Ok I have 9 questions for GB - I am only allowed 1
So which do I keep & which do I dump
1)WRT Funded Early Years Education as provided by childminders; please could you tell me why it is that I have to subsidise funded education as the rate paid by local authorities does not reflect the rate I charge. Non-funded child pays £4 an hour in advance, funded child I receive £3.32 an hour in arrears.
2)When Children's Centres (with nurseries/daycare) open can more market research be done wrt the current childcare market. Although the local children's centre is excellent during the year they first opened the childcare market was so destabilised that nearly 1/3rd of childminders had to close, of course now 18 months later more childminders are needed and new ones are being recruited. An amount of support to the existing childminders during the transition could have saved lots of livelihoods and maintained continuity of care for the children.
3)When EYFS was introduced last year, why were the new regulations for childcare on domestic premises not finalised until mid-August. As an employer required to provide notice of redundancy to staff if we were not able to operate due to the new regulations, I had to needlessly threaten my employees with redundancy when in fact I was able to operate legally.
4)The grant funding to help childminders with EYFS implementation has been very patchy over the country - some childminders have received a grant, others have had the money spent on training they cannot access as they are at work, our grant has been given to the network to but resources that can only be used by accredited childminders (divisive or what) - why has this not been administered so all childminders can access it fully.
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if parents don't want their 5-18 year old child to study under the national curriculum they can home educate or go to a private school. However it is virtually impossible for a parent to get exemption from EYFS for their under 5's - why is that?
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Do you really think I as a childminder (who rarely if ever makes a profit) should be required to administer EYFS at the same level as a head of a children's centre, or a head teacher?
7)By introducing level 3 qualifications for childminders (some time in the next decade) you will preclude a vast number of childminders for whom education at this level is unlikely due to poor education or additional needs. This does not make them bad childcarers just discriminated against. In fact the EYFS discriminates against childminder for whom English is a second language or for whom reading (at the level at which the EYFS is written)is not a normal part of their daily lives.
Thanks