Outcomes for Children

 Being graded against the Ofsted judgement Outcomes for children

As we know during an Ofsted inspection the nursery will be graded against four judgements, the inspector will then make an overall judgement, The overall grade awarded will either be outstanding, Good, Requires improvement or inadequate.

So how can you achieve outstanding in the section Outcomes for children?

1. What systems do you have in place to document children’s starting points
2. Do parents contribute to children’s assessments?
3. How is children’s learning and development documented in your setting?
4. How do you ensure children are meeting the level of expected development?
5. What systems do you have in place to support children who need further support?

In order for the inspector to make their judgement they will need to see evidence of children’s learning and outcomes, majority of the evidence will come from direct observation however there is other sources of evidence that should supplement the observations such as;

• Records of children’s assessments.
• Evidence showing the progress of children’s learning from when they started to present, this should show how long the child has been at the setting and how often they attend
• Documents showing what children can do and enjoy when they started, this may include information shared from parents.
• Discussions with staff and parents about the level of children’s social, communication and physical skills on entry.
• The inspector will use the evidence to judge whether the manager and practitioners fully understand the progress children making within the Early Years Foundation Stage.
• The inspector will judge whether adult’s expectations for children are high enough – do practitioner set children realistic goals and challenges eg are children’s next steps achievable.

As this judgement is about children’s learning and outcomes the inspector will evaluate whether

1. Children are working at the typical levels of development for their age – how can your setting evidence this?
2. Whether the gap is narrowing for disadvantaged children
3. The progress of two years olds – Does your setting carry out two year progress checks?
4. The outcomes are consistent across the learning
5. Children are developing the skills in the prime and specific areas of learning
6. Children with special educational needs are fully supported to help them make progress
7. Children with English as an additional language gain those vital skills to help them communicate

As Ofsted will be looking closely at how practitioners fully understand children’s development, why not read about the early year’s outcomes as this explains more about the different ages and stages of children’s development.