Team working is such a major feature of the Grandpont Nursery School in Oxford that the building has been deliberately designed to ensure the staff meet and talk every day.
The local authority-maintained nursery has expanded over the years. It now offers daycare and is a children's centre, but regardless of their different roles, the staff work together within and across the various areas.
The Ofsted inspector, who graded the school as outstanding in all areas of its provision, reported that the 'excellent teamwork and outstanding leadership of the head teacher have ensured seamless communication and partnerships with all the staff in the nursery and children's centre.'
The Mulberry Room, which provides the daycare, adjoins the nursery classroom through a pair of glass doors and all the children can play together in the garden. The staffroom is set on the end of the building, so staff walk through the Mulberry Room to the nursery.
'It means the staff see and speak to each other every day,' says head teacher Elaine Smith. 'The nursery school is at the heart and core of the children's centre and its standards and ethos run throughout it. We have joint training. Although we have different roles, we are one team.'
The ethos of sharing and teamwork is echoed in the layout of the nursery. The classroom is one long room in a shallow V-shape, so its size does not intimidate newcomers. The central point, at the base of the V, is the book area with storysacks, bookshelves, armchairs and cushions. Parents are welcome to stay and read with their children to settle them in.
Activity areas are set out along the two arms of the V, so children can choose where to work and select resources. There are French doors along the inner arms of the V, so the room embraces the outdoors and children can flow freely.
At the bottom of the garden, a gate leads to an enclosed wooded area full of exciting possibilities, such as den making. From there, a further locked gate leads on to South Oxford Adventure Playground, to which group expeditions are often made.
Timetabling also echoes the sharing ethos. The children are assigned to five different groups. The five staff work in a different area for a week at a time so they can develop learning opportunities throughout that time. The children decide where to be and what to do and only come together with their group leader for a planned activity towards the end of the session.
The partnership approach embraces the children and parents. The nursery SENCO, children's centre outreach worker and daycare SENCO meet weekly. Home visits are made to children who are about to start at the nursery, at which point their record books are started.
'The children use cameras in the nursery,' says Ms Smith. 'We also use them to enhance the links between home and school. We let the children take them home and ask them to photograph the things they love or their favourite things on the way to school. Sometimes we may ask them to photograph the people who mean most to them.'
After an excellent Ofsted report in 2001, the nursery became a Beacon School and shared good practice in creativity with other schools. Although the Beacon project has ended, artists still visit Grandpont. The nursery children are working with a sculptor to create a permanent installation.
The Ofsted report is full of superlatives, and the message that is repeated over and over is about the quality of the staff team. 'The staff are key,' says Ms Smith. 'The relationship between all the staff is very important. They always impress me. There is a nurturing culture for us all here. Everyone is striving to move forward.'
Martha Kempton, nursery school teacher and SENCO, says: 'I think it is our teamwork and the focus of the team on the children's development that makes the difference here.
'Apart from Mondays and Tuesdays, we have a team meeting first thing every morning. On Wednesdays we have a records meeting and on Thursdays and Fridays we do planning.
'Each member of staff keeps records for about ten children - not necessarily the children in your group, which makes it harder work but enhances our teamwork, as you have to consult with everybody and share with everybody when you are compiling your records.If someone notices something amazing that a child is doing they will tell that child's record keeper.
'At our record meetings, we will look at the children we talked about the previous week and how things have developed over the past week and what we should be looking to do over the next week. We will discuss any other children we need to be looking at - maybe we know a child is having difficulties at home.
'We have non-contact time twice a week of about an hour. For some areas, such as maths, there are quite specific questions to answer and you need to have the evidence, for example to say whether a child can count six objects out of a group. I might know a child can take out four objects but I might not know if they can actually take out six objects or if it happens by chance. I can use the time to go into the nursery and join the child in an activity or game.'
Snapshot
- Grandpont Nursery School, which opened in 1949, is now in purpose-built premises and offers 50 full-time equivalent places for threeto five-year-olds.
- The Mulberry Room, adjoining the nursery school, opened in September 2001 to offer childcare for threeto seven-year-olds in response to working parents who wanted to take up their part-time nursery place but needed daycare for the rest of the day.
- In 2006, Grandpont Nursery was designated a children's centre. There is a community room, with adjoining garden and play area, for parents and children.
- There is always a minimum of five adults working in the nursery classroom/outdoors - two teachers and three nursery nurses, two of whom hold NNEBs and one is Level 3 qualified.
- The lead nursery teacher oversees planning and assessments in the Mulberry Room to ensure consistency between the two. One of the teachers is undertaking EYPS to meet the requirement for an EYP in the children's centre.
- The inspection took place over two days in March and involved observations of three teachers and three early years practitioners in 12 activity sessions.