Salcott Crescent Day Nursery School

Seymour House Day Nursery School Silva Island Way, Salcott Crescent, WICKFORD, Essex, SS12 9NR

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Inspection date

Previous inspection date 18/06/2014 Not Applicable

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early years provision

This inspection: 1 Previous inspection: Not Applicable 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 quality of teaching is inspirational. As a result, children are extremely effective learners who show high levels of concentration and communicate extremely well and rapidly become very confident, imaginative and resourceful in their play.  Children and babies settle quickly in the most welcoming and comfortable surroundings and soon develop strong bonds and affectionate relationships with the kind and caring staff.  Parents' involvement in their children's learning is excellent. They have rich and valuable opportunities to be fully included in the life of the nursery.  Children and babies are kept exceptionally safe and secure in the setting because staff fully understand the importance of safeguarding children and what their roles and responsibilities entail.  Exceedingly high standards of cleanliness are maintained throughout the nursery and both children and staff demonstrate an extremely good understanding of effective

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This provision is outstanding

hygiene routines.  Leadership and management are outstanding. The management team continually searches for ever improving ways to help the children's development. They monitor the provision with rigour and a relentless drive to help every child stay safe and make the best possible progress in their learning and development.

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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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Inspection activities

 The inspector observed activities in the indoor and outdoor learning environments.  The inspector carried out a joint observation with the Head of Early Years.  The inspector held discussions with the management, staff and children.  The inspector viewed a sample of the children's development records.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector saw evidence of suitability and qualifications of the staff, self- evaluation, risk assessment and other documentation in relation to health and safety checks.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector took account of the views of parents spoken to on the day and from responses to surveys organised by the nursery.

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Information about the setting

Seymour House Day Nursery School was established in 2006 and re-registered in 2013 under a limited company and is on the Early Years Register. It is one of eight settings run and managed by Seymour House Limited. The nursery operates from purpose built premises in Wickford, Essex. The nursery opens Monday to Friday all year round. Opening times are from 7am until 6pm. Children attend for a variety of sessions. Children are cared for in five playrooms and have access to enclosed areas for outdoor play. There are currently 139 children attending who are within the early years age group. The nursery provides funded early education for three- and four-year-old children. It supports children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and children who speak English as an additional language. There are currently 20 staff working directly with the children, all have an appropriate early years qualification at level 3 or higher. There are two staff

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Information about the setting

members with Early Years Professional status, one member of staff holds Qualified Teacher Status and one member of staff has an early years degree. The nursery also employs a cook and lunchtime assistants. It receives support from the local authority.

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

 inspire children even more to explore and express their talent and flair in expressive arts and design, for example, by providing opportunities for children to work alongside creative adults, such as artists or musicians.

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who attend

Children and babies are extremely happy and thoroughly enjoy their day at the nursery. They benefit immensely from the exceptional knowledge and understanding the staff have of the learning and development requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage. Staff have high expectations for each child and the children rise exceptionally well to the challenges presented to them. Resources and toys are highly accessible, indoors and out, and cover the breadth of the seven areas of learning. Consequently, there are vast opportunities for children to develop independence, as they make decisions about what to play with and whether to play indoors or outside. In addition, staff plan and organise stimulating adult-led activities, which enable them to focus on children's next steps and other important skills, such as their recognition and use of numbers, letters and sounds. Among the many exemplary features in teaching is the way in which staff play alongside

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who attend

children, helping them to rapidly acquire a wide range of knowledge, skills and understanding. The staff make time to listen to the children and use carefully formed questions to develop their conversations, for example, when encouraging them to recall past events in their lives. Children particularly enjoy sharing their learning stories with staff and visitors, remembering what they have done and showing pride in their achievements. Staff use sign language, visual clues, objects and role play extremely well to help all children overcome communication and language barriers. Children also use these skills very well to talk to one another and to imaginatively extend their ideas.

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who attend

Staff demonstrate an excellent understanding regarding the different stages of children's development and make the very best of daily routines to support the curiosity of babies and toddlers. Staff skilfully allow babies and toddlers to explore the possibilities of sensory materials, such as shaving foam and through well-loved favourites, such as sand and water play. Observation and assessment is intrinsic in the staff's practice. They note the characteristics of learning, depth of involvement and follow children's interests in detail. Accurate planning, assessment and termly reporting enable staff to ensure that all children are making rapid progress in their learning and development. Highly effective strategies engage parents in their children's learning. On entry, staff link closely with parents to obtain detailed information about their children's individual abilities. Parents are also fully involved in the baseline assessments and the required progress check for children

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who attend

between the ages of two and three years. They contribute comments in their children's development records and note children's special individual achievements for display. Parents regularly meet with key persons for consultations about their children's progress. They also spend time in the nursery at the stay and play sessions or join in with story time. Children with special educational needs and/or disabilities and those who speak English as an additional language are supported extremely well. Staff are fully aware of the individual needs of children and have regular input from other professionals, so they are successfully working together to form targets for further development.

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who attend

Children's self-esteem is very high, as a result, they display exceptional levels of confidence in their own abilities and growing independence. Consequently, all children are extremely well prepared for their future learning, including developing the skills they need in readiness for starting school. A high focus has been placed on children developing the personal and social skills they need to become motivated and independent learners. As a result, children listen attentively and are keen to contribute their ideas at group conversations. Children independently learn how to change their clothes to get ready for a physical activity. They have excellent opportunities to learn about technology when they use tablets or programmable toys. They write purposefully or explore making marks, both indoors and outside. For example, children particularly enjoy showing visitors how they carefully write the labels for the herbs growing in the garden. Every area in the nursery

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who attend

incorporates books for enjoyment and learning. The youngest children show their growing appreciation as they seek staff out to look at a book with them. They enjoy the comfort of sitting closely with them and looking at the pictures as they listen to the story. Through staffs' consistent input, they start to read the books themselves as they look at the pictures, point to them and name the characters. As children get older, staff concentrate on repetitive phrases in stories to encourage children to join in and provide them with literacy packs to take home and practise their skills with parents. Children develop their understanding of the world through a range of activities with interesting visitors to the nursery, such as a postal worker, librarian and the police. They concentrate and take pleasure in demonstrating their creative skills with a wide range of different materials. There is now scope to enhance children's experiences and inspire their creativity even

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who attend

more, by extending the variety of visitors to include artists and musicians.

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

Provision for children's and babies' care and well-being is exemplary. Children and babies settle into the nursery extremely well as staff are sensitive to their unique needs and spend considerable time discussing their individual requirements with their parents. As a result, staff put together a highly detailed profile before a child starts at the nursery. Settling-in visits are flexible and are based on the needs of individual children, to maintain their emotional well-being. Every child is assigned a key person to be responsible for their development, routine care practices and liaison with parents. A successful buddy system is also in place so that when the child's key person is absent there is a named member of staff ready to cover for them and to work with the children. This means that babies and children form extremely warm bonds and attachments and feel immensely secure with the staff supporting their play. Even the youngest babies are alert and listen and respond

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

contentedly to the voices of their key persons. Each room in the nursery has produced a transition booklet for children, either as a new starter or if they transfer to a new room. These provide both children and parents with a wealth of information that include details of the daily routines in each of the rooms, the staff, activities and equipment that is available. The support for children during their transfer to full-time school is excellent. Staff are proactive in contacting the schools and arrange visits from teaching staff so that children become familiar with their new carers. Reports and transfer forms are also completed so that the schools are aware of each child's needs and abilities. This effective communication between the nursery and local primary schools ensures that everyone is working together, to effectively promote continuity in children's care and learning.

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

All staff have a calm and consistent manner with the children. They talk to them in a very thoughtful and respectful way, which results in a very warm and welcoming environment. Children behave exceedingly well. They are polite, listen to the staff's instructions and play harmoniously and cooperatively by effectively sharing and taking turns. As a result, the older children recognise that their play is much more exciting when they include others. Independence skills are effectively developed as children serve their own food at mealtimes, pour their drinks or lay the table ready for lunch. Babies and toddlers capably feed themselves, with staffs' encouragement. Staff also readily respond to and follow up children's ideas and suggestions for their play and learning. For example, children often choose songs and stories and staff use props, puppets and pictures help babies and toddlers to express their choices. As a result, children feel listened to and valued. Also,

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

they show that they feel safe through their interactions with the staff and learn about safety as they are invited to assess risks for themselves and discuss safety measures. Children talk about sun protection, knowing that wearing a hat and a shirt with long sleeves can help to protect them from burning. Staff are conscientious about ensuring all children wear hats and sun lotion and play in the shade or indoors during the hottest times of the day. Children's welfare and safety in their home environment has also been carefully considered as parents are invited to join a first-aid training course in the nursery.

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

Children have excellent opportunities to learn about healthy lifestyles. They eat healthy and nutritious meals and snacks and discuss foods that are good for them. This knowledge is effectively extended as children enjoy growing herbs and salad vegetables in the nursery garden. Children follow well-established hygiene routines and understand why they must wash their hands after messy play or using the toilet. Nappy changing and toilet training is hygienically and sensitively carried out, to promote children's good health and protect their dignity. Children's physical development is promoted well as the outdoor areas are exceptionally well designed and thoughtfully resourced with a range of exciting and interesting toys. Children really relish the opportunity to choose when they wish to access the play areas adjacent to their playroom. A wealth of outdoor apparatus are provided that encourage children and babies to use wheeled toys, climb and pull

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

themselves up, or take part in team games and obstacle courses.

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provision

Leadership is inspirational. The management team pursues and maintains excellence in all areas and has an exceptional knowledge of the requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage. Both managers and staff implement and maintain all the required essential documentation for the highly efficient management of the nursery. Extremely robust procedures and staffs' vigilance protects children from harm. Comprehensive background checks are carried out when the nursery recruits new staff. All staff receive an intensive induction programme, which means they have a superb awareness of their roles and responsibilities. All staff are vigilant about the security of the children and complete safeguarding training. As a result, they can identify the signs and symptoms that might cause them concern about children's well-being and understand the action they must take. Risk assessment is rigorous, well considered and continually reviewed in line with the

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provision

specific needs of individual children. The main entrance doors are electronically secured and playgrounds are fully enclosed. In addition, the outdoor areas have been refurbished with an impact-absorbent surface, to support children's outdoor play and to enable them to challenge their physical skills in safe ways.

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provision

Reflective practice is at the core of everything that the nursery does. The management and staff teams meticulously monitor and review their practice and the educational programmes. Systems to check the quality of teaching are rigorous. For example, both management and peer observations of staff interactions with children provide excellent opportunities for reflection and planning for improvement. Themed reflective practice weeks are also used particularly well, to ensure that staff use optimum opportunities to really accelerate children's learning. Managers continually use the most up-to-date research and thinking to further develop the provision. Robust self-evaluation includes rigorous analysis of data and the views of parents, carers, staff and children. This informs the priorities identified in the sharply focused nursery development plan. There is an extremely strong ethos of continual professional development for staff, in order to

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provision

maintain excellent standards of care and learning for children. Staff progress is meticulously monitored by managers through meetings and appraisals. This enables all staff to be fully supported, both personally as well as professionally. The nursery invests heavily in staff development and training to ensure that they have a fully qualified, knowledgeable and highly skilled staff group, where the staff retention is consistently high. An excellent overview is maintained of the rapid progress of both individual children and groups of children, using a computer tracking tool. Also, regular audits are undertaken of children's progress records and planning within the rooms. This means that staff can promptly target any areas where children's progress is less than expected, to ensure that no child gets left behind.

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provision

Very close working partnerships with parents are strongly nurtured. This ensures that parents feel relaxed and confident enough to share with the staff any aspect of their child's development and any ideas they have for their child's further progression. Regular parent consultation sessions and an open door policy further promotes staff availability to parents. These extensive arrangements ensure that parents are fully included in all aspects of their child's care and learning. A wealth of information is shared with parents through newsletters, notice boards and the dedicated website. Parents also have access to literature about childcare issues and trends. Parents' opinions are actively sought in a variety of ways. For example, through questionnaires and written comments displayed in the entrance hall. All parents and carers spoken to are delighted with the care and education their children receive and say that the staff 'go the extra mile' to promote their

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provision

children's care and learning. The nursery managers link effectively with other early years providers when they attend learning community meetings, to share ideas and discuss best practice. There are also close and effective links with teaching staff from local schools to provide thorough support for children as they move into full-time education.

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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 Requires improvement The provision is not giving children a good standard of early years education and/or there are minor breaches of the safeguarding and welfare requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage. It will be monitored and inspected within twelve months of the date of this inspection. 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

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Grade Judgement Description

the Early Years Foundation Stage. It will be monitored and inspected again within six months of the date of this inspection. 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 EY472655 Local authority Essex Inspection number 950189 Type of provision Full-time provision Registration category Childcare - Non-Domestic Age range of children 0 - 5 Total number of places 72 Number of children on roll 139 Name of provider Seymour House Limited Date of previous inspection not applicable Telephone number 01268766126

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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

If you would like a copy of this document in a different format, such as large print or Braille, please telephone 0300 123 4234, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk. You may copy all or parts of this document for non-commercial educational purposes, as long as you give details of the source and date of publication and do not alter the information in any way. To receive regular email alerts about new publications, including survey reports and school inspection reports, please visit our website and go to ‘Subscribe’.

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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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