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Key Person Time


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Does anyone have a 'child friendly' name or title for the time of day when we get into our 'key person' groups?

Many thanks!

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we just call it group time, but a child that started with us a little while ago from another nursery calls it special time. how nice is that?

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I never get how settings manage to get children into key worker groups, on one day we,d have a kp with say 2 children, then 1kp with 7 or maybe key children who don't have their kw that day, we tend to group ours in age/ability groups for set group times, would be interested to know how others achieve this.

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we have 'choosing time', we ring a bell and everyone gathers together and then each keyworker 'sells' her activity, we then split into the groups and activities they have chosen and bobs your uncle. The children get very excited, as do the keyworkers, as they make each activity sound more exciting than the last. We don't limit how many children access each activity but it generally evens out fine, if the acitvity is based on a particular childs interest (usually one or two planned each choosing time) then the keyworker will emphasise that childs involvement e.g 'today William and I and the yellow group are hatching open the dinosaur eggs' ( thank you alistair bryce-clegg!). It is a busy, but focussed, 10 minutes or so each morning and afternoon session

 

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I never get how settings manage to get children into key worker groups, on one day we,d have a kp with say 2 children, then 1kp with 7 or maybe key children who don't have their kw that day, we tend to group ours in age/ability groups for set group times, would be interested to know how others achieve this.

 

I'd be interested in this myself.

smiles

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we find this very hard to achieve as children come on different days and so do the staff, so trying to find time in groups everyday is really difficult, for example a member of staff may work all day monday, tuesday afternoon and say wednesday morning and their key child may do all day monday, tuesday and wednesday. so if we did key person time on a tuesday morning their key person wouldnt be in............... hope that makes sense!!! this is an area we really struggle with, will be interested to see what others do, also we are in one room so if you have four separate groups the children get distracted by whats going on in the other groups....

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All my staff are part time too simcity and their chidlren may do a session when they are not there but because our choosing time is open to all they can choose to join another group and so don't feel that they are being excluded. Then on another session their keygroup may have a planned activity. we always have a floating member of staff who sweeps up any children who don't fancy any of the activities on offer and engages them in something spontaneous or chosen by her on the spur of the moment according to what the children have been engaged in that morning/afternoon already. I have 4 members of staff in each session and 2 will usually be doing a planned activity from one of their key childrens interest, 1 is floating and 1 will be doing letters and sounds,SEAL or a developmental aspect focus activity, the activites will change in the afternoon and the other 2 staff will do child interest led play

Edited by max321
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We call ours "sharing time". With their keyperson or stand in. So when the child started they were given a keyperson, as time goes on they may attend more sessions, which their keyperson may not do. So they would have a stand in keyperson for that day, session etc. Works really well. We have 68 children and ten staff doing various sessions. The children love coming to this time, it's brief, ten minutes max, very active and lots of fun.

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  • 2 weeks later...

In our 2-3 yr old class key groups are given a name, currently winnie pooh characters. We have Owl, Piglet, Eeyore, Tigger. The parents are told pre start which is their KG and the children's coat hooks, Learning Journals, link books, photo board, etc are labelled in KG with a character picture. The photo board will also have a photo of the key worker next to the photos of that group. A class list and staff list is up on the noticeboard in kg order for parents. We have special key group time and the key workers will have a plush toy of the kg as a visual reminder. They very quickly learn which group they are in as do the parents. Some children want to explore another kg but generally they are comforted & kept interested by a small group session. The key workers really get to have more one to one with their key children this way. If the little children can do this it should be easy with the 3-5's

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We too name our Keygroups. The children chose the names and we currently have the Dolphins, Sticks, Princes and Princesses and the Oompaloompas. The children quickly learnt which group they were in and now staff can just call their group and go.

 

Next year we are going to try splitting the key groups into peer groups as much as possible so that hopefully Key Group time will be easier to plan as peer groups should have shared interests.

 

As we are a set up and packaway setting we do Key group time several times a week after we've packed up (as we have to have the main hall clear for the dinner ladies.)

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We have five key groups, and two key people for each group (40 children in total any session), this helps with the continuity and ensuring there is always somebody familiar, and the children are shared equally for the paperwork etc. The children have two sessions a day with their key people , one am and one pm and yes it does mean some groups vary in size but it seems to work well. Key persons are not allocated until the child has been with us a few sessions and we try to link children with people they have naturally gravitated towards, as this seems to help the attachment build.

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