Evesham Nursery School Ofsted Report

Full report

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Further improve teaching, learning and assessment so that all children achieve as well as they should in all areas of learning by making sure that teachers: - increase opportunities for children to develop their mathematical skills, especially number, in daily activities - raise the level of challenge for the most able children and monitor their progress.
• Further strengthen the impact that leadership and management have on the school’s effectiveness by: - providing all staff with regular and focused feedback to improve their practice and identify training needs - sharpening the school development plan so that leaders have a clear understanding of how priorities identified through self-evaluation will be addressed and evaluated - ensuring that governors regularly check safeguarding documents and information provided for parents on the school’s website to ensure that they comply with statutory requirements.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Good

• The headteacher’s clear vision for the school is supported by all leaders, governors and staff. Staff relationships are very strong. The staff survey shows that 100% of staff are proud to work at the nursery. Staff have created a caring and nurturing school where children thrive socially, academically and physically. Children are happy, feel safe and achieve well in all areas of learning.
• The headteacher and governors know the school very well. Priorities for development are appropriate and derived from accurate analysis of data and a detailed knowledge of children and their families. However, the school development plan is not sufficiently detailed to show how these priorities will be achieved. Actions needed are not explicit and there is no indication of when or how the plan’s impact will be evaluated, or by whom.
• The assessment leader is highly effective. She has designed a useful assessment system to monitor and evaluate children’s progress as they move through the school. Information is gathered regularly and is analysed to see how children and the different groups are achieving. Where gaps are identified, leaders provide children with additional adult support. Inspection findings show that teachers’ assessments are accurate.
• The leader of special educational needs is very knowledgeable and undertakes her role diligently. Her work contributes significantly to the nursery being fully inclusive. Children’s needs are identified early. The SEND leader ensures that funding received is well spent and targeted appropriately on children’s diverse needs. Additional external support is accessed for children with more complex needs. This results in overall high-quality provision and children making strong progress from their starting points.
• The headteacher carries out regular checks on the quality of teaching and has a clear understanding of staff’s abilities. Verbal feedback is given informally. However, monitoring of staff’s effectiveness is not formal or systematic. This means that some staff do not receive written feedback on their performance that helps to identify training needs or develop their practice further.
• Leaders use the small amount of early years pupil premium funding carefully. It provides additional adult support for eligible children to ensure that they make good progress. Leaders have a good understanding of the challenges that this group of children face and the potential impact this can have on their learning. Leaders’ commitment to equality of opportunity ensures that barriers are reduced and that children achieve well.
• The curriculum is full of stimulating and exciting opportunities. All areas of learning are planned carefully. The Nursery is very successful at widening the experiences of children, for example working each week with an artist in residence and sports coach. Children also gain valuable outdoor education experience through regular forest school activities in the meadow area.
• Children’s spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is strongly promoted through daily activities. Children learn about British values and the importance of respect and tolerance. Adults model this well. Consequently, children from different cultures and backgrounds learn and play together very harmoniously. Children’s early knowledge of the world is developed by following ‘Bear’ and his experiences when individual children take him home. They also celebrate festivals from a range of cultures and learn key words spoken by children from different countries.
• Induction arrangements are highly effective. Staff visit the children at home to establish close working relationships with parents and gather key information about children they receive. Children attend for short sessions initially and gradually build up to longer sessions. This gradual integration helps children to settle and adjust fully. Transition to primary school is also managed well. Additional support is provided for children with SEND to help them cope with the change. Communication, liaison and transfer of information to the next provider are effective.
• Parents have very positive views of the school. All parents who responded to Ofsted’s online survey, Parent View, would recommend the school and feel their children are safe and happy. Typical comments include, ‘I cannot speak highly enough of Evesham Nursery School. I have chosen to send my child here over our more local pre-schools as it is so fantastic.’

Governance of the school

• Governors share the headteacher’s determination and ambition to provide high-quality education for children. They provide effective support and challenge for leaders and ask probing and incisive questions during visits to school.
• Governors make good use of the information they receive from the headteacher and senior staff to hold leaders to account. A recent learning walk, undertaken by all governors, provided significant first-hand information of daily life in the nursery and a clear understanding of how teaching is making a difference to children’s development.
• Following the short inspection in March 2018, governors wasted no time in addressing the area for improvement to strengthen their own effectiveness. The skills audit initiated identified how governors can use their own expertise more effectively. A renewed focus on training and induction for governors has enabled them to improve their own knowledge and to provide better support for the school.
• Governors are knowledgeable about children’s achievements as they are provided with significant and clear information by leaders. They agree that this helps them to have a much better understanding of outcomes for different groups of children.
• The only shortfall in governance is that they do not check that the school’s single central record and information provided for parents on the school’s website contain the required statutory information. Both of these areas were addressed during the inspection.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.
• Leaders and governors have established a solid culture of safeguarding at the nursery. Keeping children safe is at the heart of the nursery’s work and staff understand the role they play in this. Disclosure and barring checks are carried out on all staff employed to ensure that they are safe to work with children.
• Staff receive regular training from the headteacher and know what steps to take if they have a concern about a child. Partnerships with other agencies, such as the local authority, are managed effectively to ensure that children who are vulnerable are kept safe from harm. The headteacher seeks advice and makes referrals to social services when necessary. Records are kept securely and carefully document actions taken.
• The school is a safe place for children to play and learn. Risk assessments and incident forms are appropriately completed. Staff know and understand the importance of constant vigilance.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Good

• Excellent relationships between adults and children exist in all classes. Members of staff maintain a calm and welcoming atmosphere, which enables children to feel comfortable, gain confidence and develop their independence. Both the indoor and outdoor environments are used extremely well to promote different skills, especially physical development. Resources are of good quality and children treat equipment and materials with respect. They are taught well to help tidy up at the end of different sessions.
• The quality of teaching in communication and language and personal, social and emotional development is excellent and it is good in other areas of learning. Staff model language well in all activities and use effective questioning to help assess children’s understanding and develop their speaking skills. Teachers use the correct terminology in different subjects to develop children’s vocabulary. They are highly attentive to children’s individual needs and know precisely when to intervene or stand back.
• Teachers and key workers cater well for the different ages and abilities of children in each class. They plan stimulating and exciting activities, which enthuse and engage all children. End-of-day reviews are used to record aspects of children’s achievement and contribute to the next day’s planning. Activities that are planned stem from children’s interests, themes and events. For example, children enjoyed bird-spotting, making bird feeders and learning about different types of birds to coincide with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds week.
• Children’s reading and writing skills are catered for well. Children enjoy listening to the stories that adults read and have access to a wide range of attractive books. A good range of writing tools and materials are available for children to practise and experiment with mark-making and letter formation. However, there are fewer activities and opportunities for children to develop and build on their mathematical development during child-initiated time, especially number. This restricts their progress in this area.
• Teachers use assessment information to build on what children already know and can do. Regular observations, photographs of activities and samples of children’s work all contribute to teachers’ assessment of children’s progress. They use the information gathered to make accurate assessments of children’s stages of development across all areas of learning. Learning journals of evidence compiled are shared regularly with parents. Parents speak highly about their child’s progress.
• Provision made for the care and education of two-year-old children is of a high quality. Staff work very skilfully to provide good guidance and support. Hygiene and child development are high priorities. For example, staff ensure that children are changed when needed and incorporate toilet-training to help children become dry at nursery. They do this sensitively and calmly, making it a positive experience for the youngest children.
• Adults ensure that children who do not yet speak English are fully included in class activities. Many adults use sign language and key words in the child’s own language to communicate. Translation is also helpfully provided to parents and children by support staff who can speak the same language. This ensures that children and parents receive the same information as others and are not excluded.
• Children who have SEND are included well in all activities. Effective support ensures that they maximise their learning. Interventions and support from outside agencies are also matched closely to children’s needs to ensure that children make good gains in their learning.
• Occasionally, activities are not sufficiently challenging and do not move the learning of the most able children on well enough, especially in mathematics. For example, children who can already count to 10 on entry are not moved on to numbers up to 20. Most activities planned are the same for children of all abilities. Leaders do not track the progress of the most able children as a group so are unclear whether they are achieving as well as they could.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Good

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is good.
• Children are happy and active learners. They participate fully and enthusiastically in all activities. They know the routines to follow, which makes them feel secure and develops their confidence. This applies in all classes, including for the very youngest children. All staff provide comforting reassurance for any children who may be unsure. As a result, any initial hesitancy is soon forgotten.
• Children are supervised fully at all times and kept safe. Adults provide constant reminders about safety and regularly assess risks in the environment. For example, the forest school area was not used during the inspection because of icy conditions. Staff also ensure that children are suitably dressed for working outdoors in cold weather. Visits from the police and fire service are used to promote safety messages.
• Healthy snacks are provided and used as an opportunity for discussion. Children understand the importance of a healthy lifestyle. As one child commented during their role-play, ‘You can’t have five spoons of sugar in your cup of tea. It’s bad for you.’ School lunches are cooked on site using fresh and nutritious ingredients. Children benefit from watching the cook prepare their meals as the kitchen is located in the middle of the nursery. This serves as a learning opportunity and children often mirror mixing ingredients in their own role-play area. Children sit at tables and use cutlery to eat their school dinners. This strongly reinforces good eating habits.
• The children listen carefully to each other’s contributions in discussions and often applaud each other’s efforts. Most are confident in talking to a group and sharing their work. Staff provide lots of praise and encouragement to develop children’s self-esteem and resilience. Children play happily alongside each other, regardless of their different backgrounds. They chat to each other about their own families and, as a result, learn about difference and diversity in different ways.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils is good.
• Children have positive attitudes to learning and become increasingly confident and independent learners. They concentrate well and show good levels of perseverance in different tasks, such as cutting up a cardboard box with scissors.
• Children share equipment well and take turns. They are polite and friendly to visitors and behave well both inside and outside the classroom.
• Most adults reinforce good manners at all times. Staff have high expectations of children and manage their behaviour well. Children listen well and respond quickly to adult instructions.
• Attendance, although not compulsory for this age group, is good. Children enjoy coming to school and parents value the provision available. Staff follow up any absences quickly.

Outcomes for pupils Good

• Approximately half of the children start school with skills and knowledge that are typical for their age. Many of those working below the age-related expectations on entry face particular challenges in relation to their communication and language skills. This is either because they do not speak English as their first language or they have speech and language difficulties.
• As a result of the high-quality teaching they receive, all children make good progress. By the time they leave the nursery, the majority of children demonstrate age-appropriate skills across all areas of learning. This represents good progress for all groups but very strong progress for lower-ability children as they have caught up with their peers.
• Children with SEND make good progress from their individual starting points. Their needs are identified quickly. Plans to support them are detailed with clear targets and interventions. The nursery has strong links with a range of services and providers, including the adjacent special school, to support children and families with SEND. Where necessary, external professional support is accessed to secure the extra help that children need.
• Disadvantaged children make good progress alongside other children in the school. This is because the additional funding for these children is targeted effectively and used to help secure good achievement. The majority of children develop the skills and knowledge needed for the next stage of their education.
• The most able children make equally good progress over time, although occasionally, some activities lack challenge. For example, in mathematics some children are not moved on to counting or writing numbers beyond 10 when they show they are ready. As a result, they do not extend and deepen their knowledge and understanding as quickly as they should.
• Children who speak English as an additional language learn well because of the good support they receive and because staff model language correctly. They make progress from their starting points that is at least as good as, and sometimes better than, other children. Consequently, children acquire good levels of language by the time they leave the nursery.
• Two-year-old children make a strong start to their learning. Their abilities grow quickly because of well-planned and skilful support from staff. This enables the youngest children to participate in a wide range of activities with increased confidence and skills when they move to the next class.
• From different starting points, children quickly become independent and self-assured learners. They are keen to investigate, explore and try new activities. They succeed because of the high-quality care and attention of staff and leaders.

S

School details

Unique reference number Local authority Inspection number 132104 Worcestershire 10058515 This inspection was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005. Type of school Nursery School category Age range of pupils Gender of pupils Maintained 2 to 5 Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 118 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Headteacher Telephone number Website Email address Lorna Chapman Marie Pearse 01386 423 118 www.eveshamnurseryschool.co.uk head@evesham-nur.worcs.sch.uk Date of previous inspection 21 March 2018

Information about this school

• This school is smaller than the average-sized school. There are three classes.
• The nursery offers provision for children from two to four years old. Some children attend for full days, and some attend on a part-time basis.
• Most children are from White British backgrounds. A minority are from Eastern European backgrounds and speak English as an additional language.
• The proportion of children with SEND is similar to the national average. A small number of children have dual placements and attend a local special school part-time.
• The proportion of disadvantaged children is below the national average.

Information about this inspection

• The inspector observed teaching and learning in all classes. She saw both indoor and outdoor activities, all of which were jointly observed with the headteacher.
• The inspector held meetings with the headteacher, other staff with leadership responsibilities and members of the governing body.
• The inspector took account of the 31 responses to Parent View, Ofsted’s online questionnaire for 2018/19, and parent text comments. Views were also collected from parents as they brought or collected their children from school.
• The views of 14 staff were considered via the online inspection questionnaire.
• The inspector reviewed children’s behaviour over two days and checked samples of their work.
• A number of documents were reviewed by the inspector, including: the school’s self-evaluation, the school’s action plan, information on children’s current attainment and progress, minutes of governors’ meetings and records relating to attendance and safeguarding.

Inspection team

Heather Simpson, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector