Jennifer Business tips for childminders, Characteristics of Effective Learning (COEL), Childminding best practice, Communication with parents, Hourly rates for childminders

Childminding Best Practice Newsletter 11th July 2023

Note: The company I normally send out the weekly newsletters with is having issues this week meaning I cannot send out this email the normal way. So that no-one misses out I am sharing it here instead. Please share this with anyone you know as they may also normally receive the newsletter and may be wondering where it is!

Thank you,

Jennifer x

Childminding Best Practice Newsletter

11th of July 2023

Ofsted Change coming? Plus, New Funding Rates News

The Head of Ofsted, Amanda Spielman, is leaving at the end of this year. It is not yet known who will replace her but I suspect that more changes will accompany whoever takes her place as they will want to make their own mark.

Should childminders, worry about this? Those of you who, like me, have been involved in childcare or education for a long time will have seen trends come and go. (Does anyone remember the craze for having windmills in the garden?!) However the fundamentals of what children need to learn and grow, remain the same.

One of the things that are really important to understand are the Characteristics of Effective Learning, (also know as the Characteristics of Effective Teaching and Learning.) It is a requirement of the EYFS to understand these and promote them with the children in your care.

Helping children develop the Characteristics of Effective Learning does not have to be complicated or expensive. Traditional activities such as completing jigsaws or building things with bricks are simple and effective and can be easy for parents to provide at home too. Practice observing children and see if you can work out how they are ‘planning and exploring,’ ‘actively learning,’ and ‘thinking creatively and critically.’

Start by having a go at this sample 10 minute CPD activity from a ‘Childminding Best Practice Club’ toolkit:

10 minute COEL training Activity

Don’t forget to involve parents. You can do this informally by talking about which characteristics their child has shown during the day, or on a more formal basis. If you use the ‘Super Summative Assessment and Gap Tracker Kit,’ you will notice that there is a section for your to report to parents about their child’s developing COEL. The ‘Progress Check at Age Two‘ pack also includes a template for reporting on the Characteristics so you may find it useful to sit down with the parent and talk about them as part of your review meeting. (If you find dealing with parents tricky I recommend the ‘Partnership with Parents’ Pack.If you would like a copy I’ll put a link at the end of this newsletter for you.)

You will find short guides to the COEL in both the ‘Birth to Five Matters,’ and the ‘Development Matters’ documents but for a easy to understand guide for childminders I recommend the ‘Characteristics of Effective Learning Pack‘ which has activity ideas, templates and evaluation resources as well as practical guides to what the COEL actually mean for childminders.

To find links to these documents plus links to other essential documents bookmark the official documents links page from the Childminding Best Practice website:

Official document links

In other news the Department of Education has now confirmed the new funding rates. From September, these will increase to an average of £5.62 for three and four-year-olds and £7.95 for two-year-olds.

If you are not yet registered to accept funded children it is a good time to start looking into it, rather than having to do it in a rush when (if!) the proposed changes to funding come into place. You do not necessarily have to do anything yet but having the correct information will help you make informed decisions. If you have not accepted funded children before you may not have realised that you get more money for two year olds. However it is really important to check rates with your local council as although we are used to seeing the ‘headline’ rate they can vary widely from area to area.

You may also like:

Check you have all the essentials in place, including the absolute nitty gritty of the Characteristics of Effective Learning with Ultimate Childminding Checklist.

Develop a professional relationship with parents with help from the ‘Partnership with Parents,’ pack.

Special offers and deals:

Save £10 and get inspection ready with the Ultimate Childminding Inspection Preparation Pack, containing full versions of the 3 in 1 Safeguarding Pack and the Ultimate Childminding Checklist as well as Focus point questions for the Guided Self Evaluation Pack (and some puzzles to unwind with!)

Save £6 with the Super Summative Assessment Bundle Deal. Containing full versions of both the Super Summative Assessment and Gap Tracker Kit and the Progress Check at Age 2 Pack.

visit the kids to go shop

I hope you found this newsletter useful. Apologies for the unusual way of getting it to you all. Hopefully normal service will resume next week!

Best Wishes

Jennifer x

Jennifer Business Room, Business tips for childminders, Childminding best practice, Childminding humour, Communication with parents

Contracts and policies for childminders – a quiz!

Time and time again I hear about childminders who are having problems with parents over one issue or another. While some of these issues are unfortunately unavoidable, others can be prevented by having a robust contract supported by strong policies. Here are some scenarios that could be avoided by clear communication and robust paperwork. What would you do in each case?

Scenario One:

You have had a family on your books for around 10 months without any issues. Then one day your 14 year old son gets a bad headache and does not feel quite well enough to go to school. He can stay upstairs in his bedroom, so you decide to remain open that day. However the mother of one of your childminding parents hears about this and decides to keep their child at home all week as they say they are worried about their child catching a bug. The parent then refuses to pay for the entire week that she does not bring her child in for. Your contract states that you do not charge parents if you or any of your family are ill.

Do you?

  1. Tell the parent you completely understand their worries and pay back all their fees for the entire week.
  2. Resentfully pay the day’s fees back and complain about it on social media making sure everyone knows who the parent is.
  3. Realise your contracts are not robust enough so pay the money back for the day your son was ill at home and change your contracts to say that when a child is off for any reason normal charges apply.

Scenario Two:

You are a new childminder. A family visits and you like them so when they ask to start in three weeks you are delighted and agree. In the intervening three weeks you have other enquiries and sign on two more children but have to turn others away as your places are full. The day comes that the first family is due to start but they do not show up. You ring them to see what is happening and they tell you that they have changed their minds and that a relative is going to look after the child instead. You did not take a deposit or get the parents to sign a contract, intending to do it on their first day.

Do you?

  1. Offer to give them two weeks free if they start today.
  2. Have a massive argument with the parent about it. On the doorstep. With the neighbours listening.
  3. Chalk it up to experience and readvertise the place, making sure in future that you get families to pay a deposit and sign a contract to secure their place.

Scenario Three:

You have been childminding for two years without any major problems. Part of your ethos is lots of trips out to places to give the children lots of experiences outside the setting. You use contracts and gets parents to sign permission slips. You sign on a new family for a full time place, and they seem to sign everything happily with no fuss. You then check the permission slips before putting them in the new child’s file and see that they have not given permission to take the child in the car. You ask the family about this, and they are adamant that they do not want their child going anywhere in the car.

Do you?

  1. Tell all the other families that you can no longer offer any outings that are not within walking distance.
  2. Continue taking all the children on outings using the car but tell the child not to tell their parents, it is your little secret.
  3. Talk to the parents calmly and professionally and if they insist they do not want their child going in the car regretfully decide that you have to give notice under your settling in period conditions. Then alter your permission slips.

Scenario Four:

You have robust policies for charging when a parent is late to collect their child. These work well and parents are only ever late for genuine reasons as they know there will be an additional charge to pay. You are good at sticking to your policies, so everyone knows what to expect. Then one of the parents gets a new job. They start to arrive with their child up to fifteen minutes before their contracted start time and expect to be able to drop the child off. You do not have a policy covering early drop offs.

Do you?

  1. Let the children in early each time but do not charge the parents so end up feeling used and resentful.
  2. Open the door when they arrive and hand them your dog with its lead with strict instructions to walk it until their contracted start time.
  3. Change your policies to include charges for early drops offs.

Scenario Five:

You are an experienced childminder with plenty of children on your books.  You meet with a new family who need a place at the last minute. They do not bring the child with them to the initial meeting saying that they are unwell. You talk to them about your setting and what you can offer and ask them if they have any needs for the child. They say no. You gets them to fill in all the required paperwork and then set a date for the child to start the following week. When the child starts it very quickly becomes apparent that they have needs that always require one to one support.

Do you?

  1. Continue to struggle on, trying to support the child on your own until everyone is tired and stressed and other families start to notice their child isn’t getting the care they need and start to leave.
  2. Stick the child in a playpen all day while you work with the other children.
  3. Refer to your contracts and give the family notice on the basis that they have knowingly and wilfully concealed important information about their child’s needs from you.

Scenario Six:

You have been childminding for years and think you have seen it all. You take on a new family, get them to complete all the necessary paperwork and then set a date for the child to start. On the child’s first day the mum drops the child off and you could swear that they are moving in. They come supplied with several large bags, including a large bin bag full of what looks suspiciously like washing. A baby in the other room starts to cry so you shove all the bags under the stairs so you can have a look when the children are all settled.

When the children are settled you get to look at what is in all the bags. You discover the bin bag is full of dirty washing. You also find a dog lead in another smaller bag along with a short shopping list. You thinks it is odd, but the children are waiting for their morning snack, so you forget about it.

At pick up time the new parent arrives to collect up their child. You pass all the bags across and talk about the child’s day and all the fun they have had. However the parent does not look very happy at all. You ask what is wrong and the parents then berates you for not doing the washing, walking the dog and picking up the shopping!

Do you?

  1. Apologise and then the next day do your best to comply with all the parent’s requests, meaning that you have no time to spend with the children as you are too busy doing washing, shopping and dog walking.
  2. Shout, “you must be having a laugh!” and throw the bags out into the street so that the bin bag splits open and dirty pants start blowing down the street.
  3. Realise that no matter how long you have been in this job there is always something that will surprise you. Explain to the parent that you are a childminder not a skivvy. Sigh when they scream obscenities at you then decide life is just too short and give the parent immediate notice as backed up by your contracts.

How did you do?

Mostly a: Parent’s must love you. You are a complete walkover! You may think you are trying to do your best for everyone but this is not always a good thing because at some point you will either realise you cannot cope with everything you have promised to do or will end up feeling more and more resentful and unhappy. Do not be afraid to set boundaries using your contracts and policies to back you up. Then stick to them.

Mostly b: You are a complete nightmare! You bend the rules to breaking point, ignore any safeguarding protocols and love causing as much drama as possible. Try setting up some robust contracts and policies instead before someone gets hurt or you end up in court.

Mostly c: Well done. No one gets it right all of the time, but you use sensible ways of resolving problems and recognise the importance of having robust contracts and policies in place.

Written 10/04/2023

You may also like these helpful resources:

Contracts, Policies and Forms pack

Having a clear and robust contract and policies is vital to the smooth running of any childminding business and can help prevent unwanted situations and misunderstandings between parent(s)/guardian(s) and childminders.

The ‘Contracts, Policies and Forms pack’ contains a full contract, complemented and reinforced by specially written policies. Also included are lots of useful forms for you to use in your business as well as information about the sort of paperwork you will need.

There is no need to buy repeated contracts. You can print the contracts in this pack as many times as you need.

Get Contracts, policies and forms pack

Partnership with Parents Pack

This is an essential tool to help you build and develop your partnership with parents. From help advertising and attracting new families, through to daily communication and letter templates to send to help deal with tricky situations in a professional manner, this pack has everything you need.

get partnership with parents pack

Childminding Best Practice Newsletter

Sign up for the free Childminding Best Practice Newsletter via the link below and I will send you best practice ideas, childminding news, EYFS tips, outstanding ideas, stories from other childminders, arts and crafts project templates, new products, and links.

FREE CHILDMINDING BEST PRACTICE NEWSLETTERS

About Kids To Go

Kids To Go was established in 2008. Products include the Ultimate Childminding Checklist, best practice resources promoting diversity, safety and childminding in the great outdoors (Forest Childcare). It is the home of the Childminding Best Practice Club and the free weekly Childminding Best Practice newsletters.

KIDS TO GO
Jennifer Business tips for childminders, Communication with parents

10 Mistakes Childminders make on Parent Questionnaires

Last updated 15/02/2023

Sending out parent questionnaires is something that many childminders do. They are a great way to prove in writing that you are ‘communicating with parents’ and seeking their views about ways to improve your service.

But have you asked yourself WHY you are sending them? What is their purpose? What are you trying to achieve from the paperwork you are sending home and parents are spending their evenings diligently filling in?

Many childminders are making these mistakes on their parent questionnaires. Are you?

Asking “yes” or “no” questions 

Questions on parent questionnaires need to be open-ended, otherwise you are unlikely to gather any useful information from the parent. If you send home a list of statements asking the parent to circle yes/no or true/false then a yes or no answer is all the information you will find out. How are yes/no answers meaningful?

For example, suppose you ask a parent:

  • Are you happy with the quality of food I provide? Yes/No
  • Do you feel that I am helping your child to be ready for school? Yes/No

Then you force them to circle either a yes or a no. What have you learned from those answers? Nothing helpful at all.

Here are open-ended versions of the same questions:

  • How satisfied are you with the quality of the food and snacks I provide? Is there any way I could improve this?
  • Is there anything more you wish I would do here to help to prepare your child for school

You will learn a lot more from asking open ended questions than you would ever learn from closed ones.

Doing parent questionnaires for the Ofsted inspectorchildminding paperwork

Only use parent questionnaires if you really plan to use them to improve your business. While they are a great way to prove in writing that you are communicating with parents, please keep in mind that they take up not only a lot of parents’ time, but your time too. If you are just doing them to stick them in a file to show Ofsted then you are completely wasting everybody’s time. The Ofsted inspector doesn’t care that you have stacks of paperwork – they care about how you are gathering the views of others and acting on suggestions for improvement.

Not reading what the parents have written

I heard of a childminder who was marked down at an inspection because she couldn’t read the questionnaire a parent had completed in front of the inspector. The childminder couldn’t make out the parent’s handwriting and thought it was unfair. But seriously?  What is the point of asking the parent to fill it out if you can’t read what they say and don’t care enough about their answer to bother asking them to clarify? 

Asking questions you don’t care about the answers to

For every question you write on your parent questionnaire, ask yourself: what am I going to DO with the answer I receive? If the answer is ‘NOTHING’ then don’t ask the question. Only ask questions that you care about the answers to. Only ask questions that matter and those with potential solutions.

Making questionnaires too long

Parents are busy. Really busy. Just like you. They do not have time to fill in pages and pages of pointless forms for their childminder. Parents will feel that they are doing you a favour by filling in your questionnaire. They are doing something to help you. So you should treat their time and effort with respect by not taking up too much of it, by taking a genuine interest in their answers, by responding positively to any criticism you receive and by not expecting them to write too much or too often.

Sending questionnaires home too frequently

For exactly the same reasons as above, as well as making them too long, don’t send them home too frequently. If you want parents to fill in your forms properly, then about once a year is really the maximum frequency you can expect meaningful responses from busy parents.

Taking suggestions for improvements poorly

In business one of the BEST things that people can do is to complain to you about something. If one person complains directly to you, it is an opportunity for you to fix a problem that is probably affecting other people too. Sometimes it can be hard getting negative feedback. Try to remember that honest, negative feedback given directly to you is better than parents spreading rumours and complaining behind your back.

Filing them away without acting on anything

If parents take the time to fill in your questionnaire, it is important not just to read them but to have in place a procedure to act on the changes they suggest. Perhaps you have a self-evaluation document you can use? How will you hold yourself accountable for making the change?

Not feeding back to parents about changes you have made as a result of their suggestions

Make sure you have a method in place to show that you are acting on any problems, changes or things that need improvement that your questionnaires raise – one idea is to have a ‘You asked, We did’ board for example. If parents take the time to comment and suggest improvements they will be flattered that you listened and changed something as a result of something they suggested. This will make the parents feel happy and is a very professional way to treat people!

Not asking for the children’s opinions as well

 The last thing that many childminders do with parent questionnaires is to have a small section on them to gather the children’s opinions as well. I think the best way to do this is to ask the parents to speak to their children and to write what they say. Think very carefully about the types of questions you want answers to from the children. Like the parents there is no point in asking the question if you have no intention of using the answers they have provided to make useful changes.  

In conclusion

Used properly, parent questionnaires can be a great way to show that you are communicating with parents and acting on suggestions for improvements given by others. Remember to treat everyone’s time and effort with respect by not taking up too much of it, by taking a genuine interest in parents’ answers, by responding positively to any criticism you receive and by not overusing questionnaires.

Partnership with Parents Pack

The Kids To Go ‘Partnership with Parents’ Pack includes tools to help you to improve how you communicate with parents including sample open ended parent and child questionnaires you can use for your setting. The pack also includes how to extend learning at home, working in partnership in difficult situations, your transition programme, marketing your services and sample late payment and contract termination letters. 

 Childminding Best Practice Newsletter

Sign up for the free weekly Childminding Best Practice Newsletter and I will send you best practice ideas, childminding news, EYFS tips, outstanding ideas, stories from other childminders, arts and crafts project templates, new products, and links,

Sign up for free newsletters

About Kids To Go

Kids To Go was established in 2008. Products include the Ultimate Childminding Checklist, and best practice resources promoting diversity, safety and childminding in the great outdoors (Forest Childcare).

Kids To Go
Jennifer Activities for childminders, Childminding best practice

Learning with Traditional Tales – Sharing stories with my childminder

Written 07/01/2023

This time of year when the excitement of Christmas is over, but the weather is still cold and grey is a fantastic time to create a bit of cosiness by curling up with a traditional tale or two. Reading stories to children is an essential activity to help children learn speech and communication skills and helping children learn new stories also enhances their cultural capital. Sharing traditional stories can help us feel connected to our own childhoods and are part of our wider cultural heritage. There is also a fantastic wealth of life lessons that can be learned by thinking about the messages contained in these stories.

When choosing a traditional tale to share with your children it can help to think about the following:

  1. What stories do the children already know? Do you want to focus more on one you have already read so that all the children can get to know it really well, or do you want to introduce a completely new story?
  2. Consider the cultural background of the children you care for. Do you share stories that reflect their culture and history? Perhaps the children’s parents can suggest some stories that they shared when they were little.
  3. Have you got any learning intentions you want to be able to tie into the story, for example learning about sizes or stranger danger with ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears,’ the importance of helping out with ‘The Little Red Hen,’ or simple counting skills with ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff.’
  4. Are you going to read the story from a book? If so think about the language in the version you have chosen. Do they have any repeating phrases that can help children learn language? Is the language challenging enough with different words to learn but not too hard to understand that the children loose interest? There tends to be lots of different versions of traditional tales so you can find one suitable for the age and developmental stage of the children in your care.
  5. Do the children actually like the story? A story can fulfil all of the above requirements but if the children do not engage with it then it is pretty pointless!

Tips for getting the most out of the story when reading it with the children:

  1. Read the story several times until the children get to know it. (This can be done over a few days – you do not need to sit there reading it on loop!) Make sure all the children know the story well. By doing this you are helping increase each child’s cultural capital.
  2. When the children know the story well enough to anticipate which part of the story comes next encourage them to join in with repeated phrases and new words.
  3. Get the children to act out the story while you read it to them. Can they make up different actions to go with different parts or characters of the story?
  4. Can the children think of simple changes they would like to introduce to the story. For example if you are reading ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears,’ maybe the bears have pancakes for breakfast instead of porridge? This helps children take ownership of the story and also begin to understand the structures of storytelling.

Tips for telling the story to children instead of reading it from a book:

Although reading books to children is important there may be times that you simply want to tell the children a story instead. Telling a story without having a book to hold means you can have your hands free to use puppets or gestures to emphasise the words. It also means that, if you have a larger group of children that have to sit in front of you while you read, that there is no physical barrier between you and the children, meaning that you can relate more directly to them and their responses to the story. (In childminding settings with just one or two children this isn’t such an issue as they will normally be sitting on your knee as you read to them.)

  1. Use your body language and gestures to help tell the story. If a character is feeling cold, wrap your arms around yourself and shiver dramatically, if a giant appears, shade your eyes and peer upwards as if looking at them. Using gestures like this to emphasise your words will help children understand the story even if they cannot see any pictures. Encourage the children to copy your actions. In this way even non-verbal children can join in and show their understanding of the story.
  2. Think about how you can use your voice as you tell the story. Use a quiet voice when a character is creeping up to someone or a loud voice if you are pretending to be a giant! Children love it if you use different voices for different characters but don’t make voices too silly as this will distract the children from the story itself.
  3. Don’t think that you can’t move about. Why not tell a story outside and when the characters move – so do you! As long as the story remains the main focus you can act out running from a dragon, trip trapping over a bridge or climbing up a beanstalk.

Things to do so that children and parents can extend their learning:

  1. Provide puppets and props (don’t forget dressing up props if they are suitable for the story and you have them!) for the children to tell the story themselves during free play.
  2. Leave the story book somewhere accessible to the children so that they can request it when they want you to read it to them even when you have moved onto other books or stories.
  3. Share versions of the story with the children’s parents so that they can help continue the learning at home. (Worried about lending out your precious books to forgetful parents? Check out the solution below!)

Products that can help you explore traditional stories with your children:

Members of the Childminding Best Practice Club receive monthly toolkits bursting with information, ideas and support. These include special Traditional Tale focused Toolkits.

These toolkits have a wealth of resources to help you share traditional tales with your children. Including things like:

Specially rewritten and illustrated childminder friendly versions of different traditional tales. Print out as many copies as you need to share with parents.

Resources to compliment the story such as posters or games.

Ideas for crafts and activities you can do to go with the story theme.

Full set of planning covering every area of learning.

Hand drawn colouring sheet

Join the Childminding Best Practice Club

Sign up for free weekly Childminding Best Practice Newsletters

My weekly newsletters are great for childminders and EYFS providers. Newsletters contain things like: free activity downloads and ideas, business tips, links to other relevant websites or articles, Best Practice tips and ideas, news about childminding and Kids To Go products. I know how busy you are, so I aim to provide bite-size information in short, easy to read newsletters.

I get lots of positive feedback about my newsletters but if you don’t like them you can unsubscribe at any time.

Sign up here:

Receive free Childminding Best Practice Newsletters

Jennifer Business tips for childminders, Childminding best practice, Communication with parents

Supporting children with transitions at their childminders

One important role a childminder or other early years practitioner, performs is to support children through transition periods in their life. There are many transitions a child may go through. For example, starting at a new childminder’s, moving house, the birth of a sibling or starting school.

All transitions have an effect on children. It is useful to share information with parents about what the potential effects can be so that they are not too alarmed if any of the following happen:

Physical Effects

The body’s immune system is affected by stress which might mean, that a child catches illnesses more easily in the first weeks of starting with their childminder.  They may have more disturbed sleep or not want to go to bed and may become fussier with their eating habits. (I know that children starting at my setting often eat more when they are happily settled than they do at the start of their placement when everything is new and strange.)

Emotional Effects

Children may not be able to regulate their emotions as well as normal during periods of transition. They may be more tearful or angry than normal and will require extra support from an understanding adult. Some children may withdraw, becoming quieter and they may become upset more easily than normal. Children may regress as they work out changes in their life. Some may start having toileting accidents or show undesirable behaviour such as hitting other children. Their speech may seem to regress as they may talk in a more babyish style, or they may become more clingy and want to spend more time with the parent or the practitioner.

Long-term effects of not supporting children with transitions

It is important to support children as much as possible through transition points in their life as there can be long term effects if not getting it right. A child’s self-confidence and trust in adults can be badly knocked, meaning that they are less well able to cope with future challenges, underachieve in school, struggle making friends or form relationships later in life, develop anger, leading to unwanted behaviour, or, later in life depression, anxiety and self-harm.

How to support children starting in your setting       

Starting at their new childminders is a major event in a child’s life. It will often be the first time they have been away from home for any considerable period of time and may be the first time they have had to properly interact with other children and adults other than their parents. This is especially true for children who have been isolating due to Covid related issues.

Starting at a new childminder’s should, wherever possible, not be a sudden event. This gives the childminder time to prepare both the child and the parents for this change. A child may have mixed emotions about starting at a childminders, excitement and anticipation combined with anxiety about the change. Younger children and babies may not understand what is going on but will react to the separation of their primary attachment figure. The child may be very quiet and withdrawn at first and may not eat well for the first few days. The transition to staring in a new setting is a long one and the process does not begin and end on the child’s first day at the setting.

Ways to help children and parents with the process of starting with a new childminder

Meet the parents to gather information on the child, their likes, dislikes, routines at home, medical requirements (if any) religion, food likes, allergies, their stage of development at home, etc. Parents can be given ‘all about me’ forms to complete but do this together if possible as I find that at least initially parents feel more confident and supported if you go through this information in person.

  • Acknowledge that both the child and the parents need to settle into this new routine and that it takes different amounts of time depending on each child/family. Some children may settle in very quickly, others may take more time. The younger the child the longer it may take them to settle.
  • Give the parents pictures and basic information about the childminder and her family so the child is already familiar with some of the faces they may encounter.
  • Ask for the parents to supply photos of the child’s family for the childminder to make a ‘family book’ with so they child always has pictures of their family that they can look at and talk to the childminder about. For younger children the childminder can make these into lift the flap ‘peekabo’ books to encourage an understanding of object permanence.
  • Encourage parents to provide a comfort object if the child needs it for example a soft toy or a scarf belonging to Mummy which has a scent familiar to the child that the childminder can wear when holding the child.
  • Encourage the parents to use settling in sessions, the first of which where the parent can stay and then in subsequent sessions gradually spends less time staying with the child.
  • Where practical and safe to do so arrange a visit to the child’s home before they start. This way the child can first meet the new practitioner in an environment that is safe and familiar to them.
  • Be available for the parent(s), especially in the first few days (as the parent may be feeling more anxious than the child which the child will then pick up on, resulting in the child feeling anxious too and less likely to settle.) The parent may be put at ease with lots of texts to let them know how the child is doing, or photos of what the child is up to.
  • Make time to talk to the parent at drop off and pick up to facilitate the development of good and trusting relationships as well as to exchange any useful day to day information.
  • Be mindful and respectful of the child’s feelings. At first they may want to just cuddle you rather than joining in with any activities. Take time with older, verbal children for them to be able to talk about their feelings.

How childminders can help with ALL transitions:

  • Have a good understanding of child development and the importance and role of attachment.
  • Give older child time to talk about the transition and their feelings around it. However let the children take the lead in this and do not force them to talk if they do not want to. Support children by helping them understand and label their emotions. Children will often want to spend more time with you at times of transition.
  • Share information! Work with parents to agreed ways of supporting both the child and the parent. For children starting in your setting ‘All about me’ forms can be really useful and for children leaving to join a bigger setting or to start school sharing ‘transition forms’ is a helpful way of making the transition as smooth as possible.
  • Use resources such as books, dolls, social stories and role play toys to help the child explore the situation and their feelings towards it. This can prompt children to ask questions and talk about the events they are experiencing/will experience.
  • Children with additional needs may need more support with transitions. For example non-verbal children may benefit from visual prompt cards to facilitate communication or a child with a hearing impairment may need any new vocabulary they are introduced to supported with the correct Makaton or BSL signs, especially those concerning feelings.  Children with SEND may take longer to adapt to periods of change but as each child is different it is important to know your child and their needs so that you can best support them.

What about you?

Finally I want to mention possibly the most important person in the process – you! Transitions do not just affect the child and their parents; they will have an effect on you too.

It can be nerve wracking getting to know a new child and family and heart-breaking to say goodbye to a child leaving to start school. Be kind to yourself. Do not plan any big events or complicated activities when a new child is starting. Make sure you get plenty of sleep and make sure you have a healthy sandwich prepared the night before so that you have something to eat at lunch if things get hectic. Acknowledging the fact that this is a time of change for you too will hopefully make for a happier and smoother transition time for everyone.

You may find the following products helpful:

Share information to help support smooth transitions with the Super Summative Assessment and Gap Tracker Kit.

This kit contains all the tools you need to sum up a child’s development and achievements, right from when a child starts with you, all the way until they leave to go to nursery or school.  From ‘All about Me’ forms, starting points, transition and report templates as well as sample reports, tips and of course a gap tracker for when you need it.

get the Super Summative Assessment and Gap Tracker Kit

Build professional relationships with parents

Partnership with Partnership with Parents Pack

An essential tool to help you build and develop your partnership with parents. From help advertising and attracting new families, through to daily communication and letter templates to send to help deal with tricky situations in a professional manner, this pack has everything you need.

Create great partnerships with parents

Find us on social media!

Facebook: Kids To Go

Instagram: cmbestpractice

Jennifer Characteristics of Effective Learning (COEL), Childminding Inspection Tips, Inspection, Official document links, Planning for childminders

What is new for childminders in the Sept 2021 EYFS Framework?

Lots of childminders have been asking for a guide to the new September 2021 EYFS Statutory Framework. I have done my best in this article to pull out what I think are the most important points for childminders.

The information in the Educational Programmes Section of the EYFS has been expanded

The biggest change to the new EYFS is the expanded descriptions of what is included in the educational programmes descriptions (ie the Learning and Development areas). I don’t really think this information is in any way ‘new’ or a surprise. But the expanded areas are written explicitly into the EYFS so you should use it as your guide when planning your curriculum. As a childminder it is up to you how you design the curriculum for your setting but you MUST make sure that you are addressing each key point of each learning area. Development Matters and Birth to 5 Matters are designed to help you to do this so make sure you read them when you design your curriculum.

Communication, Language and especially vocabulary have been identified as the most important learning areas

Communication and language are vital and the EYFS states that ‘the development of children’s spoken language underpins all seven areas of learning and development’. The other thing that is really stressed is ‘extending vocabulary’ across each of the seven areas of learning.

 

The Early Learning Goals have been rewritten – but MOST of their content remains the same

The level of development that children are expected to have reached by the end of their reception year in school is defined by the early learning goals. As most childminders are not responsible for assessing the learning and development of reception aged children, the goals have always remained mainly in the realm of school reception teachers. Despite the EYFS making it clear that ‘the ELGs should not be used as a curriculum’, it is still useful for childminders to have in mind what the ultimate aim of some of the activities we do with children is heading towards.

Some of the key changes are:

  • Communication and Language: provides more focus on extending vocabulary
  • PSED: self-regulation is included
  • Literacy: comprehension is included
  • Mathematics: a new focus on understanding patterns

 

The role of self-regulation is recognised by making it an early learning goal

Children at the end of reception year should be able to ‘show an understanding of their own feelings and those of others, and begin to regulate their behaviour accordingly.’ They should also be able to ‘control their immediate impulses when appropriate’ and ‘give focussed attention to what a teacher is saying’. These are all important parts of the characteristics of effective learning that you should have been teaching the children all along, but the fact that they have now been recognised in the ELGs shows the increased importance that is now being placed on the notion of self-regulation. It is truly vital that as childminders you are encouraging children to sit still and concentrate on tasks sometimes, especially on tasks that are not always of the child’s own choosing, so that they can practise a skill that is vital to their success in school.

Balance is the key. Your curriculum and how you teach it is up to you but as children grow older the focus should change from the prime to specific areas of learning and development

It is up to each childminder to plan their curriculum which is in a broad sense what you want the children to learn while they are with you from when they are babies until they start school. The new EYFS says ‘Practitioners need to decide what they want children to learn and the most effective way to teach it’. There are several key points here. Firstly, it is up to you to decide the right balance between adult led activities and free play time given to children. Secondly, as children grow older you should spend more time ‘teaching’ them and less time just letting them have free play. Lastly, the focus of your teaching should gradually move away from the ‘prime’ areas (language, PSE, physical development) and include more focus on the ‘specific’ areas (mathematics, literacy etc.)

 

Assessment remains important but physical evidence of this assessment is not

Before you throw away your learning journeys and the pages of next steps: STOP. The EYFS is still very clear that ‘ongoing assessment (also known as formative assessment) is an integral part of children’s learning and development. What has changed in the new EYFS is the emphasis on the ‘professional knowledge’ of the childminder. When doing the ‘assessment’ part of the planning – implementation – assessment process, ‘Practitioners should draw on their own knowledge of the child and their own expert professional judgment and should not be required to prove this through a collection of physical evidence’.

Ofsted is making it clear that they do not want to see data. They are not going to look at your learning journeys with random snapshot photos and hundreds of ‘next steps’ written out because that sort of data is often meaningless. You still need to assess children and be very aware of exactly where each child is in their learning and development. But you no longer need to feel you have to ‘prove’ the observation.

When you do assessments you should:

  • Focus on what is useful
  • Establish starting points
  • Use the checkpoints in Development Matters as checkpoints, not checklists
  • Involve the parents
  • Take the attitude of inclusion: every child can thrive

 

You must promote oral health

The new EYFS makes it clear that you ‘must promote the good health including oral health of the children you look after. This is an addition to what was previously there and is in response to the growing problem of tooth decay in young children, particularly children from disadvantaged backgrounds. The basic message you are hoping to teach to children is that too many sugary foods are bad for you, and that you should brush your teeth.

Planning activities to promote oral health into your curriculum does not have to be complicated. Suppose you look after a child from a home where you know the parents very rarely brush his teeth?  You can make an enormous difference to that child’s oral health if YOU brush his teeth after he eats lunch with you. You are teaching him a skill he needs that will hopefully become a good habit. Furthermore, you are ensuring that his teeth are, at the very least, being brushed once a day while you look after him. And if you really want to do your bit towards helping him even more you can gently encourage the parents to help him at home, perhaps with a take home reward chart he can use each time he brushes his teeth at home?

Specific activities and resources for promoting oral health are available in my Be Safe Be Healthy pack.

Non-prescription medication does not need a doctor’s note

GPs have been finding that providers were requiring parents to get prescriptions for non-prescription medications. The new EYFS makes it clear that providers only need to have a prescription for prescription medication. So a child does not have to have a prescription for the Calpol for you to give it to him. Nothing else has really changed. You still need to get permission in writing for every medication (including Calpol) and you can only give prescription medicines that have been prescribed by a doctor, dentist, nurse or pharmacist.

In practice all childminders should have both a long term medication permission form (for Calpol etc) and a short term medication form (for antibiotics), a written record each time a medicine is administered to a child, and a way to ensure that the parent is informed ‘on the same day or as soon as reasonably practicable’. While the EYFS does not specifically state that a parent must sign your ‘medicines administered book’, I think this is a good, tidy, more traceable method than relying on a Whatsapp message.

Are you putting infants down to sleep properly and safely according to the EYFS guidelines? 

The new EYFS includes a link to the NHS guidance on reducing the risk of sudden infant death syndrome. What this means for childminders is that how you put a baby down to sleep while they are in your care is no longer at the discretion of parents – so please make sure you are familiar with the details in this link – there’s more than just putting babies on their backs.

Cyber Security for Early Years – are you doing everything you should be?

This page is full of practical information that childminders can use to check that you are doing everything you can to keep you, your setting and your data safe from cyber attacks. The site reminds you that “For Early Years practitioners, cyber security also plays a role in safeguarding the children in your care.” The link to this page was included as a footnote in the new EYFS.

Are you supervising children while they are eating?

To me, this has always been absolutely obvious: of course you must supervise children while they are eating – what if they start choking?  However, maybe not everyone was getting this, so this requirement has now been spelled out in the new EYFS. You MUST supervise children while they are eating so that rapid action can be taken if needed to save them! So does this mean that you have to literally keep them in your gaze at all times – what if you have to pop back into the kitchen to grab some ketchup. Please rest assured that ‘supervised’ is clearly defined by the EYFS. “Children must usually be within sight and hearing of staff but always within sight or hearing”.

Recommended menus and food preparation advice for early years

This series of example menus and associated guidance has been developed to support early years settings (such as nurseries and childminders) to offer food and drink in line with current government dietary recommendations for infants and children aged 6 months to 4 years. It also includes food safety, managing food allergies and reading food labels. This guide was included as a footnote in the new EYFS.

You should not vape or use e-cigarettes around children (or smoke)

The new EYFS makes it clear that as well as providers not allowing smoking in or on the premises when children are present that staff should not ‘vape or use e-cigarettes when children are around’ either. This addition is in line with Public Health England’s advice on use of e-cigarettes in the workplace.

Those are the key new points of new release of the Sept 2021 EYFS. You need to read the cited documents and make sure that you are following the new guidelines before they become statutory in September. 

Good luck!

Do you want to improve your understanding of the Characteristics of Effective Learning?

Promoting the Characteristics of Effective Learning PosterFor help putting the Characteristics of Effective Learning into practice including tools, activity ideas, certificates you can give to children, poster and display ideas, CPD worksheets for your setting, examples for your SEF and a setting checklist for the COEL, check out my new Characteristics of Effective Learning Pack for childminders.

About Kay Woods and Kids To Go

Kay Woods Kids To GoKay Woods has been writing and selling childminding resources through her company Kids To Go since 2008. Her products include the Ultimate Childminding Checklist, the Learning Journey Plus for planning, observation and assessment and best practice resources promoting diversity and childminding in the great outdoors (Forest Childcare). She is the author of the Start Learning book set published by Tarquin and she writes the free quarterly Childminding Best Practice Newsletter.

Lots of places offer help to childminders. I provide solutions.

www.kidstogo.co.uk

Jennifer Inspection

How to get outstanding under the New Inspection Framework

Last updated 22/03/2023

Getting outstanding is always a mixture of luck on the day, plus hours and hours of preparation beforehand to improve your chances that luck goes your way. Before you can get outstanding you must first make sure everything is ‘good’. So read the Inspection Handbook to make sure you are meeting the requirements for getting good. Here are some new things mentioned specifically in the 2019 Inspection Framework that you should consider if you want to get outstanding.

Story Time

Child looking at a book at his childminder's.

Ofsted wants to see you reading to the children you look after. Reading is specifically stressed in several places. Hold a story time while the inspector is there and think of other ways to show how you encourage literacy including encouraging the parents to share books with their children at home. This article discusses how to get the most out of reading traditional stories with children.

 

Teach the children some new words

Improving vocabulary is also mentioned in several places in the Education Inspection Framework (EIF) and Inspection Handbook. Try to find an activity to demonstrate to the inspector that involves teaching the children some new vocabulary words. If you are stuck for ideas why not try this ‘wild words’ scavenger hunt?

Share information with parents

You must share information with parents about their child’s progress in relation to the EYFS. You should support parents to extend their child’s learning at home, including encouraging a love of reading. There are lots of ways to do this such as What’ App’ messages, talking to parents, lending them books or sharing information you have found on-line. You can also make displays for parents to look at or stick with traditional Learning Journals.

Cultural capital

Make sure to use this term in front of the inspector! Make sure you are doing starting points observations on the children so you can establish any gaps in their learning and plan for them. This article has more on cultural capital. Do not make light of this! Make sure you are familiar with the term and are planning accordingly for the children you care for.

Sing songs

Songs, rhymes and musical games are specifically mentioned as ways to improve children’s speech and language. Make sure to demonstrate a song or rhyme or two! (You might find this article about nursery rhymes interesting.)

The language of feelings

Ofsted has stressed the importance of teaching children the ‘language of feelings’. Find ways to show that you do this at your setting or pick an activity to do with the children that gets them talking about feelings. ‘Emotional literacy’ is a biggie.

Teach diversity

Eid diversity awareness for childminders

Make sure you can demonstrate that you are teaching children about different cultures and religions and try and make these activities relevant to the children you look after in Britain. The Kids To Go MEGA Diversity Awareness Pack can help you to choose relevant activities.

Promote British values

Show that you are ACTIVELY promoting British values. Make sure you know what these are and can state examples of what you do to promote them. You won’t even get ‘good’ if you are not doing this.

(In each monthly ‘Childminding Best Practice Club‘ Toolkit there is a different tip for either British values or diversity, along with a monthly activity for you to do with your children.)

 Promote independence in matters of self care

Make a big deal out of asking the children to put their own shoes on and coats, help tidy up, set the table and pour their own drinks etc. Show how you encourage children to learn to be independent ready for starting school.

Know what your potty training procedure is

Potty training is specifically mentioned in the new Inspection Framework, probably in response to the increasing number of children who start school not potty trained. Even if you don’t have any children being potty trained at the time of your inspection, make sure you can describe your procedure (including how you communicate with parents about this subject).

Promote resilience

Resilience is one of the most important aspects of the Characteristics of Effective Learning (COEL). Children do better in school if they can pick themselves up after a set back and try again. This is a skill that can be nurtured, practiced and taught to children and one that can make a huge difference to their life chances. The Kids To Go COEL pack gives you lots of great ways you can promote this important life skill.

Promote physical activity and risk taking

A young boy developing physical skills and learning to judge risks by climbing a tree.

Be clear about not only how you give children opportunities to run around and get exercise, but also how this activity promotes children’s risk taking skills. How do you encourage children to take appropriate risks so they can build character by ‘failing and falling’ sometimes.

 

The internet, digital technology and social media

If the children have access to the internet, how do you check they are using it safely? Furthermore, how to you encourage parents to promote internet safety at home? Read this article about internet safety to help get you started.

 

Be able to explain what you need to do to improve

This is not new but it is more important than ever to have an accurate self evaluation of your setting’s strengths and weaknesses and to demonstrate that you have a plan in place to address areas you would like to improve. You don’t need to write this down, but you should have a clear idea of what you do well and what you might need to improve. I think it is easier to put at least some of the points in writing so that you can refer to them during your inspection and make sure you actually do them.

 What plans for Continual Professional Development (CPD) do you have for yourself and any assistants you employ?

You should have a plan for your own CPD. I think it is a good idea to keep a written record of this so that you can produce this for your inspector and show you are trying to continuously learn. Remember that CPD does not just have to be formal courses put on by your local authority. The Childminding Best Practice Club toolkits have CPD activities you can try each month – it’s just about trying new things or looking at something you have been doing for years in a new way, and asking yourself what you learned from the skill, what the children learned and how you would do things differently next time.

Safeguarding, safeguarding, safeguarding

You will not get good if you are not meeting the safeguarding requirements, so make sure you read the Inspecting Safeguarding handbook, recognise the signs of abuse, could identify a child at risk and could explain to your inspector without looking it up what you would do if you thought a child you were looking after was being abused.

Lots of this is not necessarily new, but it stressed more than before in the new Inspection Handbook. Aim high! Outstanding is an achievable goal that any childminder can get with hard work and the determination to be the best at what you do.

Childminding Best Practice Club

Join the Childminding Best Practice Club for just £2.50 each month to receive monthly themed packs emailed to your inbox.

Join the Best Practice Club

 

About Kids To Go

Kids To Go was established in 2008. Products include the Ultimate Childminding Checklist, best practice resources promoting diversity, safety and childminding in the great outdoors (Forest Childcare). It is the home of the Childminding Best Practice Club and the free weekly Childminding Best Practice newsletters.

kIDS TO GO
back to inspections main menu
Jennifer Characteristics of Effective Learning (COEL), Childminding best practice, Inspection, Learning Journeys, Planning for childminders

What does ‘Cultural Capital’ mean childminders should DO?

The first and most important thing to say about “Cultural Capital” –  is DON’T PANIC.

  • You do not need to attend a training course on cultural capital.
  • Ofsted does not want to see a poster up in your setting labelled cultural capital.
  • You do not have to start taking childminded children to the opera!

Cultural capital is defined in the EYFS framework as ‘the essential knowledge that children need to be educated citizens’ and what is necessary to ‘prepare them for future success’. Some children arrive at your setting with different experiences than others. The experiences they arrive with are their ‘cultural capital’. All children have SOME cultural capital when they arrive with you at your setting. But for some, this cultural capital is not enough to narrow the gap and get them ready for school (and for life!). The curriculum you plan for that unique child can make all the difference to his or her future.

Your job as a childminder is to find ways to establish what a child’s ‘gaps in learning’ are, and then plan your curriculum to help the child in the area that he is missing or behind.

As soon as a child starts in your setting you should be gathering information about a child’s starting points to help you understand where they might have gaps in their cultural capital. I recommend using the ‘All About Me,’ forms from the ‘Super Summative Assessment,’ pack with parents to start with and then follow that up with your own starting points a few weeks later. (There is lots more information and advice in the pack so if you have a copy, fish it out and have a look!) For example, parents may write on their ‘All about Me’ form that their child does not know any nursery rhymes. Therefore for this child learning nursery rhymes would be very beneficial.

Reading to children is essential to develop their communication and language

Another key example is communication and language; an area in which many children are currently needing additional support and input. Some children arrive at your setting speaking really well with great vocabularies because they are exposed to lots of words and their parents read loads of books to them at home. Research has shown time and again that this gives them a massive advantage in school and in life. Other children come from much less fortunate backgrounds where they are not read to so much at home and know far fewer words. If you identify talking and vocabulary for example, as a child’s weakness, then your job as their childminder is to find ways to enhance it. In other words, you should make sure to plan a curriculum where you read a lot more and talk a lot more to children whose parents do not read to them at home.

What about the Characteristics of Effective Learning?

The same rule applies right across the areas of learning and development and also applies to the characteristics of effective learning. For example, if a child has not had opportunities to explore their creativity and imagination then this is an area on which I recommend you focus.

Another example is a child who is never given any choices at home and who appears to passively take everything he is given. You can enhance his learning and prepare him for school by encouraging him to make choices and be independent while he is with you.

If you find the characteristics of effective learning confusing, or would just like some more ideas around the topic, look the the ‘Characteristics of Effective Learning,’ pack for help and guidance.

Provide a broad and balanced curriculum.

Enhancing cultural capital by gardening with childminding and early years children.
Gardening is one way to enhance children’s cultural capital

I know, it sounds like a party political broadcast soundbite doesn’t it?! However this is really important and part of what Ofsted have been trying to promote. Simply put it means that you need to make sure you are giving children opportunities to learn about lots of different things across all seven areas of learning. It is good practice to use children’s interests, for example, tractors, to help engage and interest them in their learning but if all you ever offer is tractor themed activities they will not learn about other things like dinosaurs, plants, healthy eating and so on. Instead offer other activities that help children broaden their knowledge of the world.

Here is a quick checklist of what you need to do to ‘do’ cultural capital:

  • Do starting points observations on all new children across all the learning and development areas and the COEL. This will show you the child’s strengths and areas of weaknesses.
  • Ask yourself what you would do to fill the child’s gaps in learning. Think of a plan for each individual child. What can you develop? What can you encourage? What are their next steps? (Don’t forget to share these with parents.) This is your ‘intent.’
  • Follow through on your plans. (This is your ‘implementation’ stage.) After you’ve been doing your plans for a while, check that your plans are having an effect. (What has been their ‘impact’?) Has the child started to catch up? Have you broadened their cultural capital from when they started with you?

This blog was updated in August 2023

You may also find these resources helpful:

Childminding Best Practice Club

One way of making sure children are exposed to plenty of new ideas and concepts is by planning around themes. Childminding Best Practice Club members receive a monthly ‘toolkit’ containing loads of planning, crafts, activities and colouring sheets all around a different theme each month. To find out more see the information page here:

Expand children’s learning with the Childminding best practice club

Super Summative Assessment and Gap Tracker Kit

This kit will help you recognise any gaps in children’s learning and also contains all the tools you need to sum up a child’s development and achievements, right from when a child starts with you, all the way until they leave to go to nursery or school. From ‘All about Me’ forms, starting points, transition and report templates as well as sample reports, tips and of course a gap tracker for when you need it.

Super Summative assessment kit
characteristics of effective learning for childminders

Characteristics of Effective Learning

Confused by the Characteristics? This pack can help. It contains information about the Characteristics of Effective Learning, broken down in a way that is easy to absorb, as well as business tools, printable posters and activities

CHARACTERISTICS OF EFFECTIVE LEARNING PACK

 Childminding Best Practice Newsletter

Sign up for my free weekly Childminding Best Practice newsletter and I will send you best practice ideas, childminding news, EYFS tips, outstanding ideas, stories from other childminders, arts and crafts project templates, new products, and links.

Sign up for free newsletter
Jennifer Business tips for childminders, Childminding best practice, Marketing

How childminders can cut costs and save money

Looking at ways to keep costs down has always been important in childminding, but with the advent of the 30 hours, many childminders are feeling more financial pressure than ever. I asked other childminders to share how they save costs in their settings and received lots of ideas including some really original ones you may not have thought of:

 

childminders cutting costs Replace cooked meals with packed lunches

One obvious way to cut costs is to abandon hot lunches and replace them with packed lunches brought from home. One childminder wrote, “I stopped doing main meals but still charge the same – best thing I ever did.”

I feel sad about this because studies have shown that packed lunches are rarely as healthy as hot meals and often contain low quality food and junk food. Childminders are generally more informed about nutrition than the average parent and are in a position to help give children the best start in life by offering them healthy, nutritious meals. Childminder Jan Bartram writes, “I really don’t encourage packed lunches. A lot of them are packed with cheap processed food full of sugar and salt.” I do feel that offering children a hot lunch is the best option. If you can.

According to an article in Nursery World (18th Sept 2017), which addressed the problem of settings cutting costs by offering hot meals as an optional extra rather than a default, “children from the poorest families are likely to be the worst affected”. This is because faced with the choice of paying extra for the hot meal, or bringing their own meal from home, many parents will choose to send their own. Poor children are exactly the ones who benefit the most from that hot healthy meal at lunch time, and will be the most likely to miss out.

From a childminding business sense, cutting out hot lunches can be a major cost savings for your setting and therefore it makes perfect sense. If your business is struggling then you should consider it. However, before you go down that line, there are several great suggestions from childminders who continue to make and provide hot lunches for children that I want you to consider first:

 

Cost saving ideas for childminders who provide meals

Lots of childminders suggest batch cooking and then freezing meals into portions. For this you need to have a big freezer to store things in individual plastic bags or Tupperware. Generally, if you cost it out, it works out cheaper if you are cooking a bolognaise to buy the ingredients to cook a big batch of it and freeze it, than to cook it one meal at a time. It is also considerably less work that way for you!

Pay attention to portion sizes and don’t put too much on children’s plates at once. One childminder wrote, “I will often have 3 little ones share a two slice of bread sandwich (along with fruit, cheese, veg sticks etc). Some days they eat it all and want more so I would make more; other days they aren’t that hungry, so then it doesn’t go to waste.”

portion size fishfingersUnderstanding portion sizes is also important so that you don’t accidentally overfeed small children. This link shows you what portion sizes should look like for toddlers for many common items and may surprise many people.

Buying the ingredients for the food you cook for the children when it is on sale, or buying it wholesale is another suggestion one childminder makes. “We have also found that the local butchers, fishmongers etc are willing to open an account for us as a business which allows you to get trade prices which is often cheaper than supermarkets and the meat/ fish is locally sourced.”

Another suggestion is to use your local market. Jan Bartram writes: “We buy fruit on the afternoon school run at our Thursday market. By then there are always bargains to be had. In June I took 3 schoolies and two toddlers and we bought 3 punnets of strawberries (large ones) for £1.50.”

Childminder Kay Hartburn provides all meals and snacks for her families. She writes: “I bulk cook so I can freeze some for other days. Although I don’t cook vegetarian meals I do 50% meat and 50% lentils and vegetables. Not only is it healthier it helps make the meals much cheaper. I actually love lentils and all the children eat everything I make and they love the different texture the lentils give the meals. If I have any vegetables left over I make soup or use them in stocks. Fruit is used to make other desserts like toffee apple cake or smoothie or banana bread. I do like to cook and enjoy thinking about how to use left overs in new and interesting ways the children will eat. It saves a massive amount of money.”

Whatever you do regarding providing hot meals at your setting, it is important to be honest with yourself and parents about how much the meals are costing you. You need to really sit down and do the maths, as the costs of feeding extra little mouths add up fairly quickly over the course of a week/month/year. Be especially careful with older after school children – as they can eat an awful lot more – and if you’re not careful, you will find that food costs really add up.

 

Snack time savings

childminder food safetyThe most obvious way to save money at snack time is to get parents to bring snacks from home in the same way that they send in packed lunches. However, like with the packed lunches, many parents’ ideas about healthy snacks and what a snack should be, will not measure up to what you could offer. With that in mind, here are some other suggestions for snack time savings:

Childminder Helen Qureshi asks parents to each bring a piece of fruit or something to share at snack time that day. She writes, “I started this a few months ago and it’s working very well. The children enjoy handing it over and parents are absolutely fine. One parent kept on forgetting but as we said to bring fruit or pay 50p per day they started to bring fruit. We did say it was either that or putting our fees up, so they were more than happy.”

Georgina Tattum does something similar. “I ask parents to send in snacks. I suggested they could either send in a few snacks each day or I would charge £1 per day for snacks to cover costs. They all send snacks in which is nice for the children as they get a variety. I still cook lunch and evening meals which the parents really like me doing and some parents would rather pay the £1 per day as they are busy and feel it’s easier for me to provide them.”

 

Cutting costs with craft supplies

The cost of all that paint, glue and art paper you need to look after childminded children can really add up, so it’s important to be honest about what those supplies are costing you and to keep good records. Many childminders told me that they cut costs on art supplies by simply waiting and buying things when they are sale. For example, if you know you are still going to be a childminder in December 2018, then I would be buying my little Christmas craft kits for next year this January when they are all heavily reduced and storing them in my shed for a year!

Childminder Rebecca Wilson suggested joining a “Scrapstore”. They re-use and recycle stuff for artistic and educational purposes. She writes, “Our council have membership so childminders get in free. I get the majority of my art and craft materials there, and they often have really interesting stuff that can be used in small-world, or home-corner type play. It saves money and is environmentally friendly.” Ask your council about membership or see if you and a few other childminders in your area can get together and join which is what lots of childminders do.

 

Second hand toys and equipment

An easy way to save money is to buy second hand toys and equipment. This is especially true if you are just setting up your childminding business and need to buy lots at once. There are lots of places you can buy second hand items online including Ebay and Gumtree. Facebook has a group especially for childminders to buy and sell items. They have everything from triple push chairs, to toys (I remember selling my own “Mr. Potato Head Set with one missing limb” on that site years ago!

nct nearly new saleHowever, many people prefer to pick things up and physically see them before buying second hand so if this is you as well as charity shops and car boot sales you may want to try your local NCT Nearly New Sale. When I was pregnant I got most of my baby supplies at one of these sales and it was really nice to open and close pushchairs, and test the latches on the baby gates, high chairs and travel cots etc. before parting with cash.

My advice if you go to these is if you have a particular item you want (like a double pushchair) to arrive early so you are first in the queue. Head straight for the item you want and grab hold of it. Bring your partner so they can hold the things you want, while you grab other items. Sharpen your elbows, wear trainers and remember that you can move much faster than a woman who is 8 months pregnant!!!

 

Sharing and borrowing resources

Lots of childminders share resources between them at childminder groups or toddler groups. For example, rather than each childminder making their own heuristic play set, many childminders all contribute some items and then pass the resource bag around. Your council or childminding group may be able to help you to get something like this started in your area.

If you have a local toy library, these are great thing to join. Our local library used to have a toy section which was great for borrowing jigsaws etc., but it closed down. In many toy libraries you pay a fee to join and then you can borrow what you like. Do a web search to see if you have a toy library in your area.

 

Free and discounted activities for childminders

Ask at your library about free and discounted activities run especially for childminders. Our local library runs a music group on a Wednesday that is just for childminders, only 50p per child. Compared to a private music club in our area which costs £4 per child, it is a total bargain. Libraries often have free arts classes as well as cooking and special activities around the holidays.

Always ask if places have special admission fees for childminders. One of our local soft play gyms has special childminder rates one morning a week – a great deal.

 

Apply for a childminding grant

Don’t pass up ‘free money’. Childminding grants exist for newly registered childminders in England. I got loads of brilliant toys with mine when I started that I would never have bought otherwise.

At the moment grants of up to £1000 are available to childminders who are planning to offer the 30 hours funded childcare. Check if you’re eligible and get more information here.

 

Childminding Best Practice Club – save 25% on my childminding resources

Childminding best practice club logoJoin the Childminding Best Practice Club for just £2.50 each month to receive monthly themed packs emailed to your inbox and 25% discount on all of my products for childminders. Great value for money on high quality products!

 

 

Can you think of other ways to save money and cut costs that I’ve missed? Please leave me a comment.

 

About Kay Woods and Kids To Go

Kay Woods Kids To GoKay Woods has been writing and selling childminding resources through her company Kids To Go since 2008. Her products include the Ultimate Childminding Checklist, the Learning Journey Plus for planning, observation and assessment and best practice resources promoting diversity, safety and childminding in the great outdoors (Forest Childcare). She is the author of the Start Learning book set published by Tarquin and she writes the free quarterly Childminding Best Practice Newsletter.

Lots of places offer help to childminders. I provide solutions.

http://www.kidstogo.co.uk/childminders/childminding.html

Jennifer Business tips for childminders, Childminding best practice, Marketing

Why childminders should consider limiting the choices they let parents and children make

An episode of Supermarket Secrets got me thinking about childminding businesses and my own business of making products for childminders. In the episode, a jam maker with a small market stall had about 20 different types of jam that customers could choose between. As an experiment, she was asked to remove most of the jams, leaving customers with a choice of only her 5 best-selling jams. To her surprise, she started selling MORE jams than ever before.

pot of jam The point of the experiment was to show that, while people like to have SOME choice, too much choice about things that don’t really matter (like flavour of jam) can cause people to get so overwhelmed that they decide it is easier not to buy any at all. By focussing the customers’ choices around just 5 flavours of jam, the customers still felt they had a choice, but without being overwhelmed by that choice.

The experiment fascinated me. I have never thought of this before! I always thought the more choice you give people the better. But I realised I needed to rethink things. The jam experiment can be applied to many businesses, from large supermarkets to childminding businesses and even to my own business with the packs I make for childminders.

 

Limiting children’s choices

I want to start by thinking about minded children who like and need to be given the opportunity to choose things. The more choices that you can give them, the better for building and promoting the characteristics that will make them into effective learners. But anybody who has ever asked a child ‘which toy would you like to play with?’ while staring at a cupboard full of toys, will recognise the vacant, drooling expression they will get as a response. Because the toy cupboard is too big, the decision is overwhelming, and there is too much choice.

childminding in small spaces toys bookSo one way to apply the jam experiment to childminded children is to focus their choices by giving them a between two or three toys. This way, they feel they have power but without being overwhelmed. The same applies to footwear (shoes or wellies), car seat strap (which arm first?), sandwich fillings (cheese or ham?), sandwich shape (square or triangle), colour of plate (red or green) and choice of fruit (apple or banana?). Giving choices, while limiting those choices to two things you are happy for a child to choose between, gives you all the power while the child has the illusion of feeling nicely in control of his life.

Where this can really be helpful is when you are trying to get a child to try new things or to do things they don’t really want to do. They don’t want to do potty training, but if you can offer them a choice of using the potty or the big toilet, they can feel they have some power over this awful thing they are being forced to do. They don’t want to go on a walk, but if they have the choice of the park at the end of your street or the playground at the common ground, then they feel more in control. If they never want to do the arts and crafts projects or other structured activities you set up for them, have you ever tried redirecting their attention from the task by giving them a choice about something completely irrelevant: like if they would like to stand up or sit down while they work? The illusion of choice gives all the power to you, empowers the child in a good way and makes everyone more happy.

 

Limiting parents’ choices

The second key group of people who badly need their choices limited are parents. Parents have really important decisions they have to make all the time. By the time they get their child to your house on a morning, they have already made a hundred decisions for their child, some important and many not. They are ready to hand their child across to you and have some of the pressure removed from them for a short while.

If you ask people if they like to have choices, everybody will say yes. But what the jam experiment shows us is that most people would really like to have a few important choices to make, but not have to spend too much time choosing things that don’t matter very much. You can help parents and help yourself if you get parents to focus on the one or two decisions you really need them to make, and then helping them further by making the rest of the minor decisions for them.  Here are some areas where I feel many childminders overcomplicate things for parents for giving them too much choice:

 

Outings

Suppose you run your business so that parents can decide which outings to send their children on. This is a common suggestion for childminders who are offering the funded hours, to give parents the ‘option’ to pay extra for outings. I disagree with this approach.

Feeding the goatsIf you charge extra for these outings and let parents decide whether to send their children on them or not, then every single outing is a decision for the parent they may not really want to make. They will think they want power over this decision, but truthfully, they will be happier if it is out of their hands. Can we afford the entrance money for the farm on top of the hourly rate? Maybe we should wait and take our precious little boy there ourselves at the weekend? What if I upset my childminder by saying I’d rather he didn’t go?  What if he feeds his first goat when I’m not there to take the photograph for Facebook? Parents don’t want to go through this stressful thought process for every little day trip you take to something with an entrance fee (music club, soft play etc).

When you offer parents choices about things like this that don’t really matter, then you are making them sweat and worry over choices they really don’t need to make. Giving parents choices about outings is also really annoying for you, as what will you do if one parent says no?  If you have in your contract right from the start that outings are included in your fees and you take them regularly, then you have removed from that parent one extra decision they simply don’t need to bother with. By choosing your setting, they are choosing outings. Decision made. Phew.

 

Meals

child eatingMany childminders offer parents a choice of a hot meal or providing their own lunch. If you charge extra for the meal, many parents will feel they should bring their own from home to save money. If this decision is removed from parents, by stating in your policies that “a hot meal is included in your price and there is no discount if you want to provide your own food” means that you never have to deal with refunds at the end of the month, awful unhealthy packed lunches, or worse, asking parents to decide which days they would like a hot meal for their child this week, and which days they will providing it. Providing hot lunches as a default means that all the children eat the same thing, healthy things you have control over. Parents actually love the convenience of NOT having to make lunch each morning.

One childminder offered children (via their parents) a choice hot lunch for the week. It was a lovely idea, but then I thought about it from the parents’ point of view: I really don’t care if my child eats lasagne or a jacket potato on Tuesday – could you please just feed him so I can go to work, happy in the knowledge that he is being fed a healthy meal that I don’t have to make myself!

How you choose to structure mealtime is ultimately up to you, especially in light of the new funded hours, but remember that it is totally your choice what you do, so don’t make a rod for your own back by making the whole thing too complicated for yourself or for parents.

 

Prices, hourly rates and holidays

A childminder posted a question on Facebook the other day asking if she should start charging for the school run from when she leaves her house, or when she actually collects the child? She further wondered if she should still charge for the walk on days she was collecting her own child as well as the childminded ones. In my opinion, this gives the parents far too much to worry about. If you structure your payment scheme like this, then the parents will have to spend their evenings scrutinising the bill each month to make sure they have been charged correctly. You leave them with too many choices to consider.

The simple way to avoid this is to keep it simple for them by charging a flat rate before and after school. They can either take up one of your after school places at a £15 flat rate (for ex.) or they can go somewhere else. They can either keep their child with you until 6pm, or collect him earlier but there is no discount as they have paid until 6pm to hold the space.

 

My new Childminding Best Practice Club with monthly themed packs is intentionally designed to limit choices for childminders

One of the ways I adapted the jam idea of limiting choices was when I started the Childminding Best Practice Club a few months back. The key benefit of the Club is a monthly themed pack of activities (like space themed crafts) emailed straight to the childminder.

childminding best practice club space issueI really worried when I launched the Club. There are 7000 crafts with space themes for pre-schoolers online. I really worried about those 7000 space activities because I worried that people wouldn’t want to join my Club because they could just find ideas online and copy them.

But the truth is that people find 7000 preschool space craft projects completely overwhelming. You start scrolling through them and by the time you’ve looked at a few pages of ideas you are so overwhelmed you make the decision that it’s probably easier not to do space theme after all this month.

By limiting people’s choices to the seven or so ideas in the pack, that come with templates already made that just have to be printed off, childminders have responded really well to having their choices ‘focussed’ for them in this way. When offered a choice of 7000 crafts, or just 7 crafts with templates, to my surprise people have been very pleased with the ‘focus my packs have given them’ and as a result lots of childminders have joined.

 

Limiting choices focusses you on what is important

Parents are overwhelmed with choices at the moment, especially in regards to funding. In a market that is saturated with choice, often about decisions that don’t really matter all that much, you can really help parents by focussing their choices on the stuff that really matters in your setting. You can help yourself out too by limiting choices about things that cause you more work.

Research has shown that people actually feel more comfortable making choices when there are less items to choose from. Think about all the ways you can apply this to your own childminding business from how you treat the children, to your policies and permission forms, meals you provide, late fees and hourly prices.  Look at how you structure choice on your forms and in your daily routines and ask yourself: do I really need to give the parents choice here? Is this too much choice? Am I overwhelming them with decisions they don’t really need or want to make?

Aim to make things easier on children, parents and yourself. There are so many important decisions that parents have to make – and there are many more decisions that are essentially just flavours of jam.

 

Childminding Best Practice Club

Childminding best practice club logoJoin the Childminding Best Practice Club for just £2.50 each month to receive monthly themed packs emailed to your inbox.

 

 

About Kay Woods and Kids To Go

Kay Woods Kids To GoKay Woods has been writing and selling childminding resources through her company Kids To Go since 2008. Her products include the Ultimate Childminding Checklist, the Learning Journey Plus for planning, observation and assessment and best practice resources promoting diversity, safety and childminding in the great outdoors (Forest Childcare). She is the author of the Start Learning book set published by Tarquin and she writes the free quarterly Childminding Best Practice Newsletter.

Lots of places offer help to childminders. I provide solutions.

http://www.kidstogo.co.uk/childminders/childminding.html