Haydon Meadow Pre School

Haydon Meadow Pre School The Haydon Centre, Thames Avenue,Haydon wick, Swindon, Wiltshire, SN25 1QQ

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Inspection date

Previous inspection date 02/05/2014 03/03/2009

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early years provision

This inspection: 4 Previous inspection: 2 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 4 The effectiveness of the leadership and management of the early years provision 4

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This provision is inadequate

 Children's safety is compromised as staff do not use robust risk assessment procedures to prevent children leaving the premises unsupervised. Staff deployment in one room is poor and does not ensure children's safety.  The provider has failed to inform Ofsted of a significant event and has failed to implement procedures for checking staff's ongoing suitability. In addition, staff do not have a sufficiently robust understanding of their responsibilities in relation to safeguarding children. This puts children at risk.  The quality of teaching is variable. Some staff do not have secure understanding of how children learn in order to identify, plan or extend children's learning as well as they can. Staff training and monitoring has not suitably identified or tackled these inconsistencies.

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It has the following strengths

 Children enjoy the activities on offer, appear settled and are generally occupied. Partnerships with parents and others have some positive effects on children's 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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Inspection activities

 The inspector completed two joint observations with the owner.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector looked at children's observations, tracking and assessment records, planning documentation, evidence of suitability of staff working with children in the pre-school, and a range of other documentation.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector spoke to members of the staff team about the progress of their key children and their understanding of the pre-school's policies and procedures.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector took into account the views of children, written comments from parents and carers, and spoke to a number of parents and carers.

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Inspection activities

 The inspector mainly observed activities in the sessional pre-school room and the garden area. Some activities were observed in the full daycare room.

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Information about the setting

Haydon Meadow Pre-school opened at its present location in 1988 and is privately owned. It is situated in the Haydon Wick community centre to the north of Swindon. It is one of two settings owned and managed by the same providers. The pre-school is registered on the Early Years Register only. There are currently 105 children from three to five years on roll. The pre-school is open each weekday during school term times. Sessions run from 8.45am until 11.45am and 12 noon to 3pm, which includes lunchtime. Full daycare sessions run from 9am to 3pm. Children attend for a variety of sessions. The pre-school is in receipt of funding for the provision of free early education for three- and four-year-olds. The pre-school supports children who speak English as an additional language. The pre- school employs 10 staff. Of these, five hold qualifications to level 3, three are working towards level 3 and one is employed as an off-site administrator. The pre-school also

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Information about the setting

employs an apprentice. The setting receives support from the Local Authority.

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The provision is inadequate and Ofsted intends to take the following

We will issue a Welfare Requirements Notice requiring the provider to: ensure there is a clear and well-understood policy, and procedure, for assessing any risks to children's safety, which identifies aspects of the environment that need to be checked on a regular basis, includes when and by whom those aspects will be checked, and how the risk will be removed or minimised, with particular regard to ensuring children's safety and security in respects to the entrance of the sessional room and deployment of staff. It is an offence to fail to meet a welfare requirements notice without reasonable excuse.

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must:

 ensure all staff understand the safeguarding policy and procedures and have an up to date knowledge of safeguarding issues. Ensure staff are able to identify signs of possible abuse and neglect at the earliest opportunity, an are able to respond in a timely and appropriate way

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must:

 ensure that staff know that they are expected to disclose any convictions, cautions, court orders, reprimands and warnings that may affect their suitability to work with children

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must:

 improve staff supervision opportunities to ensure staff have the necessary skills and knowledge, and a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities, and that teaching practice is consistent to ensure children are sufficiently challenged in their learning

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who attend

Children make steady progress in relation to their starting points and, overall, children appear happy and generally settled in the pre-school. Staff gather suitable levels of information from parents on entry to the pre-school, which guide them on children's starting points and individual needs. Staff complete detailed observations of children in their learning journeys, along with some photographs of children at play. These contain adequate levels of information and form a more general guide of how children are progressing in their learning. However, the assessment information and children's identified next steps in learning are too closely focused on formatted targets from guidance documents. This means staff do not necessarily reflect on what children most need to work towards in their individual learning. This demonstrates staff are not necessarily tailoring their planning or interactions with the children's next general

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who attend

development milestone. Nonetheless, staff generally know their key children well. Through general discussions with staff, parents get an adequate overview of the progress their child is making and some ideas on how to build on learning further at home.

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who attend

The quality of the teaching across the pre-school is variable and requires improvement to be good. Staff provide an adequate range of activities which keep children suitably occupied and happy in their day. Children play outside at the water play activity, experimenting with measurement and volume, or they dig and plant in the soil. They are able to choose computer games, such as separating glass and paper into virtual bins in their recycling game. This helps children develop an understanding of sustainability and promotes their use of technology. However, while the activities on offer are varied, teaching and staff interactions generally lack sufficient purpose or momentum. For example, when staff read to the children they skip through the book very quickly and do not allow children time to ask questions about the story or look closely at the pictures. Although the children enjoy the story and ask for it again, staff interactions with children

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who attend

do not always build on what children already know and can do. This is because staff only have an adequate understanding of how to question children in order to promote challenge,

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who attend

The planning for the day generally allows for a balance of child-led play opportunities and adult-led key-person sessions. Staff use children's interests to plan the activities on offer, which generally keeps them focused in their play. However, planning for group times is weaker. For example, children are invited to talk about their holidays in their key-person groups. One child is selected from the group to stand and talk about their experiences while the staff member writes down their responses. The staff member directs questions at the child but, by doing so, initially excludes the other children from the conversation. They soon become distracted during this time as they are not actively involved and have to sit down for an extended period of time. This shows the quality of teaching is not always strong enough and planning for the activity is weak. Staff have not prepared sufficiently well and there is a lack of any visual props, such as books or resources linked

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who attend

to the topic, for the children to see. This means that some children cannot relate to the topic being discussed and soon start to climb under the tables or ask to leave the activity. Further examples of weaker teaching practice were also observed, such as during a sound game where children were tasked to listen for the sounds and identify them on their cards. Children had trouble listening and matching the pictures because staff allowed the compact disc to move too quickly on to the next sound. Staff did not use opportunities to introduce number or look at colour, for example by encouraging children to count the amount of counters they have. As a result, the learning intentions and value gained from these activities were limited by staff's understanding. This in turn affects the amount of progress children make overall.

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who attend

Nevertheless, outside small group times, children enjoy the attention they receive from staff and are beginning to make friends and enjoy the activities. There is some evidence of good teaching practice, for example, when staff support children to become more independent at snack time, but on balance the quality of teaching still requires improvement to ensure that children make good progress.

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

A suitable key-person system operates within the pre-school and staff know their key children well, which helps build friendly relationships. However, staff deployment in the sessional room is not well managed. On occasions, children are not visible to staff when they play, even though staff-to-child ratios are met overall. This lack of supervision means children are able to play in the bathroom area without staff noticing. Therefore, staff sometimes miss behaviour incidents that occur between children which then remain unchallenged. This also does not support children's safety because the main entrance of the sessional room is unlocked, which could allow children to leave the room unnoticed.

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

Overall, routines and activities support the varying needs of the children in the pre-school to a satisfactory level throughout the day. Children arrive at the pre-school and are escorted into their rooms by staff. This routine adequately meets the needs of most children, although those newer to the pre-school find it initially hard to settle as they separate from their parents in the hallway rather than the main classrooms. Adaptions to the daily routine now allow children to access the outdoor area more freely during the sessions. These areas are suitably resourced and the pre-school has made provision for outdoor play in all weathers by providing umbrellas and outdoor rain suits so that children can access fresh air daily. There is a satisfactory range of resources within the main classrooms, although some books are outdated and do not promote positive images of gender. Children have access to resources that support their developing literacy skills and

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

underpin the, 'Every child a talker' scheme. Some of these also reflect children's home languages and backgrounds. However, their use is limited because only some children in the pre-school are allowed to have access to these resources and then only during adult- directed activity times. This means that staff fail to extend the use of resources to all children. By storing them out of reach, children also miss the chance to revisit what staff have been working on with them in group time. This limits the learning potential of the resources and these additional interventions and does not support continuous progress in learning.

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

Children's behaviour is managed appropriately given their ages. Staff help children to develop their personal, social and emotional skills as they explain about sharing and the pre-school's five golden rules. These are suitably reinforced with some good practice observed by staff as they tackle unwanted behaviour, such as children running in the classrooms. However, some children are only making satisfactory progress in this area. This is because, while staff tackle the incidents as they happen and children adjust their behaviour accordingly at the time, they then choose to run again in the room. This does not demonstrate that children have a secure understanding of why this behaviour is not safe. Children generally only show a basic regard for treating resources with respect and staff report that some books and toys are kept out of their reach because of previous incidents where toys were damaged. Strategies to support sharing and turn taking are

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

used with marginal success because staff do not always promote these consistently. For example, staff place a timer at the computer station to help children learn about taking turns. This is often ignored by children when it goes off because staff do not follow through on helping children understand that their time is up. Children benefit from a healthy snack menu, which encourages them to develop their tastes for different foods and learn about healthy options. A cafe-style snack time allows children to enjoy a social time with their peers. They are encouraged to spread butter on their bread and pour their own drinks, which supports their self-care skills and prepares them for their move to school. However, this routine is managed on a rota basis, which only allows a limited selection of children to sit down for snack at one time. This means that some children wait for long periods of time until it is their turn and they miss

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

opportunities to be actively engaged in play as they wait.

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

Children's care needs are adequately promoted as they follow suitable hygiene routines, such as hand washing, with staff providing suitable explanations about why this is important. Children are involved in routine activities which develop their understanding of safety, such as taking part in the fire drill, so they know how to swiftly exit the premises in an emergency. Appropriate action is taken to ensure accidents are kept to a minimum and staff are qualified to administer first-aid treatment. Suitable procedures are followed for the administration of medication and the treatment of children's ongoing medical needs is suitably risk assessed and monitored.

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

Arrangements for children to move on to school are satisfactory. Staff take some suitable steps to prepare children for school, such as inviting teachers in to visit them and attending local cluster meetings. These meetings enable staff to adopt similar practices in the pre-school that are also used in local schools to promote continuity in children's learning.

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provision

This inspection took place as the result of a notification from the provider with regard to an incident whereby a child left the pre-school unsupervised for a short period of time. This raised concerns relating to child supervision, staff deployment, safety and risk assessment. At the inspection, it was found that the provider had acted appropriately by informing parents and Ofsted of this event. However, it was also noted that the risk assessment had not been sufficiently reviewed after the incident and so prompt action has not been taken to prevent this happening again. As a result, the door to the sessional classroom remains unsecured and is not being sufficiently monitored to ensure children are secure. This means that visitors to the complex can freely access the classroom and children can leave the room unsupervised. In addition, because staff are sometimes deployed elsewhere in the room or in the outdoor area, children are often not in their line

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provision

of sight and/or hearing to ensure they are supervised appropriately. This is a breach of the statutory requirements and compromises children's safety because the risk still remains. Ofsted will issue enforcement action which the provider must take in order to make improvements. In addition, the provider has failed to notify Ofsted that a number of children in the setting have been treated for a notifiable disease which is also a breach of requirements.

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provision

Safeguarding procedures are weak and do not sufficiently promote children's well-being. Children are at further risk of harm because the provider does not have a robust understanding of their responsibilities to safeguard the children's welfare. Although recruitment and induction procedures are robust and staff are fully vetted before they start at the pre-school, procedures to ensure that staff declare changes to their ongoing suitability are not securely in place. This is because the provider was unaware of the requirement to inform staff that they need to disclose any changes to their suitability. This weakness does not ensure that children are cared for by staff who have been subject to a rigorous ongoing procedure to determine their suitability, especially as some staff checks were completed a while ago. Whistle-blowing procedures and other child protection procedures are generally sound. Staff discuss how they would document any concerns

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provision

they have about the children or staff at the pre-school and senior staff demonstrate that they are aware of the correct reporting procedures to follow if they note a concern. However, the lack of a robust monitoring procedure means some staff have a weaker understanding of safeguarding procedures than others. This has led to some inconsistencies in practice that have remained unchallenged. There is an adequate regard to the implementation of further policies and procedures and staff generally follow guidelines to ensure they meet further needs specific to children.

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provision

The providers have not fully met their responsibility in overseeing the delivery of educational programmes within the pre-school. Although staff have opportunities to attend additional training and are subject to staff supervision and appraisals, these opportunities have not been used well enough to address weak teaching or inconsistent practice. This means that overall the quality of teaching across the pre-school is variable with some staff failing to sufficiently promote a programme of learning that reflects the needs, aptitudes and interests of the children attending. As a result, teaching requires improvement in order to deliver a curriculum that has sufficient depth, breadth and challenge, so that all children make good or better progress in their learning.

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provision

Procedures to monitor the effectiveness of the provision and drive forward further improvements are ineffective. This is because self-evaluation procedures are not robust enough in identifying the key areas that require immediate action, such as the ongoing safety and supervision of children. More generally, self-evaluation has addressed some areas of practices. For example, access to the outdoor area is improved and there is an increase in activities within this area. However, these opportunities have been implemented with varying success. As a result, while children have a range of new play opportunities and resources, staff still demonstrate varying levels of confidence in supporting and guiding children to use them. This means that, to date, they have only had a marginal impact on the amount of progress children make.

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provision

Partnerships between parents and other providers, such as childminders, are generally positive and they express great satisfaction with the levels of information shared with them and the care that their child receives. The pre-school provides information for parents on display boards and they are able to attend regular meetings to hear how their child is progressing in their learning. A complaints procedure is in place and concerns raised by parents are suitably addressed. Families have some access to additional resources, such as books, which they are able to take and read at home and extend children's learning at home. Suitable steps are in place to ensure that children are referred to external agencies should staff feel they would benefit from any additional support. Staff work with speech and language teams to support those children with delays and have put a number on interventions in place, for example, the 'Every child a talker' programme.

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provision

However, because these interventions are limited to adult-directed activity time and not embedded in the daily practice, the value they have added to children's learning is only satisfactory and, therefore, children make only satisfactory progress overall.

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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. We re-inspect nurseries and pre-schools judged as requires improvement within 12 months of the date of 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

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Grade Judgement Description

is not meeting the safeguarding and welfare requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage. It will be monitored and inspected again within six months of the date of this inspection. Met There were no children present at the time of the inspection. The inspection judgement is that the provider continues to meet the requirements for registration. Not met There were no children present at the time of the inspection. 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 508009 Local authority Swindon Inspection number 973247 Type of provision Full-time provision Registration category Childcare - Non-Domestic Age range of children 3 - 5 Total number of places 60 Number of children on roll 105 Name of provider Christine Webb and Debbie Waldron Partnership Date of previous inspection 03/03/2009 Telephone number 01793 706696

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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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