Children's home run by The Smith Foundation

Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 1 Registered provider: The Smith Foundation

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Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This home is run by a registered charity and provides care for up to four children who may experience social and emotional difficulties.

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Information about this children’s home

The manager registered with Ofsted in October 2024.

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Information about this children’s home

Two children were living in the home at the time of this inspection.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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outstanding

How well children and young people are helped and protected good

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outstanding

The effectiveness of leaders and managers outstanding

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outstanding

The children’s home provides highly effective services that consistently exceed the standards of good. The actions of the children’s home contribute to significantly improved outcomes and positive experiences for children and young people who need help, protection and care.

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outstanding

Date of last inspection: 20 February 2024

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outstanding

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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outstanding

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

20/02/2024 Full Good Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 3

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Both children have lived at the home since it opened, providing them with twenty months of consistent and stable care. Children continue to make wonderful progress. Professionals, who know the children, noted that the resilience and perseverance of staff has enabled children to feel safe in the home. Children have clear routines and boundaries, and staff understand the importance of these to increase children’s feelings of safety.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Children have amazing experiences living in the home. Staff meticulously plan experiences that children enjoy but that also support their progress and help them build important skills. One child has a season ticket for a local football club, and he very proudly showed a shirt he received from the goalkeeper at a recent game. This was thanks to a sign that he made with staff. This child is part of a local junior team and regularly attends a skate and trampoline park. This supports the child to learn how to interact with other children who are not from the home or school.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Another child is supported to attend conventions in line with his interests. He has short breaks at seaside caravan parks and promotes positive community experiences, such as spending time in coffee shops practicing his social interactions. The child’s social worker said, 'To say he has come out of his shell is an understatement!' Staff are creative in how they capture these amazing experiences. They use videos, newspaper templates and books so that children have accurate memories of their time living in the home.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Children attend the provider’s local school. Both children are making positive progress in education. They have good attendance, which is supported by effective daily communication between the home’s staff and school staff. Bespoke education plans have been put in place when needed and staff from the home advocate for this to happen. Staff also liaise with other services children receive through education to ensure that children are receiving the right type of support to help with their participation.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The home is beautifully presented and proudly displays photos of the children. Children’s bedrooms meet their needs well and are appropriately personalised how children want them to be. There is a vast amount of communal and outdoor areas, which allow children to have their own space. The in-house clinical team has supported staff to ensure the home’s environment meets the needs of children, including a dedicated sensory space. The clinicians have supported staff to consider more than just aesthetics. An example is having a set morning routine evoking positive thoughts relating to all children’s senses, such as the smell of bacon, songs on the radio, and the rooms being the right temperature. These all contribute to a positive start to the day.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Children’s health needs, including emotional well-being, are carefully considered by staff. Specialist support is sought and tenaciously advocated for by staff who know children well. This has led to improved health and well-being for children. Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 4 Staff advocate for and facilitate children spending time with their families. Parents are grateful for this support and are complimentary of the care provided to their children. This has enabled a child to have positive family time with their sibling. Staff also enabled a child to see their parent for a final time before they passed away. Staff then supported the child to safely attend the funeral and contribute to this in a meaningful way.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Staff have an extensive understanding of children’s needs and most staff are attuned to the children, therefore able to use their skills to support children to regulate more easily and remain calmer. Incidents of children being unable to manage their emotions or behaviour have reduced. This has led to a reduction in the times that children need to be physically held or guided by staff. However, there have been some incidents where staff have not maintained boundaries as set out in the children’s plans. This has led to some incidents escalating.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

However, good quality, reflective conversations take place after incidents. Managers have good oversight of children’s records and are striving to improve the way these are written. There is good use of therapeutic input to support this and to ensure that recording is evidence-based and routed in the therapeutic practice outlined in the statement of purpose. Staff are willing to reflect and learn. This prevents the same issues happening again. Relationships are repaired after incidents, and children are supported to understand the impact of their actions on others. Staff continue to show the children that they care, even after serious incidents where they may have been hurt.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Children’s experiences are complemented with meaningful and focussed conversations between staff and children. This helps children to learn, receive feedback and praise and share concerns. Furthermore, children’s social awareness and understanding of social relationships has improved to increase safety in the community. One parent gave examples of their child being safer because staff have helped the child have increased understanding of road safety. This reduces the likelihood of him running away from staff, and in turn has helped the child to spend increased time with their family. For another child, staff have spent time supporting them to be able to verbalise their feelings, rather than relying on communicating through behaviour. This has contributed to the reduction of incidents.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Risk assessments and behaviour plans are used effectively by staff to meet children's needs. They are well-written, easy to understand and clearly outline how staff can support children. Some individual risk assessments such as children being in each other’s rooms, clearly considers the risks as well as the positives. This means that the rationale for decision making is clear and ensures that practice is not risk averse.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

The manager has not shared details of two serious incidents, which are notifiable events, with the regulator. The manager responded appropriately to both incidents but failure to report these prevents the regulator from having oversight of the provider’s response to incidents. Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 5

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The manager is a calm and reflective leader. He is aspirational for children and enthusiastic that children receive an excellent standard of care. The manager has highly effective systems in place to enable the good oversight of children’s documents and the day-to-day running of the home. This level of monitoring enables him to address any concerns around staff practice in a timely manner. The manager has high expectations of staff and holds them to account when they are misaligned to the values and ethos of the provider.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Staff are proud to work in this home. They are eager to share the progress children have made and beam with pride while talking about the children. Staff spoken to have an excellent understanding of children’s needs and experiences. They are attuned to children and are resilient.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Supervision takes place regularly. Documents detail high quality, reflective and purposeful discussions. Children are discussed and this offers a space for staff to reflect. This is complemented by monthly team meetings, which supports the continuous embedding of therapeutic practice and ensures that staff remain reflective. There is an additional layer of support from the in-house clinical team. This creates a continuous learning cycle, using evidenced-based practice to understand children's behaviour.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The manager has strong relationships with others involved in the children’s lives. This ensures that everyone, including children and families, can be involved with care planning in an appropriate way. Some reports for statutory meetings are written from the child. External professionals have praised these and shared these with their wider organisations as examples of best practice. The manager has identified that this type of recording is going to be replicated across all the children’s documents. Training has already started to prepare staff for this. Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 6

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Statutory requirements

This section sets out the actions that the registered person must take to meet The Care Standards Act 2000, The Children’s Homes (England) Regulations 2015 and the ‘Guide to the Children’s Homes Regulations, including the quality standards’. The registered person must comply within the given timescales.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must notify HMCI and each other relevant person without delay if—

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Requirement Due date

there is any other incident relating to a child which the registered person considers to be serious. (Regulation 40 (4)(e)) 7 April 2025

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that staff maintain clear boundaries and expectations for children, as outlined within children’s plans. Staff should understand reasons for these boundaries and support children to understand this too. (‘Guide to the Children’s Homes Regulations, including the quality standards’, page 39 paragraph 8.11)

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people, using the social care common inspection framework. This inspection was carried out under The Care Standards Act 2000 to assess the effectiveness of the service, how it meets the core functions of the service as set out in legislation, and to consider how well it complies with The Children’s Homes (England) Regulations 2015 and the ‘Guide to the Children’s Homes Regulations, including the quality standards’. Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 7

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: The William Henry Smith School, Boothroyd Lane, Brighouse HD6 3JW

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Inspector

Joanna Beal, Social Care Inspector Inspection report for children’s home: 2736722 8 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 and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, further education and skills, 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, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspector

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Inspector

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Inspector

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