Once your child has started
Childcare information for parents from Flying Start.
High quality childcare environment
The experience that your child will be given in childcare is based around the Foundation Phase philosophy, which means that your child will learn through playing and meaningful experiences. The learning experiences will be led by your child’s interests and will follow their natural development progress. This will prepare your child for the next stage in their educational journey, which is also focused around the Foundation Phase philosophy.
Your child will be given the choice to experience a variety of activities, which include:
- enjoying books, songs and rhymes
- sand and water play
- painting and creative crafts
- role play
- construction
- small world and multi-sensory
Children will also be able to enjoy learning and playing in the outdoor environment. Outdoor play is vital to children’s development as they can experience freedom that cannot be achieved indoors. It allows children to develop and practice their gross motor movements, take risks and explore activities on a larger and messier scale.
High quality childcare staff
All Flying Start childcare staff have or are working towards a qualification as recognised by the Care Council for Wales and in accordance with Care Inspectorate Wales regulations.
Each member of staff will be experienced inworking with young children and have an enhanced DBS check.
Staff will attend a minimum of 5 days training that is arranged by the Flying Start teacher. This is in addition to the training requirements set by Care Inspectorate Wales, such as paediatric First Aid, safeguarding and food safety.
Settings may close for staff to attend these training days. The childcare setting will let you know in advance when they are closing for training.
Childcare staff will promote positive behaviour in a way that is developmentally appropriate for the age and stage of the child.
It follows the principles of the Nurturing Families Programme, to ensure consistency with the course offered to parents. The programme focuses on positive discipline, it makes allowances for the fact that children need time to learn what behaviour is ok and what is not and that they are still learning.
It pays attention to what they are doing well rather than noticing what they are doing wrong. It respects children’s rights and feelings and helps them to think and act for themselves.
Speech and language development
The childcare setting will use a tool called WellComm to support your child’s speech and language development. A Flying Start team member will have already visited you to see what the best way for us is support your child’s speech and language development whilst they are in the childcare.
This support continues for the year they are with us. We look at how we support the children to learn language, communicate effectively with us as staff and with each other. We use the WellComm as a tool to help us make sure that we are supporting your child to develop as an individual.
We will discuss the support with you and we may suggest that you have support in the home on a one-to-one basis from a family worker or from a referral to the generic speech and language service.
Attendance and absence
We want to make sure that your child makes the most of their time in the childcare, routine is important for children and your child should attend every day. Even though the childcare is free for you, Welsh Government pays for the childcare and we follow school policies for absence. The childcare setting sends a weekly attendance register to the childcare officer and monitoring officer.
It is important that you let the childcare setting know before the start of the session if your child will not be attending. Either because they are sick, on holiday, or any other occasional day off, such a doctor’s appointment.
Childcare has an absenteeism policy to follow if you have not contacted them to let them know that your child will not be attending the session.
- The leader will contact you in order to find out why your child has not attended. If you have concerns or if your child is not attending for any reason other than illness, they will discuss this with you and see if they can help or offer solutions.
- If your child is still not attending and we do not know why, the childcare leader will notify the childcare officer, who will contact you by letter and inform your health visitor that your child is absent from the health visitor will contact you directly for a chat.
- If your child continues to be absent from childcare and there is a long period of non-attendance, the childcare setting with contact the childcare officer again. Under these circumstances, your child’s childcare space may be withdrawn.
The childcare leader will give you the childcare’s statement of purpose during your stay and play session, which will provide you with detailed information specific to the setting that your child will be attending.
The same information can be downloaded in the original leaflet format.
Download documents
These files may not be accessible