The West Sussex approach puts the child first. We work with children, families, communities, our partners and schools in a restorative, strength based way. Strong relationships are at the heart of what we do.
Broadcast for Early Years and childcare providers in West Sussex from West Sussex County Council
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Wednesday 15 June 2022
Have your say on mental health and wellbeing within the Early Years sector
The Professional Association for Childcare and Early Years (PACEY) is carrying out a survey of early years and childcare practitioners to try and understand the current mental health and wellbeing of the workforce. PACEY are hoping to gain insight into the wellbeing of those working within the sector and identify what support is needed. The findings will also be used in PACEY’s response to the Governments 10 year plan to support mental health in England.
The survey is open to all practitioners (PACEY members and non-members) within England and Wales and will close on 22 June 2022. To find out more information and take part in the survey, click here.
Advance Notice of Planned IT Upgrade (OPP/2 Year Old FE applications/FIS website)
Please be advised that the Online Provider Portal (OPP) will be unavailable on Wednesday 22 June due to planned maintenance. This affects all functions within the OPP. Please also note that parents and carers will not be able to submit 2 year old Free Entitlement applications online, and our FIS childcare website will be unavailable.
Early Years Recruitment on Facebook
The Early Years Training team run a page on Facebook called West Sussex Early Years Training, for all things Early Years Training and Events and we have over 1000 followers. You can find us here https://www.facebook.com/WSEYT/
If you would like to use this platform to advertise any job vacancies you can tag us or send us a message to include a post for you.
Vacancy advertisement information must include:
- The name of the setting, address and contact details of recruiting manager.
- Job title, hours of work, location.
- A brief summary of the position.
- You may wish to include salary information.
Early Childhood Hub
The Chartered College of Teaching has launched a new Early Childhood Hub. The new hub brings together a range of great articles, research and resources from people working across the Early Years sector on topics ranging from child development to professional learning.
Infant Mental Health Awareness Week
Infant Mental Health Awareness Week is organised by The Parent-Infant Foundation. The week provides an opportunity for everyone in the sector to raise awareness of the importance of babies’ social and emotional development.
This year’s theme “understanding early trauma” focuses attention on babies whose mental health is most at risk. Babies can experience psychological trauma when their environments are repeatedly harmful or threatening to them, or their parent or caregiver. Traumatic experiences might include physical and emotional abuse, neglect, exposure to domestic abuse or high levels of stress or conflict at home.
A nurturing relationship can make a child more resilient to negative events. Without a nurturing relationship to support them, children experience negative events as more traumatic. Because of the brains plasticity and being susceptible to influences in the earliest years of life, traumatic experiences in this life stage can have a greater impact on the brain’s development and function. With early development laying the foundations for what happens next, early trauma can have potentially widespread and long-time consequences.
This Infant Mental Health Awareness Week, you can look to equip and empower yourselves as well as parents and carers. This can be done by gaining a greater understanding of the effects of trauma and how nurturing, sensitive, responsive and trusted relationships are key to ensuring babies and children feel safe and secure with the competencies to thrive.
The Parent-Infant Foundation have made a short film on ‘What is Infant Mental Health’ which can be viewed here. They have also developed an infographic on ‘Why Mental Health Matters’ which can be viewed here. For ideas and tips for creating nurturing relationship with babies visit the BBC's Tiny Happy People website.
The Anna Freud Centre (Early Years in Mind) are holding a Trauma and Repair Webinar on Thursday 16 June from 4.30 to 6.00pm. In this webinar, without downplaying the effects of trauma, the panel will acknowledge the realities through a lens of repair. Facilitated by the Chair, Dr Abi Miranda, the panel will discuss a range of topics that highlight best practice in the context of trauma. For example, effective multi-disciplinary working with social workers, providing a “good enough” online service for adoptive parents, and celebrating nursery cultures that foster belonging and anti-racist practice. To book your place visit the website.
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Trauma Awareness Training
The Virtual School offer specific and tailored Trauma Awareness training for Early Years settings through the use of Virtual Reality. The National Survey of Children’s Health showed that in 2018, 30% of children had experienced at least one ACE (Adverse Childhood Experience) and in 2021 that has risen to nearly 50% with 9% having experienced four or more ACEs. With so many of our children experiencing traumatic events, equipping staff to be able to use a trauma informed approach could be very beneficial to all children in your setting.
If this is something that you might be interested in learning more about, please come to our online Demo Session on Wednesday 6 July 10.00am to 11.00am where you can learn more about what the training entails and how the use of Virtual Reality enhances the learning experience. To book your place please contact Gemma Peck gemma.peck@westsussex.gov.uk.
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- 22 Jun - IT downtime
- w/c 20 Jun - Summer term payments expected (FE providers)
- w/c 20 Jun - Summer term Inclusion payments expected
- 23 Jun - Portal opens for Autumn estimates
- 31 Aug - Sufficiency submission deadline
To allow our Early Years and Childcare Advisors to focus their support to where it is most needed, we ask that you check for information online before you contact us.
COVID-19 guidance
Other information and guidance (WSCC)
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Practice support (EYFS, Diversity and Inclusion, health and wellbeing, transitions, legislation, regulation and safeguarding)
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Supporting families in your childcare setting (includes CLaWBA, integrated reviews)
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Tools for schools and settings (supporting the inclusion of all children in early years)
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Business support (Free Entitlement, marketing, finance, recruitment, advertising)
- Training and qualifications
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Network meetings/events (Learning and development, INCO SENCO, business and welfare)
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Online Provider Portal (submission dates, help guides)
For help to access information
To request additional support for your setting
Please inform the Family Information Service if your setting needs to close or is re-opening. Email family.info.service@westsussex.gov.uk and include your setting name, Ofsted URN, the date you intend to close/open, and any changes to your operating hours. If you inform us of re-opening, you will be reinstated on the public list and appear on our website www.westsussex.gov.uk/fis.
If closing due to COVID-19, please consult the guidance to check when to inform Ofsted.
In the event of your setting having a confirmed COVID-19 case, if Public Health or the Department for Education have stated you must close for any period of time you must inform the Family Information Service. However, if Public Heath have not explicitly stated in correspondence to you that the setting must close, we would expect you to make contact with your Early Years and Childcare Adviser (EYCA) to talk through your circumstances, where possible, before making the decision to close the setting. If you are not able to make immediate contact with your EYCA then please email your nearest Early Help Hub using the following email addresses:
Where there are not clearly evidenced reasons why the setting had no option to close, there could be implications for funding received as per the government guidance.
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#218 (Advance notice of planned IT downtime, Beyond COVID-19 infection prevention and control public health webinars; safeguarding reminder; action planning to improve outcomes for children with SEND; infant mental health awareness week)
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#217 (HAF Deadline Reminder, Invitation To Take Part in Research, SEND and Inclusion Newsletter, Launch of the NPQEYL, Staff Ratios Consultation, Learning Language and Loving It, Good Practice Articles)
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#216 (Early years COVID-19 recovery experts and mentors programme; children we care for - designated lead forum; vodcast on outdoor learning; child safety week; speech and language courses this term)
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#215 (Summer term FE actuals - deadline this Friday, consultation on childcare ratio changes before summer, Tax-Free Childcare resources, new guidance on progress check at age 2, Ofsted EIF curriculum roadshows for South East, free SENCO training, speech, language and communications early years summit)
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#214 (Advance notice of planned IT downtime, summer term FE actuals claims reminder, FE for families from Ukraine, transition events 16-27 May, new resources from the National Literacy Trust)
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