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Bulletin 335

16 December 2024

Welcome to our Early Years and Childcare Bulletin. Previous Bulletins are available at: Cheshire East Early years and Childcare Bulletin

Business Support

Briefing for Prospective Childminders

Please share this information on your social media accounts: Are you interested in becoming a Childminder? We are running regular Childminder briefing sessions to provide information on what it means to be a Childminder and how to apply. Please click on the link below for more information and to complete the online form. Interested in Becoming a Childminder (cheshireeast.gov.uk)

Wraparound Childcare Programme and Childcare Early Years Entitlements Expansion Funding

The application process for the next funding round for applying for Revenue and/or Capital Grant Funding for the Wraparound Childcare Programme is now open.

Funding is available for all Wraparound projects which have been created since September 2024 and any existing wrapround provision where new places are being created.

The Capital Funding round for the Childcare Early Years Entitlements Expansion Programme is also open.

The funding for the childcare expansion is to support the creation of new early years places for children aged 9 months – 4 years old in line with the 30 hours roll out from September 2025.

Closing date for the third round is Noon on Monday 27 January 2025.

Dates for all bidding rounds during the Spring term are:

Please click on the links below to apply.

If you would like support in completing the documentation for the grant applications or any have any questions or queries, please email: earlyyearsandchildcareteam@cheshireeast.gov.uk

Safeguarding and Welfare Requirements

Safeguarding and Welfare Requirements: Focus on...

Children must be kept safe while on outings. Providers and Childminders must assess potential risks or hazards for the children and must identify the steps to be taken to remove, minimise, and manage those risks and hazards. The assessment must include consideration of staff to child ratios. The risk assessment does not necessarily need to be in writing; this is up to providers/childminders. Vehicles transporting children, and the driver of those vehicles, must be adequately insured.

National updates

CSC reform practice survey now live!

Working Together to Safeguard Children is the multi-agency statutory guidance that sets out expectations for the system that provides help, support and protection for children and their families, giving practitioners clarity about what is required of them individually and how they need to work in partnership with each other to deliver effective services. In December 2023 this guidance was updated with a focus on the following core themes: improved multi-agency working, a clear child-centred approach in working with children and their families, and decisive and effective multi-agency child protection response. 

The Department for Education (DfE) are currently undertaking a review of these changes to Working Together to Safeguard Children introduced in 2023 and they are seeking feedback on the new principles for working with parents and carers, new multi-agency expectations, new national multi-agency child protection standards, and changes to section 17 including clarification that a broader range of practitioners can lead the direct work with children and their families. The DfE want to develop an increased understanding of, and stronger evidence on, how Working Together 2023 is being implemented to inform future reviews of the guidance. 

The DfE are inviting responses from as many people as possible at all levels, across all agencies, to ensure they get a multi-agency response.    

The survey can be completed by clicking the button below.

Your responses will be used by policy teams within the Department for Education to inform future policy planning and reviews of guidance.   

If you have any issues or questions, please contact: workingtogether.statutoryguidance@education.gov.uk. 

Help shape future early years projects funded by the Education Endowment Foundation 

The Education Endowment Foundation has commissioned CooperGibson Research to explore the professional development and support programmes available to the early years sector in England. The research will provide information about the packages of support that setting staff are using to enable them to improve 2–5-year-old children’s learning outcomes, and how these programmes relate to key thematic areas that could be included on the EEF’s research agenda in future. 

In order to get the best picture of the professional development and support programmes available to the sector, please complete the survey which should take around 10 minutes to complete and will be live until 20 December.

Updated DBS Fees

The Disclosure and Barring Service have changed its fees, in order to meet the increased operational costs of delivering DBS’ safeguarding service.

From Monday 2nd December 2024, fees for DBS checks have changed.  

The new fees are as follows: 

• Update Service – £16 (per year) 

• Basic DBS check – £21.50 

• Standard DBS check – £21.50  

• Enhanced DBS check – £49.50  

• Enhanced DBS check with Barred List(s) – £49.50 

The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) is funded by the fees paid from DBS check customers, and therefore fee changes can be required to meet the increased operational costs of delivering DBS’ safeguarding service. Each DBS check has its own price that is designed to cover all costs of that specific check, and each check’s fee is scrutinised separately. 

School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 

The School Based Nursery Capital Grant information for eligible schools about the School-Based Nursery Capital Grant has been updated. Updates include clarification about Pupil Referral Units being excluded from applying for the grant, supporting documentation larger than 1MB cannot be uploaded to the Online Application Service and must instead be compressed or emailed to images.schoolnurseries@education.gov.uk, and maintained nursery schools unable to access the Online Application Service can request to be placed on the registration of interest for future school-based nurseries by submitting their details through the Customer Help Portal.

A link to the webinar which took place on 28 November was also added. The ‘School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 2024 to 2025 guidance’ has been updated to clarify how the department will allocate funding in the case of a tie breaker which results in more successful applications than funding available, to clarify the role of local authorities, to state that applicants who are not awarded the SBN grant can choose to continue with their significant change application, without needing to submit a new one, and that bid coordinator must use the schools DfE sign-in account to apply via the Online Application Service.

EYFS Learning and Development

To contact BookTrust, please see the contact details below:

Frances Lennon, BookTrust Coordinator - 07827 954086

Sarah Harrison, BookTrust Administrator - 07827 877966

bookstart@cheshiresharedservices.gov.uk

SEND

School Transition Feedback

As the term closes the Transition Team would like to thank you all for your continued cooperation, allowing them to work with yourselves, to support our children and young people with a smoother transition from and to their next phase of their education. The team are receiving some really positive feedback from settings around the pilots they have been carrying out, the resources they have collated and the new website they have created. The team feel the transition process is taking a positive turn and settings are engaging and sharing their experiences and good practice with them.

In order for the Transition Team to keep moving forward and ensure, they have the right support in place, they need as much feedback as possible. If you haven’t already, please can you send any feedback regarding the resources, websites or anything else that you feel will help the team to make transitions smoother for all. The team are not precious and encourage any feedback.

Please follow: School transitions to access various guides and resources and please follow the links at the back of each guide and at the bottom of the website. Alternatively, please email using the details below.

The Transition Team would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and hope you have a well deserved break.

Cheshire East SEND Transition Team contact details:

Rachael Pickles – Transition Team Manager:
rachael.pickles2@cheshireeast.gov.uk 07816 144386

Loren Whiteside – Transition Adviser:
loren.whiteside2@cheshireeast.gov.uk 07557 801258

Cheshire East Chatters

Family Hubs

Cheshire East Food Alliance – community food projects Christmas and New Year opening times

Cheshire East Food Alliance have compiled a list of community food projects and their Christmas and New Year opening times. Please share this information with any families who may need support to access food over the Festive period.

Click on the link below to access the list.  

Continuous Professional Development

Spring Term Training now available on the Early Years Training Hub

The ChESS Early Years Training Hub has been updated with lots of training opportunities for the Spring term, please take a look and book on now!

New training next term:

Infection, Prevention and Control

• 14th January 2025 13:00 - 14:30 (Microsoft Teams)
• 29th January 2025 13:00 - 14:30 (Microsoft Teams)
• 10th February 2025 13:00 - 14:30 (Microsoft Teams)

Join us to learn about infection, prevention and control, delivered by an Infection Prevention & Control Specialist Nurse from Cheshire & Wirral Partnership NHS Foundation Trust. This training will support you to understand the importance of infection control, how infection can be spread and standard precautions and the strategies which are used to stop the spread of infection e.g., PPE, hand hygiene and cleaning. This session will also provide an overview of common illnesses and discuss your point of contact for advice and guidance.

Out of School Club Network

• 22nd January 2025 11:00 - 12:30 (Holmes Chapel Comprehensive School and Sixth Form College Training and Conference Centre)

This network session is for Out of School Club providers. The Out of School Club Network will include up to date information on the wraparound programme and breakfast clubs’ schemes and provide an opportunity to network with other providers.

Transitions in the Early Years

• 27th January 2025 10:00 - 12:00 (Microsoft Teams)

This is an Autism Education Trust (AET) training course. This course aims to provide you with the knowledge, skills and understanding to plan transitions and implement processes to improve the education and wellbeing of children in the Early Years. There continues to be a significant increase in Early Years children at risk of exclusion from their settings, often linked to poorly managed transitions. Transitions occur throughout an entire person’s life, in both life stages, events, changes throughout the day, and even in between tasks. This training will develop your understanding of the differences between macro and micro transitions, increase your knowledge of why transitions can be challenging for autistic children, support you to identify the key principles of transition support in the Early Years and identify key considerations when planning Early Years transition support.

Safer Sleep and ICON

• 30th January 2025 9:30 - 11:30 (Microsoft Teams)
• 4th February 2025 18:30 - 20:30 (Microsoft Teams)

Join us to learn about safer sleep and ICON, delivered by a Named Midwife for Safeguarding Children from East Cheshire NHS Trust. This training session will provide information on safer sleep including the most up to date, evidence-based practice regarding the safest ways to sleep babies. This session will also provide you with information regarding ICON, a national initiative to help reduce the risk of abusive head trauma, more commonly known as 'shaken baby.' 

WellComm for Childminders

• 5th February 2025 18:30 - 20:00 (Microsoft Teams)

Would you like to receive practical support on how to integrate WellComm activities into daily best practice within your setting? Or try out WellComm screening and explore activities from the Big Book of Ideas? During this session there will be opportunities to discuss and define terms relating to communication and how these relate to the WellComm screening tool, examine the rationale behind using WellComm to screen, track and monitor individual children and discuss the practicalities of setting up targeted groups. If you would like to purchase a WellComm toolkit before the training, please visit this website: www.gl-assessment.co.uk.

Step Inside the Preschool Room

• 5th March 2025 10:00 - 12:00 (Microsoft Teams)

This session is part of a series focussing on supporting the three different age groups of children within the Early Years. This training will look at practice and provision in the preschool room, consideration will be given to providing an enabling preschool environment and to reflect upon your preschool curriculum.

Physical Development in the Early Years

• 17th March 2025 9:30 - 12:00 (Oakenclough Family Hub)

“Physical development is crucial for children’s overall progress. It enables children to engage with the world around them and lays the building blocks for their later physical capabilities and health” (EEF, 2024). Physical Development is the growth and development of both brain and body and involves developing control of muscles and physical coordination. Progression towards this control is not defined by the child's chronological age, but by the opportunity to acquire skills. Join us to explore how to promote Physical Development in the Early Years and how to offer fine and gross motor opportunities for children aged 0-5. This training will explore in depth the impact Physical Development has on children's holistic learning and development, and we will share good practice and provision ideas to inspire you as Early Years providers to get children moving.