Footprints Day Nursery

Footprints Day Nursery Elim Christian Centre, Hall Street, CHELMSFORD, Essex, CM2 0HG

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Inspection date

Previous inspection date 05/08/2013 27/01/2010

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early years provision

This inspection: 2 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 2

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This provision is good

 Children actively engage in and explore an exciting range of freely chosen play experiences, which enable them to make good progress across all seven areas of learning. Effectively planned adult-led activities enhance children's learning and further challenge them.  Practitioners proficiently capture and follow children's interests, which encourages children to be keen and motivated learners.  Practitioners form a team of knowledgeable and experienced early educators, who demonstrate a good understanding of how children learn. The clear management structure and support from the church management committee contributes towards the smooth running of the nursery.  Children enjoy outdoor learning in a stimulating, well-resourced and interesting garden. They have access to a good range of natural materials and learning opportunities in the garden. Children use a small balcony to develop their knowledge of growing and

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This provision is good

planting, as they plant and tend to a range of vegetables and flowers there.

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It is not yet outstanding because

 Indoor play spaces are not always used flexibly to enable children to fully explore, move, build and role-play.

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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 all three playrooms and viewed all areas of the nursery.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector held discussions with the practitioners, assistant manager, church advisor, nominated person, Special Educational Needs Coordinator, parents and children at appropriate times throughout the inspection.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector looked at a range of records including written risk assessments, information about planning and assessments, information about the qualifications and suitability of practitioners, children's details, accident and medication records and a selection of other relevant documentation.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector took account of the views of parents spoken to at the time of the inspection and through written comments.

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Information about the setting

The Footprints Day Nursery was registered in 2000 and is on the Early Years Register and the compulsory and voluntary parts of the Childcare Register. It is situated on the first floor of a church building in the Chelmsford area of Essex, and is managed by the nursery management team. The nursery serves the local area and is accessible to all children. It operates from a number of first floor rooms and there is a fully enclosed area available for outdoor play.

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Information about the setting

The nursery employs 21 members of child care staff. Of these, 20 hold appropriate early years qualifications at level two and above, including one with Early Years Professional Status.

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Information about the setting

The nursery opens Monday to Friday for 51 weeks of the year. Sessions are from 7.30am until 6pm. Children attend for a variety of sessions. There are currently 74 children attending who are in the early years age group. The nursery provides funded early education for two-, three- and four-year-old children. It supports a number of children who speak English as an additional language and children with special educational needs and/or disabilities.

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

 review the organisation of play spaces within the nursery rooms, to ensure that they provide opportunities for children to explore, build, move and role-play.

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who attend

Practitioners demonstrate a clear knowledge of how children learn and deliver the learning and development requirements of the Statutory framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage effectively. Children are active and busy and fully engaged in an interesting range of planned and freely chosen play experiences. Children successfully learn and develop as practitioners have a secure knowledge of when to intervene in children's chosen play and how to sustain their interests.

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who attend

Children's language development is promoted throughout the nursery by practitioners skilfully questioning the children and providing them with a good amount of time to respond. For example, the youngest children enjoy lively stories and rhymes, joining in enthusiastically at their favourite parts. Older children are encouraged to play a game whereby they make up rhyming words that rhyme with their Christian name. This creates much laughter, especially when they invent a rhyming name for the practitioner leading the activity. Children's literacy skills are well promoted as children have good opportunities to enjoy books, to practise handwriting skills and to see a wide range of print being used for a purpose through the nursery wall displays.

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who attend

Children enthusiastically participate in growing plants, flowers and vegetables. They are provided with opportunities to enhance this knowledge in the large nursery garden as well as the small balcony area, leading from the pre-school room. Children enjoy planting the seeds, tending to their plants, watering them and then harvesting their produce, which is sometimes used by the cook for meals and snacks. Children are provided with good opportunities to explore the local community when they go for walks and outings. They learn how to purchase items from the local shops and practise road safety as they successfully negotiate the roads on their route.

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who attend

Children enjoy exploring new ideas. They watch and make note of what happens to a series of water filled containers, when other things are added. For example, glitter, raisins, powder, juice and oil. They anticipate which of these items will float and which will sink and also talk about the changes that occur in the water. Practitioners support this learning well, using appropriate language to extend children's thinking.

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who attend

Children enjoy being imaginative and expressing themselves through role play. For example, a large plastic spinning tray becomes a tortoise's shell, with the little tortoise's head, legs and arms poking out from underneath. Other children want to join the tortoise and are given large pieces of material to use as their shells. Before long the first tortoise has a number of friends, all moving slowly around with their heavy shells on their backs.

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who attend

Practitioners make clear observations of the children's play and achievements. These are recorded in their learning journeys and used to identify children's next steps in learning. Weekly planning within each base room, enables practitioners to tailor the planning to meet the individual needs of each child. Summative assessments of the children's progress are shared with parents and the nursery effectively implements the requirements to complete the Early Years Foundation Stage progress check at age two. Children make good progress across all seven areas of learning including those who speak English as an additional language or those who have special educational needs and/or disabilities. The nursery's special educational needs coordinator works well with outside agencies to identify any gaps in children's learning and to implement effective intervention to help to close these gaps. Children are effectively prepared for entry to school as practitioners

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who attend

encourage them to become independent, to be good listeners, to follow directions and to be comfortable when meeting new adults.

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

Children are settled and content in their nursery life. They form good relationships with their key person and other adults caring for them. An effective settling-in procedure ensures that parents and children are able to visit the nursery a number of times during the settling-in period to enable the child to feel fully confident when left for the first time. Parents complete a clear 'all about me' sheet, which provides the key person with information about their children's siblings, pets, likes, dislikes and special people in their lives. Parents are also encouraged to bring photographs of special people in the children's lives to the nursery. These are laminated and made into books, which the children can look at whenever they choose. Children move through the three base rooms within the nursery according to their age and stage of ability. Effective arrangements, ensure that this process is made as comfortable and smooth as possible for every child.

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

Practitioners skilfully enable children to communicate their needs, for example, in large group times or when they sit individually and chat quietly. Children in the pre-school room have been provided with a 'thinking area', whereby they can consider their feelings, use dolls and puppets to express themselves, or simply sit and think. Children are well behaved and enjoy their nursery experiences. They form close friendships with peers and chat confidently to them. Practitioners effectively enhance children's self-esteem and confidence by using clear, positive language and reinforcing their good behaviour. Children's achievements are positively recognised, for example, children in the toddler room receive a paper apple, detailing what they have done well, to place on the apple tree. For some children this may be remembering to place their water apron back on the hook after use, or being kind and caring towards their friends.

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

The nursery environments are bright, welcoming and attractive. Children are actively encouraged to guide their own play as resources are very well presented on low-level shelving. The rooms are zoned into specific areas, for example, construction areas, drawing areas and role-play areas. While this provides clear and well-organised spaces for children, some of the areas can inhibit children's natural curiosity. For example, the 'movement area' in the pre-school room is quite small, providing space for one or two children to make use of the space effectively. When a larger group of children want to develop this space for large movement or role-play, they are sometimes reminded that only a small number of children can play there. The game then ceases and children are not able to follow their own ideas or interests. Children go out into the nursery garden, which is situated on the ground floor, throughout the day with adult supervision. There

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

are systems in place to enable children to make some choices about whether they play indoors or outdoors and the nursery are further developing this to provide opportunities for more choice. The nursery garden is very well presented with an exciting and stimulating range of natural play materials and resources. Children have opportunities to explore all seven areas of learning outdoors.

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

Children learn about keeping healthy and safe as practitioners effectively deliver the nursery's policies on healthy eating, safety and generally meeting children's well-being needs. Children enjoy a range of meals and snacks throughout their day. They sit together with their peers and practitioners create a calm and relaxed atmosphere by chatting quietly to the children about their home life, what they enjoy doing and what they want to do for the rest of their day. The nursery menus have recently been reviewed and developed to ensure that all meals and snacks are healthy and are cooked from raw ingredients, rather than processed foods. Children learn about taking risks, for example, when they walk up and down the stairs to go to and from the garden. They have clear rules about lining up and holding on to the low-level handrail situated at their height.

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provision

The nursery is led and managed by a manager who is supported by the church management committee. A practitioner who holds Early Years Professional Status is also employed to act in a mentoring role, providing support and guidance for other practitioners. A recent review of the management team has resulted in the appointment of a second manager, who, will mainly be responsible for quality. A number of the practitioners have worked at the nursery for long periods of time, forming an established and stable workforce. Practitioners ensure that children grow, flourish and develop through well-planned and purposeful experiences. The manager monitors the educational provision, giving guidance and support to individual practitioners on their delivery of the learning and development aspects of the Statutory framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage. The nursery has made enormous changes and improvements since the

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provision

last inspection. Many of the improvements have been as a direct result of effective self- evaluation and feedback from parents. Practitioners reflect on their weekly planning and how well the rooms are operating. They review this information at the nursery's regular staff meetings and take forward any areas that could be further improved.

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provision

Children's safety is given a high priority as practitioners understand their responsibilities with regards to safeguarding children. They are knowledgeable about the nursery's safeguarding policies and follow it if they have any concerns. All adults working with children or having regular contact with them are suitably vetted and proof of their clearance is held on file. Effective systems for risk assessing the premises, outside space and outings help ensure that children remain safe and secure at all times.

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provision

Partnerships with parents and other early years professionals are strong. The nursery provides parents with clear written information about the provision and its written policies. Well-presented wall displays help to further enhance parents understanding of how children learn and also provides information about good practice issues, such as, healthy eating. Parents are encouraged to view their children's learning journeys and to take them home to share with other members of the family. They are provided with opportunities to comment on their children's learning and to contribute towards identifying their next steps in learning. Parents spoken to at the time of the inspection feel that their children are progressing well and are happy with the care they receive. Parental questionnaires enable parents to play an active role in the nursery's self-evaluation process. Feedback is used constructively to inform practice. For example, some parents recently commented that

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provision

they were not made aware of changes to their child's key person following a re- organisation of rooms. Management have taken this point on board and are reviewing the way in which they introduce any changes to key persons. Links with the local schools that children feed into are good, and effective communication between the nursery and schools aids a smooth move for children progressing on to their next place of learning. At present there are no children who attend another early years setting, however, in the past when this has occurred, key persons have developed close working links with the other early years setting by introducing a three-way diary used between this nursery, the parents and the other early years setting. This has helped to complement the learning that takes place in each area of the child's life.

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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 203995 Local authority Essex Inspection number 876228

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Type of provision

Registration category Childcare - Non-Domestic Age range of children 0 - 17 Total number of places 84 Number of children on roll 74 Name of provider Elim Foursquare Gospel Alliance Committee Date of previous inspection 27/01/2010 Telephone number 01245 358855

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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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