Community Action Project

Language gives Community Action Project its clearest character: a termly book anchors vocabulary work, with repeated phrases for toddlers and action words for older children. In April 2025, these activities gave children concrete ways to practise speaking rather than simply listening.

At its 10 April 2025 inspection, Ofsted rated the nursery Good and found safeguarding effective. Based at C A P Centre on Windmill Lane in Smethwick, it accepts children aged 2 to 60 months.

The early years foundation stage sets the framework for children's learning, development and care, connecting everyday play with the skills children are developing.

In April 2025, communication activities included learning a song and exploring its rhythm with instruments. Staff also used strategies that supported bilingual children in both their languages. The termly books gave this work a shared thread, with different language demands for younger and older children.

Outdoor play offered practical problems to solve. In April 2025, children experimented with pipes to make a ball travel through them, while bikes and sand tools created opportunities to practise taking turns. These are useful contrasts: one activity invites experimentation, another requires children to make room for someone else.

The curriculum needed more precise steps for emotional regulation and larger movements. In April 2025, these areas were less clearly mapped out than communication and language, especially for older children.

The difference matters when considering what children learn beyond vocabulary. A book can give toddlers familiar words to return to and older children verbs to build into sentences. Emotional regulation and physical development also need a clear path through increasingly demanding skills. The April 2025 weakness concerned that progression: activities alone did not give older children's learning sufficiently precise direction.

In April 2025, children generally followed the golden rules and treated one another respectfully. Sharing outdoor equipment put those expectations into practice. Waiting for a sand tool or a turn on a bike connected behaviour with an immediate situation, giving children opportunities to practise cooperation during play.

At the April 2025 inspection, Ofsted found that observations informed children's next learning steps, targeted language activities provided individual support, and collaboration with health professionals helped children with SEND progress.

In April 2025, nappy changes provided individual conversation and relationship-building time. Daily toothbrushing and hygiene teaching brought health habits into the routine. Praise explained what children had achieved, making encouragement specific rather than simply congratulatory.

Conversations with parents covered children's needs, and home learning packs extended activities beyond the nursery in April 2025. However, monitoring of teaching needed to identify more precisely where practitioners required further support.

Those April 2025 conversations made parents' knowledge of their children part of the learning discussion. The home learning packs provided a practical connection between nursery activities and home, rather than leaving family involvement solely to conversations. Together, the two arrangements gave parents both a chance to explain their child's needs and material to continue learning outside the setting.

Staff development in April 2025 included appraisals, supervision and training, with recent training addressing support for children with SEND. The improvement priority concerned how leaders identified the practice that needed further attention. Training and regular staff discussions were already happening; monitoring needed to become more searching so that support addressed the aspects of teaching that would benefit children's learning.

The address is C A P Centre, Windmill Lane, Smethwick, B66 3LX.

In April 2025, opening hours were 8.30am to 4pm, Monday to Friday, throughout the year except bank holidays. A holiday club operated during school holidays, and the nursery provided funded early education at that time.

• Learning between activities. In April 2025, periods after lunch and before snack sometimes lost purpose and clear expectations. These transitions matter because they occupy part of the child's everyday experience. A visit is an opportunity to discuss how staff now organise the move from meals back into play, keep children involved and make expectations understandable. This addresses the specific routine weakness identified in April 2025.
• Curriculum and staff development. April 2025 improvement priorities included clearer progression in emotional regulation and physical movement, alongside more searching monitoring of teaching. The judgement was Good, with specific work still required.
• Attendance arrangements. The April 2025 opening window was 8.30am to 4pm. What attendance patterns and funded-hours arrangements would fit your child now?

Community Action Project suits families who value language practice woven into books, music and individual interaction. Its April 2025 provision also combined outdoor problem-solving with practical health routines. The balance is clear: a Good judgement and useful everyday learning, alongside necessary improvements to curriculum sequencing, staff monitoring and transitions.