Ready to join our family - that’s great news. Please complete our registration form and we will be in touch. https://www.katiebkids.co.uk/registration-page

For ease we have created a Kit List that includes all the essential items that your child will need for a day at KatieB Kids. In creating this list, we have considered sustainability, the season and what your child needs to be comfortable, safe, and able to enjoy everything that we offer in our nursery. We also have some recommendations for kit that we have found works well. Find full details of our Kit List here.

Early years education is governed by strict guidelines that state the required staff for each age group that we care for. These are:

3-23 months 1:3

24-35 months 1:5

36 months to 5 years 1:8

We recognise that some activities, such as outings and woodwork will require adjustments to this, and we always have more staff to ensure that we can assess risk, and deploy our team to maximise the opportunities for our children.

We love food at KatieB Kids, we have a 16 week rolling menu with professionally considered meals and snacks to meet all nutritional requirements and to promote good food habits. Our weekly bulletin will remind parents what week menu we are on.

Every day in our nursery we are actively and proactively looking, listening, and noticing, not only what makes each child ‘tick’, but how each child plays, interacts, and learns. If we had any emerging concern about a child’s progress and development, we discuss this with parents promptly. We dissect the best way to achieve maximum learning for every child considering their schema, learning style and interests, alongside anything that we know could impact upon their wellbeing – perhaps a change to family circumstances. We achieve this through building close relationships with our families, and offering professional support to our educators, and supporting warm, detailed and genuine handovers every day. We do our very best to capture images of all our children to share through our digital parent portal. We want our parents to enjoy receiving pictures of their child at nursery, and we know how important it is that families feel part of their child’s day when they are at work. We share weekly insight bulletins, lead workshops and produce extensive resources to support linked to our ethos and values. Finally every parent receives a termly report on the progress of their child, including ideas for home.

We will use the daily handover to share information with you verbally, how your child has been, and what they have been doing. It is important for the children that we do not spend unnecessary time completing paperwork when they will benefit more from our direct attention, and we believe that a verbal informed handover is more personal and relevant for you. In addition to your handover we send families weekly bulletins that capture insights from the week from every room, with explanations and key information that we think you need or would want to know.

We recommend children wear clothing that they are comfortable in and which enable them to move freely. Our children love messy play, so please don’t send your child to nursery in any clothing you don’t want to risk getting messy. You will need to provide your child with weather-appropriate clothing for outdoor adventures, with their name clearly visible in each item of clothing. In summer, we provide factor 50 sun-cream, but you may provide your own if you prefer.

If your child’s key person is in nursery, they would always want to deliver the handover upon collection. However this is not always possible, as they may be required to support other children in the room. Be reassured that all our educators know every child in their room well, and will always provide you with all necessary information about your child’s day. You are always welcome to request a meeting with your child’s key person if you would like a more thorough catch-up.

It is a legal requirement for children in Early Years education to have access to the outdoors. If your child isn’t well enough to go outside, then they shouldn’t attend nursery for that day.

We ask for all children to be dressed for the weather.

To enable us to be flexible in the routines within the nursery and to maximise benefit to the children we ask for consent on registration for children to partake in daily outings without notice.

We have a realistic attitude to the needs of working parents, but we must safeguard the wellbeing of each individual child and prevent the spread of infection in the setting. If your child is unwell or requires medication to be at ease, then you should keep them at home. Regrettably in nursery children cannot be given the 1:1 attention that they require if they are unwell, and this may result in increased stress for the child. Medication may also be masking symptoms of a transferable infection and we have a duty of care towards all the children in taking all sensible measures to prevent this.

We are unable to care for children with sickness and/or diarrhoea, a fever with a temperature of 101F/38C or above, a continuous cough, chickenpox, measles, mumps, meningitis, hepatitis, a virus or any unexplained rash. Should a child develop such symptoms while they are at the nursery, you will be contacted to collect your child. The Department of Public Health guidelines state that 48 hours must have passed since the final episode of diarrhoea or vomiting before children return to a childcare facility. For COVID illness we will follow government policy.

If a child develops a temperature whilst at nursery, we will call and ask that they are collected within 90 minutes. With your consent, we can administer 5ml of Calpol to your child while they are waiting for you, but this is only under the proviso that they will not be staying at nursery for the remainder of the day. This is because we are unable to provide the 1:1 care that an ill child needs. A child who has been sent home with a temperature will need to remain home from nursery for at least 24 hours.

If you have given your child Calpol within 4 hours before bringing them into nursery, they will not be permitted to attend. If you want to alleviate pain and symptoms associated with teething, then there are products that are effective, but do not contain paracetamol. Calpol or other medicines containing paracetamol could mask the symptoms of an underlying illness or infection, which would be difficult to manage without 1:1 care from an adult.

If your child is prescribed antibiotics, they will not be allowed into nursery until they have been on them for at least 48 hours, in order for them to start feeling better. After this time, we can administer the medicine at nursery if a Medicine Form is filled out and signed at drop-off. All medicine must be prescribed by a medical professional and have the child’s name clearly visible on the label. We cannot administer unprescribed medicine other than Calpol (which is only given if a child is soon to be collected).

Parents / guardians must never bring any medication or food into the nursery in the child’s belongings. Children have open access to the cloakrooms to develop independence when getting ready for the outside adventure or for home and this is a serious hazard.

For any accidents involving a bump to the head, you will be informed via telephone as soon as the accident has happened. It is our policy to also do this if your child has been bitten, as whilst this is a normal behaviour for children, we recognise it can be a shock to hear. An accident form will be filled out for all accidents on Nursery in a Box and you will receive a notification via the Parent Admin app. You will be verbally notified of any accidents at handover.

When you register your child, you are asked to create a ‘collection password’. This password must be provided by anyone collecting a child, other than their parents. If someone is collecting your child for the first time, we ask for a photo of them so that they can be easily identified. Please let us know in advance if you anticipate someone else picking up your child.

In order to protect children with allergies, we only serve food which has been prepared on site and which we can guarantee do not contain any potential allergens.

On a child’s birthday, we are happy to present them with a cake and candles and, where possible, film them being presented with the cake whilst ‘Happy Birthday’ is sung, to be uploaded to the Learning Book. We then leave it to each parent’s discretion as to whether or not they would like to take a slice home for their child. We need an ingredients list so that we can see exactly what ingredients they contain.

We have a diverse cohort of children at KatieB Kids, and recognise festivals from a broad range of cultures, to support our children in learning about people of different faiths and backgrounds. If you, as a family, celebrate a specific festival, we would love for you to share ideas of activities we could try at nursery such as recipes, songs, dances or decorations. The Prescolare children, in particular, love to share their experiences with their peers.

Holidays offer wonderful development opportunities for children and quality family time but unfortunately holidays are charged at the normal session rate to reserve the child’s place at nursery. If you are planning a holiday, you should let us know in advance so we can record this on our register. The nursery has a duty to inform Kent County Council where children are in receipt of Early Years Free Entitlement are absent for more than two consecutive weeks in a term. If you decide to withdraw your child from the nursery, you are required to give 1 month’s notice. If you wish to re-join at a later date, you will be required to re-register and will only be offered a place if there is availability at that time. A child who has been withdrawn from the nursery cannot re-join less than 2 months after their leave date.

Bank holidays are charged so that our dedicated, hard-working team still get paid.

Training days are charged for, too, as they allow our educators to engage in high quality professional training, led by genuine experts who are commissioned to present. These enriching, inspiring and motivating days will allow us to ensure that we are delivering continuous improvement of our practice to enhance the experience that all of our children have within our nursery. We strongly believe that it is in the interests of the nursery, the children, families, and the individual, that each educator is given every opportunity to develop their skills and to broaden their knowledge in early years provision. We hope that you agree that a commitment to an employee enrichment culture alongside a professional development programme is important to ensure that our team can thrive, enabling our children to reach their unique potential and to become independent, confident, and emotionally intelligent individuals. We rotate our training days so that families are not penalised on any one day.

Our credit controller, Sarah, works on Mondays, so accounts on Nursery in a Box’s Parent Admin will be updated manually every Monday to reflect any payments made during the previous week

Fees are due monthly in advance in accordance with your booking pattern. Payment can be made by debit or credit card, standing order or bank transfer and should be received by the 5th day of each month. A late payment fee of 5% of the total invoice will be imposed for payment made over 7 days beyond the 5th of the month. Payments not received by the 19th of the month will impose a penalty fee of 10% and the child’s place in nursery will be suspended. Fees are reviewed every April against the operation costs for the setting which includes annual staff salary increases. At least one month written notice of increase will be given. To leave the nursery one month’s written notice is required to the nursery manager.

If a child is collected late from the nursery, then in order to avoid infringing legal requirements the nursery must pay for additional staffing. To cover this cost a late collection fee of £10 within the first 15 minutes and an additional £10 for every 15 minutes thereafter will be imposed. In situations where a child is collected late on more than 5 occasions throughout their time at the nursery the regular late collection fee will be doubled from then on until the child leaves the nursery.

You may be eligible to claim 30 hours’ funding for your child from the first term after they turn 3-years-old. You can apply via the government portal https://www.gov.uk/apply-30-hours-free-childcare and then provide the nursery with your eligibility code. The nursery manager will then be able to send you a parental declaration form to sign so that they can claim funding. We have several options for families wanting to use their 30 funded hours as part of their day care.

For working families that require full day care and booking patterns over the whole year we offer a reduction in fees through government support. Invoices for funded weeks will reflect the cost of consumables, the additional hours, and the local authority funded hours that we have applied. Holiday weeks will reflect our private fee rate.

For families accessing our funded only booking patterns, invoices will reflect the local authority funded hours that we have applied and a consumable fee.

Funding options are subject to availability.

The cost of consumables is calculated to maintain our quality and to ensure that we can sustainably offer the highest standards of care and enable a commitment to reinvestment to the nursery.