Harewood Centre Nursery School

Overview

Harewood Centre Nursery School continues to be a good school, providing a nurturing environment where every child is seen as unique. Staff establish effective routines and high expectations, ensuring children develop independence, strong communication skills, and positive behaviour through warm support.

Strengths

• Staff know children well and provide tailored support, particularly for those with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND), helping them quickly acquire key knowledge and skills.
• Leaders have focused the curriculum on essential communication and language skills, planning specific vocabulary for each learning area to aid development.
• Assessment practices are helpful and reduced in volume, allowing staff to spend more time interacting with children rather than completing paperwork.
• Children are well-supported in early reading foundations, with staff emphasising rhyme and sounds, enabling them to break down words by the end of their nursery year.
• Parents are highly appreciative of the care provided, noting that staff create special bonds and provide regular updates.

Areas to improve

• Leaders should map out the curriculum with sufficiently small steps of progress to ensure staff are clear and precise about what children need to do next.
• Governors should evaluate the quality of education more effectively, as they currently lack sufficient knowledge of the curriculum’s substance and implementation.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective, with governors actively checking site safety and staff training, while leaders use a new recording system to log concerns and follow them up appropriately.