Nursery World - 15 hours .. the free entitlement

In this new series, James Hempsall investigates how different settings are adapting to the new flexible requirements

The free entitlement offers opportunities to consider providing a full day of childcare rather than managing two sessions a day.

Managing arrivals and departures, achieving lunch as an integral part of the day and the use of premises all require thinking about organisation, use of space, cohorts, key workers and curriculum. This was the case in Shadwell Childcare in Leeds.

Shadwell Childcare was established in 2005 when the village playgroup accessed local authority Daycare Expansion Funding to build a facility in a school extension. A requirement of the funding was that the setting offer extended integrated care as well as the traditional two-and-a-half-hour nursery education sessions. Leeds was a first wave pathfinder and in 2007 Shadwell introduced the 15 hours 'extended flexible offer'. Families can access this as a stand-alone offer in threehour sessions or flexibly over a minimum of three days. The setting is now able to offer an additional three full days or six sessions per week.

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