All Saints Playgroup

All Saints Playgroup John Wood Room, All Saints Church, All Saints Road, Cheltenham, GL52 2EY

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Inspection date

Previous inspection date 18/07/2013 20/05/2011

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early years provision

This inspection: 3 Previous inspection: 3 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 2 The effectiveness of the leadership and management of the early years provision 3

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This provision is satisfactory

 Staff engage and interest children, particularly in the outdoor activities available, because they provide a relaxed atmosphere that enables children to concentrate and play well together.  Caring staff are committed and flexible to meet the needs of children and their families.  The team of staff works well in partnership other providers to support children's effective learning and development.

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It is not yet good because

 Staff occasionally miss opportunities in play to maximise children's understanding of letters and sounds, which results in fewer opportunities to extend their early writing skills.  The policies and procedures are not in a clear format to robustly support joint working with parents and carers to support children's welfare.  The provider had to take recent action to meet with requirements and as a result, had to update safeguarding procedures.

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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 inspector observed activities in the play room and the outside learning environment.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector had discussions with the provider-manager, staff, children and parents.  The inspector undertook a joint observation with a staff member indoors.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector sampled a range of documentation, including children's records, planning, safeguarding procedures, policies and notices for parents.

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Information about the setting

All Saints Playgroup registered in 1990 and is privately owned and managed. It operates from All Saints Church in the Pittville area of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. The playgroup has use of the John Wood room, kitchen, entrance area and toilet facilities. Staff cordon off an area of the church grounds for children's outside play and the playgroup uses an adjacent allotment. The playgroup opens on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 9.15am to 1pm and on Tuesday and Thursday from 9.15am to 3.15pm during term time. It is registered on the Early Years Register and on the compulsory and voluntary parts of the Childcare Register. There are 42 children on roll from two to under five years. The playgroup is in receipt of funding for the provision of free early education for children aged two, three and four years. It currently supports a small number of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. There are five members of staff and four of

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Information about the setting

these hold appropriate early years qualifications. A staff member is working towards a further early years qualification at foundation degree level.

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

 help children to increase their early reading and writing skills by providing additional challenges in play situations to further extend their understanding about letters and sounds

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

 review the presentation of policies and procedures to provide parents and carers with clear, up-to-date information about the children's welfare.

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who attend

Staff have positive impact on children's learning and development so that all children make good progress. Staff work with parents from the start and are well aware of children's starting points and capabilities. They take good account of when children joined and how often they attend. Staff make good use of ongoing, observational assessment. They effectively evaluate children's play to incorporate their next steps into the planning. Key persons regularly revise these goals to keep themselves aware of children's current learning needs. The educational programmes for each area of learning effectively help children to reach expected levels of development. Children achieve good personal, social and emotional development. They enjoy the challenges to develop physically and receive plenty of stimulation from attentive staff throughout the day to extend their listening and speaking skills. Adult-led routines support

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who attend

children to participate and learn well. This includes use of two groups for stories and key groups for conversation at meal times to enable each child to contribute and learn. Overall, children gain good levels of skills in early reading and writing. They enjoy a wide range of books with anticipation and interest. They work as a group to create collages of their favourite stories, looking at pictures in books and choosing what they need to create the characters. Staff write interesting captions on the resulting displays using children's words about their activities. However, they do not maximise children's learning about letters and sounds as they play, for example by always encouraging them to name their work.

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who attend

Staff give children strong support to help them develop good attitudes and skills to learn effectively. For example, they successfully increase their levels of mathematical understanding through creating symmetrical paintings of butterflies and counting in number game activities. Staff offer children the space and time to explore what they are interested in. As a result, they enjoy and persevere in their chosen play activities. For example, staff suggested creating a rainbow flower tower. Children filled flower pots with compost and then, with help, built them into a tower. They chose the plants they wanted, took them out of the pots and looked at the roots. After they inserted the plants into holes they had dug and watered them, children then painted their favourite flowers. Activities such as these enable children to gain a good understanding of their natural environment.

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who attend

Key persons have good knowledge about children's interests and next steps. As a result, children receive encouragement to carry out their ideas in a wide variety of indoor and outdoor play. Children show that they are keen to express their ideas through art, imaginative play and music. During these child-initiated activities, staff have good understanding of how to offer appropriate levels of challenge to take individual children forward in their learning. For example, after a child shared news about a family visit to see 'dinosaurs', children played cooperatively with the playgroup's toy dinosaurs. Later, they drew these and enjoyed a dinosaur story with lots of stomping and stamping. Staff provide interesting experiences and use open comments to help children think in further depth. For example, after children look for mini beasts, they responded to pretend to be some of the wildlife they find, including crawling ants and jumping frogs. Children gain

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who attend

good confidence, perseverance and independence as staff prepare them well for their transitions into full-time education.

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

Children transfer smoothly from home to playgroup. This results from the effective settling-in process and the strong welcome from the small team of key persons. New parents have ample time to raise questions as they visit and complete initial paperwork, including about their children's stages in learning. Children build strong relationships as staff provide genuine warmth and affection. They show interest in the children, listening to everything they say and attentively meeting their personal needs. This enables children to develop their independence and to have confidence to explore the learning environment.

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

Children show a sense of belonging at the playgroup as they self-register using their named photographs. Staff follow appropriate behaviour management strategies and children demonstrate that they are used to the routines and develop a good understanding of what staff expect of them. They sit quietly to listen when asked and respond eagerly to an encouraging song to make the room tidy. This enables them to learn how to behave well, develop positive self-esteem and their self-help skills. Children feel safe and secure, effectively learning how to keep themselves and others safe. For example, they safely negotiate the stairs to the washroom and learn to use a wide range of tools correctly, including table knives and gardening implements. Children know where the labelled toys and equipment belong and access many of these without help. They share resources happily and learn to manage their own turn taking, including when

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

From a young age, children develop a good understanding of the importance of a healthy lifestyle. Children increasingly take responsibility for their personal hygiene; they learn that they must wash 'to get rid of lots of germs', including before they help to prepare food. They drink regularly from their individual water bottles so that they do not become thirsty, especially in hot weather. They choose from nutritious foods, including many different fruits and vegetables they have grown, to enjoy a varied and balanced diet. Children choose whether to play in or out of doors in the fresh air each session. This means that those children who learn better outside have good opportunities to do so. Staff successfully enhance the programmes for physical development. For example, children thoroughly enjoy the challenges of a bouncy castle and inflatable slide on special days.

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provision

The provider demonstrates a satisfactory understanding of their responsibility to meet the legal requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage. The inspection was brought forward, following safeguarding concerns and an investigation by Ofsted. The provider was required to take steps to inform statutory agencies responsible for safeguarding, without delay, about any concerns for children's safety or welfare. Staff were required to improve understanding about what to do if an allegation was received about a staff member. The provider took prompt action to improve safeguarding procedures. All staff demonstrate a suitable knowledge and understanding of how to implement the setting's safeguarding policy. Management are aware of the need to inform Ofsted of any significant event, within the required timescales. The named person for child protection and other staff have a satisfactory awareness of safeguarding procedures and work to

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provision

suitably detailed policies, including child protection. Through induction and recently renewed training, staff are familiar with possible signs of children at risk and with procedures to follow if they have concerns.

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provision

The building is secure and suitable ratios of staff supervise children closely at all times to reduce the risk of accidents. Risk assessments, including for outdoor spaces, are effective. As a result, staff thoroughly check the areas that children use to keep them safe at all times. The playgroup maintains all required documents and the management and staff repeatedly amended the policies and procedures. However, they do not present all of these to families in a clear format to strongly support joint working with parents and carers to support children's well-being.

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provision

The provider-manager understands the learning and development requirements effectively. Therefore, she and the other key persons monitor children's progress carefully. They understand well the legal requirement to assess children's progress at the age of two years. Staff complete these in detail for all children of that age, including parents' comments and providing copies for families to pass to their health visitors. Staff work effectively in partnership with other providers and agencies. To link with shared providers, they visit the settings and email the children's key persons. Staff exchange information in communication diaries about what interests children and their next steps in learning. Staff liaise with other professionals and parents to support children with special educational needs and/or disabilities. The playgroup's coordinator and key persons observe these children regularly to offer sound support to them and their families.

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provision

The provider uses satisfactory systems for recruitment, staff supervision, ongoing professional development and qualification training. This helps to ensure that all adults are appropriately checked and suitable to work with children. The staff evaluate their practice suitably through daily conversation about children's achievements and learning needs. They encourage parents to feedback their views about the playgroup verbally and in an annual questionnaire; they hold meetings to discuss how to extend children's learning further. They take account of children's interests when planning activities so that children enjoy what they do. Since the previous inspection, the committed staff have worked to improve their teaching skills as key persons to benefit children's learning. The provider- manager and staff value the support of the local authority advisor to review what is working well and identify areas for additional improvements. They aim to consolidate

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provision

planning and assessment with all parents' comments and to include letters and sounds on a fortnightly basis to cover different aspects. They also plan to extend outdoor resourcing with further interesting natural media as part of the process to improve the provision for children.

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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 101469 Local authority Gloucestershire Inspection number 901116 Type of provision Full-time provision Registration category Childcare - Non-Domestic Age range of children 0 - 8 Total number of places 22 Number of children on roll 42 Name of provider Hilary Mary Fraser Date of previous inspection 20/05/2011 Telephone number 07801 889541

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Setting details

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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