Willow Tree staff nurturing “positive, kind and caring” relationships with children

A recent inspection report for Willow Tree Nursery has noted that staff work hard to ensure positive, kind and caring relationships with the children in their care.

The Care Inspectorate also identified that recruitment challenges had led to the need for continued improvements to safeguarding. 

Inspectors rated the setting as “good”. Care, play and learning, leadership and the staff team were evaluated as “adequate”. 

The inspection team highlighted the following key messages. 

• Staff interactions were positive, kind, and caring. 
• Children were meaningfully and actively involved in leading their play and learning. 
• The environment was clean, attractive, and welcoming. 
• The indoor and outdoor learning environments had undergone changes and were structured to support children's age and stage of development. 
• Quality assurance, including self-evaluation and improvement plans, were in the very early stages to support continuous improvement of the service. 
• Safeguarding systems and procedures were not robust to protect children from harm and abuse. 
• The deployment of staffing, including the arrangements for staff absences, were poorly managed to ensure high quality care and learning opportunities for children. 

Corporate Director of Education, Leisure and Housing, James Wylie, said: “Since opening in August 2021, the nursery has had a number of managers, and it has been a challenge to retain and recruit staff to the team. This is in common with the recruitment challenges faced across the early years’ service. We are pleased that the current nursery manager has been in place since January of this year and has had the opportunity to be mentored by an experienced nursery manager. 

“Staff have worked hard to build positive relationships with the children and to create a stimulating and enriching environment. On receiving feedback from the inspection team Local Authority officers from the early years’ team immediately worked with the setting to address the child protection and safeguarding issues identified. Learning has also been shared more widely. The early years’ service will continue to support the setting to recruit and train staff and develop practice in line with local and national best practice.” 

Inspectors made no “requirements” for action. However, a number of areas of improvement have been recommended including developing staff skills and confidence in relation to responding to and recording child protection concerns, embedding approaches to quality assurance and improvement planning, and improving staff deployment particularly during staff absences. These have been actioned through an improvement plan put in place after the inspection. The manager will also continue to support staff to develop their skills alongside ongoing support from the early years’ service.  

Chair of the Council’s Education, Leisure and Housing Committee, Councillor Gwenda Shearer, said: “I am reassured that steps were taken quickly to address the issues raised around child protection protocols and I am confident that improvements will continue to be made.” 

The full report can be found on the Care Inspectorate website - https://www.careinspectorate.com/.