Woodentots Nursery

Your child will be cared for by their Key Person during their attendance at the setting and will also be familiar with other members of the team who work within the room. Primarily the education programmes are planned by Key Person’s in line with each child’s individual needs, interests and developmental stage to ensure all plans are specifically targeting each child’s progression. Educational programmes are closely monitored and assessments are moderated by room leaders to ensure there is suitable depth and breadth across the seven areas of learning and that they are suitable and appropriate to support further progression. If your child has specific educational needs the SENCo will work alongside the key person to ensure the suitability of activities and will devise an Individual Education Plan (IEP) in partnership with parents and Key Person. Key Person’s attend regular meetings with their room leaders (at least every six weeks) to evaluate their planning in line with the developmental progression observed by children and to determine next steps in learning. Parents are also invited to these meetings to provide an insight of their child’s progression at home.

Throughout the setting we follow the Early Year Foundation Stage framework (EYFS), for more information [https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/early-years-foundation-stage click here]. All activities and experiences planned within the setting are in line with each child’s individual needs and are planned around their interests to fully engage them in their own learning. We ensure any large group activities are differentiated to offer support or challenge which ensures every child can participate. The level of support and guidance provided by practitioners will also be planned to ensure each child is included and able to learn at their own level.

We are completely open to support you with your child’s needs and development and are available for you to come in to discuss anything you may need and offer support or practical advice. Every child has a Electronic Learning Journal in which we upload observations supported with photographs and videos. Assessments are added to each observation to show how and where your child is progressing within their learning. You are able to access your child’s learning journal at any time through a secure internet connection and we actively encourage you to add your own observations and assessments along with making comments on the observations that we have uploaded. This ensures we have a holistic view of your child’s development both at home and nursery. Your child’s key person will make initial assessments and plan next steps during your child’s first month of attendance to ensure their development is supported from the beginning. They will have a written summary of their progress compiled each term and we encourage you to meet with the Key Person to compile this summary together. This ensures that all next steps are agreed and are supported consistently with your child. In addition we carry out a statutory progress check around your child’s second birthday to further gauge your child’s progression against expected milestones. Again, this check is completed in partnership with parents. We feel very strongly that if we had any concerns we wouldn’t wait for any of these reviews and deal with any concerns immediately.

Members of the senior staff team are responsible for administering all medicines and if your child requires support that we are not trained to give we would ensure they attended the appropriate courses. The setting has a policy for administering medicines which is available on request. All staff will be regularly updated during staff meetings regarding any medical conditions to ensure everyone is aware of them and how to best manage any situation. All staff have relevant up to date first aid training along with all staff receiving safeguarding training. Our lead practitioner for safeguarding runs in house training to update staff on any changes to the safeguarding policy and practices. Our SENDCo works with staff and parents in supporting children with behavioural needs and we put strategies in place to support them and the other children in the setting, to ensure they are included in all activities in an appropriate way. Children may be given a behaviour plan to outline the support we will be giving them and we will discuss and review this along with parents. The children within our nursery have their own opinions and can contribute to their learning and development. To do this we observe them showing their opinions through their behaviour and actions. As children get older and are more able to verbalise we ensure we take their opinions into account when planning activities and completing IEPs or behaviour plans.

We have links with lots of different specialist services due to the support we currently offer children already attending the setting. If we do not currently have links with a service your child needs to access we would ensure we develop links with the required agencies or specialists your child needed to ensure they are receiving as much support as possible. We currently work with Area Inco, SALT, Outreach EP’s, our local children’s centre and the Early Year’s Advisory Team.

All of our nursery practitioners have undertaken general training relating to SEND whilst undertaking their qualification. We have a SENDCo who has completed specialist training relating to the role. At present a member of staff is currently in the transition to undertake the role of BECo and has just completed positive approaches in managing behaviour.

>All of our activities are adapted to ensure all of the children will be able to access and participate in them in their own way. Due to the location of the setting we only plan outings within the establishment; however there are many opportunities on offer within this environment. We reduce the ratio of children to staff when outside of the setting to ensure all children are adequately supervised and supported. A risk assessment is carried out prior to any outings to ensure everyone’s health and safety will not be compromised. In the unlikely event the we determine it is unsafe for a child to take part in this activity then we may ask for parents to come with us on the trip if possible or alternatively we will provide activities for the child within the setting.

The setting is situated at ground floor level and is mostly accessed via ramps. We do have steps (no more than three) in two buildings; however these can be accessed by an alternative route. In addition the setting has disabled toilet facilities. Our outdoor environment is fully accessible from the indoors, however as it is mostly laid to grass the ground is quite uneven which may present difficulties when moving in a wheelchair when it in wet weather. We are very open to adapting our environment to suit all needs where possible.

We encourage all children to visit their school before starting, We try to work closely with the school/new setting and invite them to come in to see the children in the nursery as well as visiting the children at home with their parents. For children with SEND we would encourage the school to arrange more visits for the child to the new school to ensure the transition is as smooth as possible. We begin to do school based role play and lots of activities to promote what it will be like in school as well as stories and social stories depicting what they will experience at school and how they may feel about the transition. We also try to set up transition books for each child going to school showing them photographs of their new school and the people that will be caring for them. We will speak to the new school/ provision to give them as much information about your child as possible as well as sending a transition form and all of their developmental paperwork and learning journey. If your child has SEND we may arrange an IPA or Transition meeting to get all of the professionals working with your child together to ensure the school or new provision knows how best to support them and what they may need to put into place before your child starts with them.

The setting is divided across four large rooms and children are arranged into these rooms based on their age. Each environment is carefully planned and frequently evaluated to ensure appropriate resources for the child’s age and stage of development. Individual needs are always taken into account and transitions to the next room will only occur when it is felt the child is ready. All children receive up to 570 hours per funded year of free early years education the term following their third birthday. Additional funding can be claimed for children with special educational needs and Disability (SEND). Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) funding is allocated to your child where appropriate. A meeting is held with you and the key person to discuss how the funding should be spent for the benefit of your child. The majority of the time in the early stages of the funding it would usually support your child with one to one time with their key person through the week.

Your child’s key person, SENDCo, Area InCo and any other external agencies will discuss, along with yourselves, what support would be appropriate for your child’s needs. All children will need different types and levels of support so this will be based solely on your child’s needs. We will monitor how well the support we have put into place is helping your child and the progress they are making through regular observations, reviewing targets on IEPs and looking at how they are achieving on their developmental milestones. We will also meet with you regularly, during parent consultation meetings to compile a progress summary. We may take away the additional support if we feel that your child has made significant progress and is no longer in need of the support.

We actively encourage parents to be involved in the setting and their child’s progress. The children’s learning journals are in an electronic format and can be accessed from any computer or device linked to the internet, this ensures parents are able to contribute and comment at a time and place suitable to them. We hold many social events and fun days throughout the year such as Mother’s Day afternoon tea and Father’s Day breakfast where parents are welcomed into the setting to share some time with their child. We also have a Parent Committee in which every parent is welcome to participate in.