A call is being put out to all people who have a qualification to work with young children. Are you a teacher, childcare practitioner, childminder?
Do you need to earn some spare money to enhance your income?
I have worked in the childcare sector for seventeen years and I am starting a babysitting agency to ensure that parents have a choice of professional people to leave their children with, when requiring an evening out or needing emergency childcare in their home. Maybe you are staying for a holiday in this area so need childcare for a few hours.
I state this is babysitting and not a substitute for registered Childminders and others who are Ofsted registered.
My first step is to compile a list of qualified people who will have a portable DBS and at least one year experience working with children.
Children attending Pine Pixies Pre-School in Formby have been enjoying their autumn activities. Making characters out of the garden leaves that have fallen and pumpkin carving being just a couple.
Pine Pixies is now looking for a new staff member to join their team.
A job
vacancy has arisen for a Pre-School Practitioner for 6 hours plus per week. Must
be available to work between the hours of 8.00am and 3.15pm Monday to Friday.
Term time
only
Qualification
required: NVQ level 3 in Childcare and Early Years or equivalent
Candidates
need to have an up to date Paediatric First Aid qualification
Portable DBS
preferred.
Job
location: Pine Pixies Pre-School, St Luke’s Parish Hall, Kirklake Road, Formby.
All
applicants should have a strong desire to work with, and care for children.
They should be kind, enthusiastic, patient and able to work in harmony with
colleagues to provide children with the best possible learning opportunities,
within a safe, stimulating and happy environment. We are a small pre-school and
fully committed to bringing out the best in each and every child. The applicant
must be able to carry out observations and keep up to date files on Key
Children. We ensure everyone in our organisation is responsible for
Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children. Our recruitment processes
support safer recruitment practices and all staff are required to complete
safeguarding training as part of their induction program. All successful
candidates will be required to undertake a DBS check and suitable references
will be obtained.
All
applications to be in by Friday 3rd November 2017.
Successful
applicant to start as soon as all references and DBS checks have been
completed.
Only
candidates with the relevant qualifications will be considered.
Childcare providers fight for better funding levels
A House of Commons debate on the 'effect of the 30 hours childcare funding' is to take place today.
The shadow minister for early years, Tracy Brabin, has confirmed that she will be attending the
debate, along with the Pre-School Learning Alliance, National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA), the Professional Association for Childcare and Early Years (PACEY), and members of the Champagne Nurseries, Lemonade Funding campaign group.
Ms Brabin said, 'Thursday’s debate gives us a great opportunity to hear from Minister Goodwill about how the 30 hours roll-out is going from the Government’s perspective.
'I have a list of concerns I’d like him to respond to, including the impact of levels of funding, the children not in a place and the discrepancies from local authority to local authority.
The team from Champagne Nurseries on Lemonade Funding (CNLF) will be attending Westminster to lobby the Minister of State for Children and Families, Robert Goodwill.
Not everybody who goes in support will be able to attend inside the Houses of Parliament but will meet afterwards at the very aptly named 'Sanctuary' pub where they hope to arrive at approximately 4.30pm after the debate.
Team CNLF and about 12 others will be there at the
Sanctuary Pub & Hotel
33 Tothill Street,
London,
SW1H 9LA
Formby childcare provider Catherine Regan from Pine Pixies Pre-School said
"The government are paying providers short. The amount providers are being paid per hour, per child is not enough to deliver high quality sustainable childcare and many settings across the country have already closed their doors. Childcare providers across the country from all types of settings, including nannies and childminders are strongly united in this fight for fairer funding to ensure their sustainability. Providers are refusing to allow the words 'Free Funding' on their literature, as it is not free when the very providers delivering this funded childcare are having to subsidise it themselves."
Hopefully, the debate today will make politicians see the problem providers face and make immediate changes to save more providers becoming unsustainable. The impact that the low funding levels are having on childcare as a whole is immense. The government are a disgrace in allowing the 30 hours childcare to be rolled out when it has not been organised properly for the good of all involved.
Catherine Regan owner of Pine Pixies Pre-School in Formby recently wrote to Cllr Nina Killen, Parliamentary Researcher, Bill Esterson MP (Sefton Central) on the subject of funding, this was Nina Killen's reply,
"Labour introduced free childcare hours for parents, which were fully funded and resourced. Under the Conservatives, the free hours entitlement is chronically under-funded, with provision patchy and hard to navigate. Many providers now simply refuse to participate in the scheme. The result is that many parents aren’t even getting the hours they’re entitled to. Labour would: 1. Overhaul the existing childcare system in which subsidies are given directly to parents who often struggle to use them, and transition to a system of high-quality childcare places in mixed environments with direct government subsidy. 2. Maintain current commitments on free hours and make significant capital investment during our first two years of government, to ensure that the places exist to meet demand. 3. Phase in subsidised provision on top of free-hour entitlements, to ensure that everyone has access to affordable childcare, no matter their working pattern. 4. Transition to a qualified, graduate-led workforce, by increasing staff wages and enhancing training opportunities. This will benefit staff, who are among our worst-paid workers, and improve child development. 5. Extend the 30 free hours to all two-year-olds, and move towards making some childcare available for one-year-olds and extending maternity pay to 12 months."
Catherine also wrote to the Southport MP Damien Moore and this was his response to the current crisis.
"To address your question regarding childcare funding, I can assure you that more support is being provided to families through record investment in childcare, rising from £5 billion to £6 billion by 2020. I hope that this, along with tax-free childcare, will make a real different to millions of hardworking families.
The Education Secretary has set out her plans to reform the way in which early years providers are funded, ensuring a much better deal for nurseries, preschools and childminders. The changes will create a fairer system that better provides the affordable, high-quality childcare families deserve.
I welcome that 93 per cent of early years providers are now rated as good or outstanding. Improving the quality of these providers and the skill of those who work with children is a top priority, and I know that Ministers continue to work hard to drive these standards higher still."
Left, Bill Esterson MP and Damien Moore MP
Catherine said
"Damien Moore has I believe misunderstood the reasons for providers' concerns. He is only seeing in his response the side of the families, but the families cannot have this childcare if there are no settings left to provide it due to the current under-funding crisis. "
Catherine would like to extend an invitation for these MPs to visit her setting and discuss the concerns she and others across the country are facing. UK childcare is in deep crisis and it is up to politicians such as these above to get the problem sorted fast.
Childcare in England is grossly underfunded and many childcare settings and childminders have been forced into closure. Many of them rated as Outstanding by Ofsted.
If you have a family member or friend that uses childcare, or you work in childcare or schools then please help.
There is a 'very large' campaign to make the government listen and put in place 'urgent' changes to increase funding levels. Without these changes, childcare levels will go down, more settings will be forced to close and the high level of excellent childcare we have in our country will be at an all time low.
The government is turning a blind eye to the chaos it has implemented.
The Facebook page and group called 'Champagne Nurseries on Lemonade Funding' asks for your help. There is a Thunderclap set up for 7pm TONIGHT.
Are you a parent, grandparent, carer, aunt, uncle, childcare professional, teacher, nanny? Whoever you are, if you care about the state of childcare today then please help us to make the government listen.
We NEED you NOW! Thunderclap deadline is 7pm tonight. It takes ONE minute of your time.
At 7.00pm, your Facebook status/twitter account will automatically change to the status that is shown on thunderclap. You need to do no more. Simple!
Please show us you are united in this with us. Click the link before 7pm and send a strong united message.
Catherine Regan a childcare provider for the last sixteen years supports this campaign wholeheartedly.
Catherine's business, Pine Pixies Pre-School in Formby, is registered for children from two years old and can have up to 32 children per session. Places currently available for fee paying and funded children.
http://pinepixies.webnode.com// Funding available Two Year Old Offer Free Early Years funding which offers all 3 and 4 year old children up to 15 hours per week of free early education for 38 weeks of the year. An additional 15 hours of free childcare for families where both parents are working (or the sole parent is working in a lone-parent family), and each parent earns the equivalent of 16 hours a week at the national minimum or living wage, and earns less than £100,000 a year.
I wrote an article reporting what I considered vandalism in my nursery setting. It has since transpired that the damage was done whilst a group was renting out the church hall during the holidays. The group it seems was the Sefton Aiming High group.
This group does a lot of great work within the community with children with disabilities and their families. I do not hold the children attending this group responsible.
However, on 2nd August the Sefton group organiser decided to carry out an activity whereby the children did hand prints in paint across the fencing in the church garden. Instead of assessing whether this would harm the area in question, it went ahead. To do this activity the organiser should have at least had the decency to do it on the opposite side of the garden on the side of the hall itself. That way the paint would not have impacted so negatively on the nursery that also use the area.
The Aiming High team told me the paint will wash off in the rain, but it rained heavy that evening and the paint is still there. The organiser of this event should have washed it off everything before leaving the hall that day.
Equipment belonging to our nursery was also used that day, some of it was found underneath where the painting had taken place. This equipment was taken out of the locked hall and out of the nursery's outside playhouse.
We have no problem with our items being used respectfully and put away where they were found. However, a lot of items were broken and pushed back into the playhouse along with a cap which does not belong to any of our children, where it would not have been noticed until we opened up in September.
The wooden playhouse window had in the past been slightly cracked by vandals. This had been safely sealed months ago with clear safety tape. However the window has now been completely put through and the Aiming High organiser had put duct tape right across it and left it. This now has to be professionally fixed as it is unsafe for the children in our setting.
Thankfully we are closed at the moment, otherwise I would have had to keep the children out of the garden completely, as it would have been unsafe for their use. I do not even know what type of paint they used and if it was safe for 2 years upwards.
I phoned my insurance and they advised that the onus rested with the group who rented the hall and damaged our items. My insurers also advised me to phone the police and record it with an incident number.
We recently had our Ofsted inspection and the inspector commented on what a lovely and well - resourced garden we had. We take great pride in our facility being a friendly and safe place for the children in our care. The staff have worked very hard and what we have achieved has taken us years to put in place, with very little funding. We are now in a position where damaged items need to be replaced and the fault was not ours.
With the state of under-funding in schools and nurseries at present I cannot afford to personally pay to put this right, and would not by law be allowed to use the Sefton funding to put it right either.
I hold the organiser of the group responsible and ask that Sefton put this right before we open in September.
Following this incident the safety and well-being of the children in my nursery has to be considered here first and foremost; as does the equipment my nursery has lost, which will cost me approximately £300 to replace with no funding to do it with.
Pine Pixies Pre-School Owner Catherine Regan was shocked when she went into the setting garden. The equipment belong to the nursery had been thrown around and left outside. The fencing had graffiti hand prints all over it, paint splashed all over the area and the water pipes pulled off the wall.
The bug hotel the children had made had all been pulled out and strewn across the garden along with the tyres and palettes stored away for the summer.
The tractor the children love had been pulled out and the steering wheel broken off and nowhere to be seen.
Catherine said she cannot understand who would do such a thing. Thankfully, the planting the children had done was all still untouched. What was also strange was that there was no sign of entry.
Paint splashed all over area and pre-school equipment.
Tractor pulled out of shed and the steering wheel gone.
Water play pipes pulled off the wall. Paint all inside pipes.
Our end of term parties were enjoyed greatly, with the Teddy Bears' Picnic for the younger children and the Leavers' Party for the older children moving on to school.
Many varied 'teddies' turned up for the party.
Some of the children helped to harvest their potato crop before term ended.
We would like to give a very big thank you for all the kind presents and cards from parents.
Pine Pixies Pre-School is now taking admissions for the September term. We will be offering the 30 hours to eligible parents. We are registered for 32 children per session and accept children once they turn two years old.
Our opening times from September will be Monday to Friday term time only (38 weeks per year) Full day (6 hours) 9am-3pm Half day (3 hours) 9am-12 noon or 12 noon-3pm 9am -1pm (4 hours)
Funding available: Two Year Old Offer
Early Years Entitlement which offers all 3 and 4 year old children up to 15 hours per week of funded early education for 38 weeks of the year.
An additional 15 hours of funded childcare for families where both parents are working (or the sole parent is working in a lone-parent family), and each parent earns the equivalent of 16 hours a week at the national minimum or living wage, and earns less than £100,000 a year.
Why our ratios are better for your child Our ratios are higher than a lot of other settings. Usually, we work above the stated 1 staff member to 8 children for over threes, whereas a lot of other settings work to 1 staff member to 13 children. We think this makes a very big difference to your child.
Book your September place today and open up a world of fun to your child. We are not attached to a school and are very child led.
