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Barleymont Group of Day Nurseries, Preschool, Afterschool and Holiday Club

TEL : 02085995937 / 07595931990

Parental Partnership

*Parents are children's first and most enduring educators. When parents and practitioners work together in early years settings, the results have a positive impact on children's development and learning" EYFS 2008

At Our setting we pride ourselves that everyone receives a warm welcome. We recognise and respect a child’s family members as the most important people in their lives. We encourage families to share information about their children which will enable staff to meet children’s individual needs. Before your child starts nursery they will be invited to attend settle in sessions. During these they will meet their key person who will support your child’s transition into nursery.

We use the key person approach to help your child feel individual, cherished and cared for while they are in our care. This approach means that there is one named member of staff to act as a main point of contact for you and your child.

Your child’s key person can help you and your child by:

    ● Helping your child settle in when they first arrive at the setting.
    ● Making sure that any questions you have are answered.
    ● Observing your child’s play and providing suitable resources and activities to enhance their development.
    ● Using an app called Famly to help keep up to date records about your child’s learning and sharing these with you.
    ● Encouraging your child to develop independence skills.
    ● Ensuring that all information about your child is shared with all staff involved in their care.

At Our setting we keep in contact with all our parents by using nursery/home App, newsletters, email, and regular parent meetings. We operate an open door policy and ask parents to collect their child from the room where staff will be happy to discuss your child’s time in nursery.


As practitioners, we build up expertise in how young children learn and how each child operates within our setting. But it is the parent who knows their child best, and unless there is a sharing of information between practitioners and parents, a child's learning needs will be neither fully understood nor, ultimately, met.

Sharing information  about the child: Opportunities for talking to parents about their child's learning may happen formally and informally, and spontaneous exchanges can generate useful information. for example, at dropping-off and picking-up times, so allowing a culture of informal information sharing to develop.

A trusting and warm relationship between key person and parents begins with the initial contact meeting, and it is crucial that, from the start, parents understand that staff values their knowledge and understanding of their child.

However, it may not always be possible for practitioners to speak to parents on a day-to-day basis about their child's learning milestones, current interests or recent experiences. Parents' working hours may prevent them from having daily or even regular contact of any kind with the nursery; hence we use an app called Famly for communicating with the parents. It’s a two-way communication and can be useful where contact time between practitioner and parent is limited.

Parent and key Person meetings: We organise parent and key person meetings on a regular basis and in a more structured way usually towards the end of the term. Again, the timing of these meetings will depend on the parents' daily routines and commitments, and our staff team are flexible when arranging them.

These meetings offer an opportunity for the practitioner and parents to share their observations and to consider the implications of these in terms of planning for the child's learning. The emphasis of the meeting is to celebrate what the child has achieved and on looking for ways of building on their current interests and achievements.

Key Person meetings usually take place in the nursery, and give both parents and key person time to prepare and think about issues that they want to discuss. An up-to-date development profile can provide a useful focus for discussion, particularly if that profile includes contributions from home. A series of photographs, or a video sequence, can also be very informative in such meetings. Famly app used at the setting alloes learning journeys to record development using photographs as well as videos. These are opportunities to look at the child's learning journeys together and to talk about appropriate provision and support for the child's developmental stage.

Children's online learning journey: documented through photographs, on-going key person observations, focus activities and notes can give a deep insight into what is motivating them and provide useful information about their stage of development. Video has the added advantage of recording speech and movement and can be played again and again in order to revisit interesting observations. We ask parents to share observations from home as well and contribute regularly to the child’s online journey by sharing any wow moment, special stories or home learning activities. Planning together for children's learning results in a more holistic approach, an enhanced curriculum and continuity for the children.

Where a pattern of behaviour or personal learning interest has been identified, the key person and parent can discuss experiences that could be offered at home and in the nursery in the hope that they would engage the child and further extend learning.

For example, if both parent and key person have noticed that the child often gathers objects in bags and transports them around the home and nursery, they could agree to provide a collection of bags and everyday objects at home and similar resources in nursery.

Alternatively, the key person and parent may decide to make a change in family circumstances the focus for planning. Perhaps relatives are coming to stay for some time and the mother is planning to involve the child in preparing a room and food for their guests. In response, the practitioner could provide additional resources in the nursery home corner and make time to discuss and 'play out' the experience with the child.

Summative reports: offer parents a written summary of the child's learning and are usually organised under the 7 areas of learning. These end of the Preschool year reports are discussed with the parents during Parent Meetings before passing the report to the child’s Reception Year teacher in the Primary School.