone number 01322 285885

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Type of provision

set out in the guidance ‘Complaints procedure: raising concerns and making complaints about Ofsted’, which is available from Ofsted’s website: www.ofsted.gov.uk. If you would like Ofsted to send you a copy of the guidance, please telephone 0300 123 4234, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk.

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Type of provision

For the purposes of this inspection the following definitions apply:

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Type of provision

Full-time provision is that which operates for more than three hours. These are usually known as nurseries, nursery schools and pre-schools and must deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage. They are registered on the Early Years Register and pay the higher fee for registration.

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Type of provision

Sessional provision operates for more than two hours but does not exceed three hours in any one day. These are usually known as pre-schools, kindergartens or nursery schools and must deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage. They are registered on the Early Years Register and pay the lower fee for registration.

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Type of provision

Childminders care for one or more children where individual children attend for a period of more than two hours in any one day. They operate from domestic premises, which are usually the childminder’s own home. They are registered on the Early Years Register and must deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage.

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Type of provision

Out of school provision may be sessional or full-time provision and is delivered before or after school and/or in the summer holidays. They are registered on the Early Years Register and must deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage. Where children receive their Early Years Foundation Stage in school these providers do not have to deliver the learning and development requirements in full but should complement the experiences children receive in school. achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children's social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, work-based learning and skills training, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for looked after children,

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Type of provision

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Type of provision

T: 0300 123 4234 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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