How many hours do your Dc get in preschool??

[norksinmywaistband]

My Dc are at a local preschool in a church hall, It is lovely and everything you can ask for.

They still do 2.5 hour sessions, and I was led to believe that provison should now be 5x 3 hour sessions.

Do all providers have to increase or am I hoping for too much??

[compo]

it's still 5x 2.5 hours where I live

[Twiglett]

have never heard of any increase in hours .. sorry

[littlerach]

Still 2.5 x 5 here too.

[bonkerz]

DD is at play school 9-12. We currently pay £7 for this and was shocked to find out that when she is 3 the funded amount is £3.45 per hour! So either its a brill discount till she is 3 or they actually do make money from the funding!

[DaisySteiner]

Councils don't have to fund the 3 hours sessions until 2010. Some councils are doing it already, most aren't I think. If your council is funding it then the pre-school should be offering it I believe.

[MrsMattie]

2.5 hours a day, 5 days a week. Three hours would be nice!

[Twixabix]

My ds get 5x3 hour session at pre-school.

[DaisySteiner]

Bonkerz - they don't make money exactly from the funding, but if it works like our pre-school the voucher payments effectively subsidise the fee-paying children. We do it like this to try and help those on lower incomes afford to send their children when they're still 2 - my life would be much easier if we charged the same as the vouchers as we are currently losing money as a result and I have to work out how we're going to keep going

[DaisySteiner]

2 year olds cost more than 3 year olds too because of the increased staff ratios.

[Olihan]

My dd does 9 - 12.30 for a morning session or 9 - 2:50 for an all day session. They don't do just afternoons. AFAIK, they are funded for 2.5 hours and we pay £2.50 for the extra hour in the morning.

[Twiglett]

DD has just started full day pre-school .. they have a limited number of places for siblings who are due to start school in the next year and DD started today ... I'm fairly sure this might be unusual

[Reginaphilangy]

Nursery Education Grant funded hours do not increase until 2010 - there are some 'pilot' boroughs that do offer the longer sessions and some boroughs are phasing the funding in from 2009 but it is not compulsory in most areas yet.

Any money that is 'made' from the funding is (or should be) fed back into the pre-school to either buy supplies or subsidise non-funded children.

[Fennel]

My older two had 5 full days of preschool (free) from the term after they were free, that was in Manchester.

Now we live in a different area, my dd3, who's 4, gets 5 sessions free 2.5 hours but it is a full day preschool, they can go for school hours or even 8-6 like a nursery, so she goes for 4 days 9-3.30 but we pay for the hours over 2.5 hours.

I have heard they will increase provision to 3 hour sessions soon. But it hasn't happened yet.

[Fennel]

term after they were three that should read!

[LIZS]

It is increasing to 3 funded hours 5 times a week but not nationally until 2010. Check your LEA website to see whether it is still 2.5 or 3 hours currently locally as it will vary.