The Ark Nursery Day Care of Children

39 Pages·2012·0.7 MB·English

The Ark Nursery
Day Care of Children
1 High Street
Dundee
DD1 1TD
Inspected by: Karen Lock
Type of inspection: Unannounced
Inspection completed on: 19 June 2013
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Contents
Page No
Summary 3
1 About the service we inspected 6
2 How we inspected this service 8
3 The inspection 13
4 Other information 36
5 Summary of grades 37
6 Inspection and grading history 37
Service provided by:
St. Paul's Cathedral Ark Nursery
Service provider number:
SP2007008981
Care service number:
CS2007145850
Contact details for the inspector who inspected this service:
Karen Lock
Telephone [phone]
Email [email protected]
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Summary
This report and grades represent our assessment of the quality of the areas of
performance which were examined during this inspection.
Grades for this care service may change after this inspection following other
regulatory activity. For example, if we have to take enforcement action to make the
service improve, or if we investigate and agree with a complaint someone makes
about the service.
We gave the service these grades
Quality of Care and Support 3 Adequate
Quality of Environment 3 Adequate
Quality of Staffing 3 Adequate
Quality of Management and Leadership 2 Weak
What the service does well
We identified these key strengths in the areas inspected:
* we found there to be a welcoming atmosphere in the nursery;
* staff were seen to be caring and approachable;
* the service encourages parents and carers to play an active part in the life of the
nursery;
* the nursery had successfully introduced responsive planning and now older children
using the nursery were taking a more active role in determining their own play and
learning and developing their interests and ideas;
* we saw that the children were generally happy and enjoying their nursery
experiences;
What the service could do better
The service needed to;
* review and improve its procedures for medication;
* review format of daily diaries to include more information about childrens progress
and their enjoyment of nursery;
*review the format and organisation of Parents Champion Committee meetings to
maximise participation;
* ensure that displays, including photographs, are well presented and of a scale that
can easily be viewed and are accessible to children;
* continue to seek parental views and ensure that they address the issues raised by
parents through our questionnaire returns;
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* ensure that feedback from children and parents is routinely evaluated and directly
used to influence service improvement;
* staff should ensure that all rooms all have open windows and fresh air on a regular
basis to ensure that children are cared for in comfortable room conditions. Staff
should continue to monitor room temperatures and open windows or use fans to
improve the environment;
* ensure that the on- going decoration and maintainance of the nursery is regularly
planned to ensure that improved standards are achieved to the general environment;
* review how they used the outside play space, how they increased indoor energetic
play opportunities and how they ensured better access to external resources, outings
and activities to enhance the quality of physical play;
* to review approach to risk assessment to ensure that risk is regularly reviewed and
reflects any changes to the environment and resources;
* the manager should continue to monitor the impact of the increased number of
children in the pre-school room to ensure best outcomes and experiences for
children. The service should seek ways to access other resources and facilities both in
the nursery and externally to ensure that children always have the best experiences;
* should consider improving the range of multi-cultural play materials in the nursery
when purchasing new play equipment to reflect diversity;
* should develop greater understanding of GIRFEC and reflect its principles in nursery
practice;
* review menus to further promote healthy eating;
* develop the role of staff meeting, with, more emphasis on team developement;
* develop quality assurance systems and ensure effective monitoring of the nursery's
work;
* continue to review its approach to handling complaints.
What the service has done since the last inspection
The service now had a permanent manager who had been in post for six months. She
had started the huge task of reviewing aspects of the nursery's work and addressing
the many areas requiring attention as identified at two inspections of the service in
2012.
The staffing shortages that had affected the service were now easing and there was
more stability in the staff group, with less reliance on supply and agency staff. This
had resulted in more consistent care.
Conclusion
We found that the nursery was now slowly improving and starting to address the
weaker areas of practice. The new manager had submitted a very honest and
accurate self assessment, identifying relevant areas requiring improvement. We found
that children were generally happy and enjoying a range of stimulating activity.
Feedback from parents was mixed, but generally positive about the standard of care
received.
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There was a commitment from the manager and the directors to improve the nursery
and a willingness to work co-operatively with the Care Inspectorate and Dundee City
Councils Childcare Development Officers to raise standards and address the issues
identified in this report.
Who did this inspection
Karen Lock
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1 About the service we inspected
The Care Inspectorate regulates care services in Scotland. Prior to 1 April 2011, this
function was carried out by the Care Commission. Information about all care services
is available on our website at www.scswis.com.
If we are concerned about some aspect of a service, or think it needs to do more to
improve, we may make a recommendation or requirement. A recommendation is a
statement that sets out actions the care service
provider should take to improve or develop the quality of the service based on best
practice or the National Care Standards. A requirement is a statement which sets out
what is required of a care service to comply with the Public Services Reform
(Scotland) Act 2010 ("the Act") and secondary legislation made under the Act, or a
condition of registration. Where there are breaches of Regulations, Orders or
conditions, a requirement may be made. Requirements are legally enforceable at the
discretion of the Care Inspectorate.
The Ark Nursery is a day care of children service for up to 59 children under school
age at one time. The service operates from premises adjacent to St Paul's Episcopal
Cathedral in Dundee city centre. The service provider is St. Paul's Cathedral Ark
Nursery, a limited company with charitable status managed by a board of directors.
The staff group consists of a manager and deputy, child care staff, administrator and
cook. The nursery is a partner-provider with Dundee City Council (Education and
Children's Services) and as such provides funded places for pre-school children. The
service is non-denominational.
The premises consist of separate play areas for three age groups: 0-2, 2-3 and 3-5.
The two areas for younger children have separate sleeping sections. There is a nappy
changing room and all children have access to toilets and wash facilities. The service
also has a dining room with open plan kitchen for snacks and meals. A rooftop area
provides outdoor play space.
The service's aims and objectives include:
• creating a stimulating, caring and safe environment for all children;
• actively promoting the development of positive self-image;
• working with parents and carers in an open and honest way;
• eliminating racism;
• encouraging the input of parents and carers in all aspects of the running of
the nursery.
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Based on the findings of this inspection this service has been awarded the following
grades:
Quality of Care and Support - Grade 3 - Adequate
Quality of Environment - Grade 3 - Adequate
Quality of Staffing - Grade 3 - Adequate
Quality of Management and Leadership - Grade 2 - Weak
This report and grades represent our assessment of the quality of the areas of
performance which were examined during this inspection.
Grades for this care service may change following other regulatory activity. You can
find the most up-to-date grades for this service by visiting our website
www.careinspectorate.com or by calling us on 0845 600 9527 or visiting one of our
offices.
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2 How we inspected this service
The level of inspection we carried out
In this service we carried out a high intensity inspection. We carry out these
inspections where we have assessed the service may need a more intense inspection.
What we did during the inspection
We wrote this report after an unannounced inspection. The inspection was carried out
by Care Inspectorate Inspector Karen Lock. The inspection took place over several
dates between 04 June and 19 June 2013. We gave feedback on findings from the
inspection on 19 June 2013 to the nursery manager, a director and Wendy Knight, a
Childcare Development worker from Dundee City Council.
As requested by us, the service sent us an annual return. The service also sent us a
self assessment document.
We provided the service with 20 questionnaires for parents and carers of children
using the service, twelve completed questionnaires were returned before the
inspection.
In this inspection we gathered evidence from various sources, including the relevant
sections of policies, procedures, records and other documents:
* supporting evidence from the nursery's annual return and self assessment
* nursery policies and procedures
* a range of wall and table displays, including photographs and topic work
* recent newsletters
* evidence of consultation with parents and children
* accident and incident records
* medication records
*attendance registers
* risk assessments
* menus
* sample of children's folders
* staff photographs, names and positions held
* staff meeting minutes and agendas
* planning
* mind-mapping, floor/talking books
* staff training records
* nursery annual development plan
* certificate of registration and insurance certificate.
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We spoke with various people about the service, including:
* six parents
* children attending the nursery
* a director of the service
* nursery manager
* most staff
We spent time observing how staff interacted with the children. We also considered
the general environment and equipment used in the service.
Grading the service against quality themes and statements
We inspect and grade elements of care that we call 'quality themes'. For example,
one of the quality themes we might look at is 'Quality of care and support'. Under
each quality theme are 'quality statements' which describe what a service should be
doing well for that theme. We grade how the service performs against the quality
themes and statements.
Details of what we found are in Section 3: The inspection
Inspection Focus Areas (IFAs)
In any year we may decide on specific aspects of care to focus on during our
inspections. These are extra checks we make on top of all the normal ones we make
during inspection. We do this to gather information about the quality of these aspects
of care on a national basis. Where we have examined an inspection focus area we will
clearly identify it under the relevant quality statement.
Fire safety issues
We do not regulate fire safety. Local fire and rescue services are responsible for
checking services. However, where significant fire safety issues become apparent, we
will alert the relevant fire and rescue services so they may consider what action to
take. You can find out more about care services' responsibilities for fire safety at
www.firelawscotland.org
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What the service has done to meet any requirements we made at
our last inspection
The requirement
The provider must deal with all complaints according to their policy and procedure,
and maintain a record for inspection. This is in order to comply with: SSI 2010/210
Regulation 18(1), 18(3) and 18(7). Timescale for implementation: within 48 hours of
receipt of this report.
What the service did to meet the requirement
The nursery had reviewed its approach to complaints and although on paper this
looked appropriate it is too soon after the upheld complaint in March 2013 to state
confidently that complaints are dealt with robustly and consistently. The Care
Inspectorate should continue to examine complaint activity in subsequent inspections
until the service has reassured us that their system is robust.
The requirement is: Met - Within Timescales
The requirement
The provider must ensure that there is a personal plan in place for all children using
the service. This plan should contain: (i) personal information about the child,
including their personal preferences and information about their family; (ii) how the
development needs of the child will be assessed and reviewed; (iii) how the service
will support the development of the child, including plans for next steps; (iv) evidence
of the child's ongoing development. This is in order to comply with: SSI 2010/210
Regulation 4(1)(a) and 5(1) Timescale for implementation: within four months of
receipt of this report.
What the service did to meet the requirement
All children now had individual learning logs that had started to identify individual
needs. This inspection found that the format was very good but that files were of
an inconsistent standard. A further recommendation has been made at this
inspection to ensure a consistent standard of recording is achieved.
The requirement is: Met - Within Timescales
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