A Bristol nursery school has hit back at an Ofsted ‘inadequate’ rating and claimed staff felt intimidated during the inspection, describing it as “an awful experience”. Staff and owners have also challenged some of the education watchdog’s findings.
The inspection of Play Station Nursery at Filton took place in January when Ofsted's findings changed the nursery from ‘good’ to ‘inadequate’. The report, published last week, criticised “staff’s lack of oversight and knowledge of safeguarding procedures which compromised children’s safety”, noting examples of broken or hazardous materials and wet decking.
The report also found that children were not taught “effectively about boundaries and expectations” describing the children’s behaviour as “poor and they struggle to engage in activities”. It highlighted that children were seen throwing toys or dough at each other and staff failed to intervene.
Read next: Gran left bruised and battered after e-scooter hit-and-run
It also found that managers did "not communicate to the staff team what it is they want the children to learn”, and added that staff did not have the skills or understanding to implement the curriculum successfully.
The report also stated that staff do not teach children the knowledge and skills they need and do not help children develop a positive attitude to learning. It said that children were not motivated to “persevere at tasks and engage in learning” and that not all parents were aware of their child’s key person and how well their children were doing.
Nursery's response
However, a spokesperson for the nursery has hit back at the report and said they did not agree with the findings. The team behind the nursery in Conygre Road in Filton, have also lodged two formal complaints against the watchdog. She said: “This was an awful experience for our team, we have been in the childcare industry for over 20 years and at the site in question over 10 years, we have had many Ofsted experiences and nothing quite like this one.”
She said the children currently in their care had been through lockdown which presented challenges, as had losing a staff member with members of the management team having to step in and cover for teachers when necessary.
She claimed: “The inspector arrived late and was flustered from the start, and therefore did not follow what would have been a learning walk and give us the opportunity to show off our setting and discuss our cohort and fantastic parent partnerships, which we feel would have given the inspector more knowledge of our setting when making the judgement. The staff felt very intimidated and the inspector did not put them at ease.”
The nursery spokesperson added that the broken equipment referenced in the report “was a bucket that was slightly rusted, nothing else was broken". She added that the decking is slippery and "on this day of inspection it was a very wet day, children are very aware of this and take precautions”. She said they rent the building from South Gloucestershire Council and have advised them of the slippery surface.
She said that the comment regarding boundaries and expectations was in regards to a child who had been with the nursery for two days and “was not yet fully immersed in our nursery routine and rules," adding: "This child was also the key person issue and we do a relationship mapping process where we make sure the key person is best fit for the individual child.
“We take particular offence to the comment ‘leaders do not recognise weak staff practice’ - the inspector asked quite specifically - who would you say is your strongest member of staff. The manager felt this remark to be intimidating and replied that we identify strengths and weaknesses and was able to show a detailed training program for staff of which the inspector declined to see.”
She added: “We would also like to point out we had another inspection at a sister setting under the same management team and encountered a very positive experience, completely different to this one with a very positive outcome. Our passionate staff work hard to ensure we create a nurturing and supportive setting for our families.”
Responding to the nursery's claims about the inspection, a spokesperson for Ofsted said: "We don’t comment on individual inspections or complaints."
Read next:
