AnonyMouse_30128 Posted April 18, 2021 Share Posted April 18, 2021 So i am looking forward (for the first time in a year) to planning September and our curriculum. How is everyone feeling about the changes? what are you planning to do differently? how are you feeling about it? (personally i think after the year we have had change seems to be overwhelming me) How do people feel about the emphasis on problems and issues, areas of concerns etc, oral hygiene and working with health visitors?!?!?! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_7120 Posted April 18, 2021 Share Posted April 18, 2021 7 hours ago, finleysmaid said: So i am looking forward (for the first time in a year) to planning September and our curriculum. How is everyone feeling about the changes? what are you planning to do differently? how are you feeling about it? (personally i think after the year we have had change seems to be overwhelming me) How do people feel about the emphasis on problems and issues, areas of concerns etc, oral hygiene and working with health visitors?!?!?! Hi FM, I feel quite overwhelmed with it all, I’m usually a grab the bull type person who’s ahead of the game but not this time, I think we have had so much to manage and deal with this year that to throw this massive change (and 2 if we choose to go with one of them - I know not statutory) at us seems too much right now (but maybe I’m feeling this as I’ve had staffing problems which has meant I’ve been back in ratio pretty much full time so there’s been no time until now to even consider what it will all look like come September and feel a bit on the back foot, I also think reading to much on Fb groups hasn’t helped 🤦♀️ You might have seen my post with a few questions around how I can still make Tapestry work for my setting and especially how to formulate a plan of attack to share with staff (I have a couple who are going to find moving away from statement ticking difficult, it’s taken years to fine tune it and now that seems to be going out the window ...though from J & B replies I’m beginning to feel less anxious about how it will work. As manager I still want to be able to look at different cohorts and know where the problems are or where more challenge is needed (I’m still not quite convinced concerns/no concerns is enough for high achievers), I think having the same 30 chn everyday and within a year age range has to be more doable to remember where they’re all at than having 50 or 60 a week, doing between 6 hours and 30 hours and covering 3 different year group cohorts (or more if you manage a nursery provision). Oral hygiene - I’m not planning on introducing teeth brushing, more info to parents I guess and give it more prominence as planned activities, more resources. Health visitors - I don’t often feel they support our concerns when we raise them or they pass the buck back to us to speak to parents if we have health concerns like weight/hygiene etc and if we manage to get them to arrange an appointment they feed back to parents that it’s ‘age appropriate’ (even when a child hasn’t started toilet training at 4 and no developmental reasons), once a parent has heard that they don’t want to listen to our concerns 🤷♀️ 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SueFinanceManager Posted April 19, 2021 Share Posted April 19, 2021 Hi The education team have put together some info that you can refer to if you wish, it is on our sister site for Tapestry but feel free to use it:Preparing for September 2021 in the EYFS EYFS in September 2021 with Tapestry - using Tapestry 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_30128 Posted April 19, 2021 Author Share Posted April 19, 2021 mousie Yes i did read your other thread.. i have decided i need to do eyfs framework and DM first. (i started to read birth to 5 and got a bit cross so ive parked that for the moment!!) Once i have done all of that then i can look at tapestry as i'm struggling to see how it all fits together . Not good with change and trying to work out how it works for us, like yourselves its tricky. My cohort is all very varied from high to low income, all sorts of different religions, cultures languages etc and a high proportion of SEND too. I like the variety but it does raise issues!! I worry about the perceived emphasis on 'problems' too/ Sue thank you for all of that.i had found it on twitter earlier too! I just need to pace myself i guess! talking about it with the team today helped. There are always things that i will like/not like !!! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jules Posted April 26, 2021 Share Posted April 26, 2021 Hi folks, I just wanted to pop in with a couple of things you might find useful from Ruth Swailes - she wrote this article for us, about how to reflect on the new documents. And coming up VERY soon is a podcast with Ruth, talking about developing a curriculum - you'll spot it on the FSF homepage when it goes live. One thing I took away from what Ruth said was about looking at what you already do well (in all aspects of working with the children at your setting) and building on from that, perhaps rather than feeling like so much has to change. Easier said than done though! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_19802 Posted May 5, 2021 Share Posted May 5, 2021 With regard Oral Hygiene - we have discussed this might be the time to rid the morning of Snack Time! I have always thought this a time consuming and unwarranted 'activity' when only open for 3 hours (Preschool) each session. During Covid we no longer offered food of any kind to help reduce the hand to mouth action - and washing hands before and after was becoming, again, far too time consuming so we just offered a Drinks Bar - Milk or Water whenever needed. Interestingly apart from one or tow children in the first week no one has asked for 'Snack!' Which kind of proves its not necessary. Not eating between meals is surely a good way for children to have healthier teeth - as well as reducing obesity. We would have food of some kind available in case of a missed breakfast and I believe we should be doing what we consider in the childs best interest now rather than Ofsteds??? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_8282 Posted May 6, 2021 Share Posted May 6, 2021 Missed this post first time around. I can't seem to give any thoughts to September yet, think it's because I am now focussing on an imminent Ofsted inspection. I guess this will be on my summer holiday list of things to do. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_12805 Posted May 9, 2021 Share Posted May 9, 2021 Not sure I'm looking forward to all this in September. But as others have said- partly because life has been so busy lately and partly because I know I have at least two staff that are going to struggle with it. One because she 'knows' everything and one because she just doesn't like change. Although I'm not sure how much change there will be as we stopped using DM as a tick list (well some did!) a couple of years ago. But I also need to recruit a new staff member for September and am coming up to our dreaded AGM time and our annual threat to parents that we will close unless.................. However- I attended a brilliant webinair on what becoming an ICO involves. the other week and it has convinced me that this is the way forward for us. Their is a lady who specialises in doing/advising groups on this - for a fee of course- and helps and supports. It's expensive but worth paying her to do. I am determined that I am going to hand over to my Deputy in July 2022 and work from home 2 mornings as an Admin Officer- so would like to get this done by then. Oral hygiene- not going to be brushing teeth- happy to send more info home to parents on it. HV's seem to be in short supply in our area. We always ask who their HV is when children start but rarely do parents know. Rafa- we tried to stop our snack bar couple of years ago but ended up re instating it as we had some parents who seemed to think their children would starve if not fed for 3 hours. Ours have lunch at 11.50 - snack at 10.30 and dont start until 9.15 am- so it's not going to harm them to drop a snack. One thing we (as in staff team) are all in agreement about is continuing with in September is the dropping off and picking up at the door. 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_79875 Posted May 10, 2021 Share Posted May 10, 2021 13 hours ago, lynned55 said: One thing we (as in staff team) are all in agreement about is continuing with in September is the dropping off and picking up at the door. Us too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_55007 Posted May 10, 2021 Share Posted May 10, 2021 3 hours ago, Joanne_Betts said: Us too! and us lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_5970 Posted May 10, 2021 Share Posted May 10, 2021 18 hours ago, lynned55 said: One thing we (as in staff team) are all in agreement about is continuing with in September is the dropping off and picking up at the door. Definitely not us! I can't wait to have parents back in the nursery. It's one of the hardest changes we've made. We're all different I guess! 😄 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_8282 Posted May 10, 2021 Share Posted May 10, 2021 47 minutes ago, Stargrower said: Definitely not us! I can't wait to have parents back in the nursery. It's one of the hardest changes we've made. We're all different I guess! 😄 It's a difficult one, to be honest the children settle so much better... however I feel we are losing our close connections to families. We're thinking of somewhere mid-way - just not sure what yet! I certainly don't miss the parents hanging around chatting at the end of the session while staff are waiting to go home 😭 (or staff gossiping chit/chatting to parents whilst the other staff are still clearing away 😬 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_51691 Posted May 13, 2021 Share Posted May 13, 2021 On 10/05/2021 at 12:36, ladybirds1991 said: and us lol We intend to maintain front door drop-off; we found the children far more settled, much less clingy with parents (even the new children and 2 year olds) and enjoyed the independence. The most difficult part was getting paperwork for funding signed on a wintery, rainy day and talking confidentially with parents. The latter could be managed discreetly though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_59225 Posted May 13, 2021 Share Posted May 13, 2021 58 minutes ago, pasmith said: We intend to maintain front door drop-off; we found the children far more settled, much less clingy with parents (even the new children and 2 year olds) and enjoyed the independence. The most difficult part was getting paperwork for funding signed on a wintery, rainy day and talking confidentially with parents. The latter could be managed discreetly though. We are going to continue dropping off at the door but allow parents in when it's pick up, this way we can get forms signed etc but still have the quick and easy drop off (we have also found that children have settled better) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_7120 Posted May 15, 2021 Share Posted May 15, 2021 (edited) Is anyone any closer to making a decision on whether they’ll follow DM or B25 (or something else altogether) from Sept? I just keep swinging between the two, I like the JG short videos and think these will be great for sharing with staff and discussing the reasoning behinds a more informal way of assessing (not statements > concerns/no concerns) but prefer the assessment side/ranges of B25 and that aspects are included in all ranges, so thinking about mixing them up. Is there any news on when/If B25 will be available on Tapestry? And will it have aspect flags and ranges as well as area flags please? I think I’m asking will it be possible to show a child for example is: Literacy/Reading/Expected range 4 🤔 Edited May 15, 2021 by Mouseketeer Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_23379 Posted May 15, 2021 Share Posted May 15, 2021 If you use Tapestry there is a free webinar next Wednesday at 7pm which will address using Tapestry against the new EYFS framework. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_19802 Posted May 15, 2021 Share Posted May 15, 2021 On 09/05/2021 at 19:32, lynned55 said: Not sure I'm looking forward to all this in September. Oral hygiene- not going to be brushing teeth- happy to send more info home to parents on it. HV's seem to be in short supply in our area. We always ask who their HV is when children start but rarely do parents know. Rafa- we tried to stop our snack bar couple of years ago but ended up re instating it as we had some parents who seemed to think their children would starve if not fed for 3 hours. Ours have lunch at 11.50 - snack at 10.30 and dont start until 9.15 am- so it's not going to harm them to drop a snack. One thing we (as in staff team) are all in agreement about is continuing with in September is the dropping off and picking up at the door. Agree lynned55 - Sadly some Parents seem to think that Children are only happy if they have food in their mouth - we have some that greet their children with a chocolate bar at pick up - as if they felt guilty for leaving them!! Hey Ho. We have managed so far under our "System of Controls" to stay snack free and I hope to find all the right words to convince Parents that this is a GOOD thing....Teeth are precious!! To self.....stay strong, stay strong, stay strong.... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_19802 Posted May 15, 2021 Share Posted May 15, 2021 On 10/05/2021 at 15:26, louby loo said: It's a difficult one, to be honest the children settle so much better... however I feel we are losing our close connections to families. We're thinking of somewhere mid-way - just not sure what yet! I certainly don't miss the parents hanging around chatting at the end of the session while staff are waiting to go home 😭 (or staff gossiping chit/chatting to parents whilst the other staff are still clearing away 😬 Yes I worry too about the connections with Parents - especially those newly joining us and vulnerable families, as there is no time to 'Be Friendly' and build relationships when you just take them quickly at the door with a queue forming behind! I think we may keep drop off at the door - because it does suit, and let them in at Pick Up? Difficult one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnonyMouse_12805 Posted May 17, 2021 Share Posted May 17, 2021 On 10/05/2021 at 15:26, louby loo said: It's a difficult one, to be honest the children settle so much better... however I feel we are losing our close connections to families. We're thinking of somewhere mid-way - just not sure what yet! I certainly don't miss the parents hanging around chatting at the end of the session while staff are waiting to go home 😭 (or staff gossiping chit/chatting to parents whilst the other staff are still clearing away 😬 Most definitely louby!! Children have and are settling so much quicker but yes, we are losing that connection with families. (or staff gossiping chit/chatting to parents whilst the other staff are still clearing away 😬 That used to drive me crazy! and coming in 15 minutes late then taking up a KW time for another 15 minutes whilst they talked! If someone thinks of something in between- I'd love to hear it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jules Posted May 20, 2021 Share Posted May 20, 2021 Hi All, Dennie mentioned the webinar where Ben and Stephen from our education team discuss the new EYFS on Tapestry. You can now watch a recording of that here. You may also find it useful if you aren't a Tapestry user as it reflects on the new EYFS. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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