Newsletter for Early Years and Childcare providers in West Sussex
#31/2024 - Wednesday 31 July 2024
This week's newsletter includes:
- Safeguarding focus - emotional abuse - childhood verbal abuse
- Reminder to have your say on Early Years Funded Entitlement payments
- Advanced warning - Online Provider Portal downtime
- Check Early Years Funded Entitlement codes for working families
- Childcare Expansion Forum - opportunity to join
- Free training from Kent Early Years Stronger Practice Hub
Difficulty viewing this bulletin? Click here to view in your browser.
Childhood verbal abuse (CVA) is a feature of emotional abuse, but CVA is not recognised as an individual form of abuse. CVA is when adults use language and other forms of verbal communication to inflict mental stress on a child. This includes:
- shouting and screaming,
- belittling,
- verbal threats,
- name-calling,
- constantly criticising,
- blaming and scapegoating,
- using hurtful sarcasm, and
- not expressing kindness or positive feelings.
The NSPCC highlights that over time, emotional abuse can have serious effects on a child’s development. CVA causes children to feel unloved, humiliated, fearful, weak and powerless. This can lead to long-term psychological problems such as depression, anxiety, anger issues, substance abuse, self-harm and eating disorders. Research from the charity Words Matter finds that every two in five children (41%) experience harmful verbal abuse by adults around them. For over half of those children (51%) the verbal abuse is weekly, and for one in ten daily (10%).
Words Matter have developed some useful resources for professionals and parents/carers that can be found on their website. They contain practical tips for communicating with children. They also have a list of the most hurtful and helpful words, which was developed in consultation with over 1,000 children. You can also read more information about emotional abuse on the West Sussex Safeguarding Children Partnership (WSSCP) website.
Often, when adult interactions with children are not positive, it is due to situations that are causing the adult to feel stressed or angry.
You should use professional curiosity to explore and understand what is happening in someone's life, rather than making assumptions or accepting what they are told at face value. Professional curiosity sometimes involves difficult conversations, but talking to an adult about what is happening and helping them to access support may help ease a difficult situation. However, it is important to understand that their behaviour towards the child is not acceptable. WSSCP have an honest conversations information sheet you can use to support any difficult conversations you have with parents/carers or staff.
In our special newsletter, dated 21 June 2024, we invited you to share your views on the three possible payment options for receiving EYFE funding. These options include varying payment schedules:
- Two payments per term: one estimate payment and one actuals payment per term.
- Monthly payments: multiple payments based on a single estimate submission, and one actuals payment per term.
- Three payments per term: two payments based on a single estimate submission, and one actuals payment.
The consultation closes this Friday 2 August 2024 at 11.55pm. Visit the YourVoice page to have your say.
Please be advised that the Online Provider Portal will be unavailable all day on Tuesday 6 August whilst essential maintenance takes place. Please note, parents and carers will not be able to submit 2 year old Local Authority Issued Early Years Funded Entitlement applications and our Family Information Service website will also be unavailable to the public.
Ahead of the autumn term, and with the further expansion of childcare support for eligible working parents, we would like to remind all providers claiming funding that the Department for Education expect you to check and validate codes ahead of a child taking up a place. Working families eligibility codes must be validated before a child takes up their EYFE place. Checking a code before the autumn term means:
- you can plan your EYFE places,
- you are able to inform parents/carers if their code is not valid and ask them to take action before the 31 August deadline,
- parents avoid receiving unexpected fees if their code is not valid for the autumn term, and
- you are meeting statutory requirements as all codes must be checked and validated prior to a child starting a funded place.
Thank you to all of you who are checking codes prior to the autumn term. To date, 25.5% of codes issued for 9 month old EYFE and 28.7% of codes issued for 2 year old EYFE for working families have been checked in West Sussex.
We provided guidance on how to check codes are valid for the autumn term in newsletter #27/2024. You can also use our eligibility checker guidance to help you check codes and understand if they are valid. It is important to remember any parent who was issued a code before 1 June will need to reconfirm their eligibility by 31 August, to ensure their code is valid for the autumn term.
In newsletter #28/2024 shared with you on 10 July 2024, we let you know about the opportunity to join the Childcare Expansion Provider Forum. You can read the Childcare Expansion Provider Forum Invitation to find out more and email an Expression of Interest form to free.entitlement@westsussex.gov.uk. Applications will be closing at 11.59pm on 9 August 2024.
In newsletter #30/2024 we shared the KEYSPH newsletter, which contained information on free webinars. In addition to these webinars KEYSPH would like to share information on Communication and Language webinars presented by the Evelina team from Guys and St Thomas’s Speech and Language Team. These webinars will focus on supporting practitioners in their day-to-day practice encouraging them to think about their Enabling Environments and In-Tune Interactions. Please book your place by clicking the course name below.
They would also like to share information on free face-to-face training from the Autism Education Trust. These training sessions are based in Kent and participants will learn about autism and what constitutes good practice. There are limited places available and you can book your place by clicking the course name below.
Useful information
- 30 Aug - Sufficiency deadline for summer term
- 02 Sep - Portal scheduled to open for autumn term actuals
- 19 Sept - Autumn term headcount day
- 27 Sept - Portal closes for autumn term actuals
- w/c 21 Oct - Autumn term actuals payments due
We have a range of online training available for you to access for your staff to ensure they have the most up to date information to support them in their role:
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.
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 EYCA team using the following email addresses:
Where there are not clearly evidenced reasons why the setting had no option but to close, there could be implications for funding received as per the government guidance.
-
#30/2024 (Online Provider Portal downtime; Reminder to have your say on Early Years Funded Entitlement payments; Reporting changes to your Ofsted registration; Ofsted Early Years and Childcare Enforcement policy updates; Ofsted News e-magazine; Kent Early Years Stronger Practice hub newsletter - July 2024)
-
#29/2024 (National Wraparound Childcare Programme Update; Letter from Sussex Police regarding FGM/C; Early years and childcare training booking portal now live; National Professional Qualification for Early Years Leadership; SEND and inclusion newsletter; Summer reading challenge)
-
#28/2024 (Recruitment and support - advertise your job vacancies; Early years training moving to new platform - final reminder; Reminder to have your say on EYFE payments; Childcare expansion forum - opportunity to join; Early years training)
-
#27/2024 (Updated safeguarding letter for parents/carers; Early Years Funded Entitlements - parental leave; Early Years Funded Entitlements for working families temporary codes; Action required - checking codes for Early Years Funded Entitlements for working families; Childcare Expansion Forum updates; Spring term network presentations; Early Years Training moving to a new platform; Early Years Training)
-
#26/2024 (Safeguarding focus - Water safety - always supervise children around water; Heat Health Alerts - Yellow; Consultation open - Early Years Funded Entitlement payments; Gypsy, Roma, Traveller and Showman terminology; Dingley's Promise - Fostering Meaningful Inclusion in Early Years Settings; Early Years Training)
Early Years and Childcare newsletter web page.
|
