Summer Newsletter S O U T H T I P P E R A R Y C O U N T Y C H I L D C A R E. Parents. Childminders. Childcare. Students. July 2010

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1 July S O U T H T I P P E R A R Y C O U N T Y C H I L D C A R E Summer Newsletter Community Childcare Providers Private Childcare Providers Parents Childminders Parent & Toddler groups Childcare Students

2 Welcome At South Tipperary County Childcare Committee, we take pride in being the One Stop Shop for childcare supports in the county. These supports come in the form of information, training, financial grants and advice. They are availed of by Childminders, Community and Private Childcare Providers, Parents and Students. The supports are enhanced through the active involvement of a range of statutory and non-statutory organisations. We welcome regular evaluation of how we do our business and will take on board your suggestions on how to further improve our service. Currently we are happy to support parents in determining the eligibility of their children for the Free Pre-School Year. Parents are now coming to terms with Aistear as the curriculum for early years care and education with Siolta as the accompanying quality framework. We acknowledge that as Siolta and Aistear are rolled out and implemented over the next two years, they will bring about a really positive experience for children in their last year of preschool before entering primary school. Literally all providers are now in receipt of government funding through either Community Childcare Subvention or the Free Pre-school Year and are using electronic returns to Pobal and the OMCYA. We encourage all providers to avail of our help until they are comfortable with the new system. In wishing you an enjoyable summertime, I would like to leave you with this thought. Here at the STCCC, there is no such thing as a stupid question. Please keep asking and we will keep on helping. Best wishes, Gerry and the team. Provider Networks Ongoing training for childcare workers and childcare practitioners, such as Road safety training Active pre-schools Policy Fire Safety Arts & Crafts Story Telling Creative music & dance Healthy eating Implementation of Siolta and Aistear in Childcare services Opportunities for childcare services to attain quality awards Increasing level of quality in childcare in South Tipperary For further information, contact Ger at or SIOLTA SESSIONS LEVEL 1 TIMES: 7.30PM 9.30PM NCNA Siolta workshops Childcare Providers ONLY Interactions, Thurles,18th October 2010 Play, Clonmel,13th December 2010 For further details contact: Maire Corbett Siolta Co-ordinater NCNA mairec@ncna.ie Mobile: Clonmel Community Resource Centre: Wednesday 15 th September 2010 Knockanrawley Community Resource Centre, Tipperary: Wednesday 22 nd September 2010 Nano Nagle Community Resource Centre, Carrick on Suir: Wednesday 29 th September 2010 For bookings, please contact Ger on or gerardineb@southtippchildcare.ie

3 Parent & Toddler Groups A Parent & Toddler Group is a group of parents/carers and their children that meet regularly in a suitable location, for example, a community centre, parish or sports hall. While these groups are great for giving the children an opportunity to play and socialise in a safe environment supervised by their parents, they are also very beneficial for the parents/carers who get to meet others in similar circumstances that live in their area. They provide a great support network where parents have an opportunity to share their experiences and advice. For more information on the Parent and Toddler Groups in your area you can contact Elaine on or elaine@southtippchildcare.ie Pictured above: Clonmel Childcare holding a Pyjama day in association with NCNA Pictured above: Darragh Noonan, Longfield Academy in his PJ s PARENT SUPPORTS Choosing Childcare Reducing your childcare costs Choosing a childminder Child development Healthy eating Promoting Positive Behaviour Questions you should ask your childcare service or childminder Support for parents of children with special needs Parenting Programmes List of Childcare services in South Tipperary Provider Networks Parent Networks Parents of Children with Special Needs Network

4 FREE PRE-SCHOOL YEAR FOR CHILDREN Parents if you have a child who was born between the 2 nd February 2006 and the 30 th June 2007 he/she will qualify for a year s free preschool in both private and community childcare services in September. The scheme operates in a number of ways depending on how long your child attends a service.i.e sessional (3 hours per day), part time or fulltime hours ( 5 hours or more per day). If you would like more information about the ECCE scheme or the childcare services taking part in it please contact us on or us at info@southtippchilldcare.ie ECCE COMPLIANCE VISITS The Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs (OMCYA) has requested that all childcare services participating in the Early Childhood Care & Education (ECCE) Scheme from 1st January 2010 will be subject to an on-site visit to ensure that the conditions of the Scheme are being complied with as detailed in your grant funding agreement. These on-site visits will be carried out by Pobal, a not-forprofit agency that delivers and manages a range of programmes on behalf of government and the EU. The purpose of the on-site Compliance Visit is to: Confirm existence of the pre-school service. Verify that the actual number of ECCE places in each service corresponds with the number approved by OMCYA. Check the qualifications of staff delivering the preschool service. Verify compliance with the approved Fees Policy. The on-site visit is not an audit of accounts, books or financial records of the service or an examination of the service s corporate governance. Over 50 visits have taken place already and further visits are scheduled. Pobal will be in contact with all services participating in the ECCE Scheme prior to a site visit. Please refer to ie for more information CCSS (COMMUNITY CHILDCARE SUBVENTION SCHEME) The introduction of a follow on scheme to the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme (CCSS) with effect from 1 September 2010, was announced in the Budget on 9 December The new Community Childcare Subvention (CCS) scheme will continue to be restricted to community not for profit childcare services. There are also changes being made to the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme (CCSS) which will take effect from September These changes concern all community groups currently partaking in the CCSS scheme. ECCE Timescale for Childcare Providers June: The OMCYA will send out draft ECCE contracts to existing providers on 11 th June approx. These contracts will have to be signed and returned to the County Childcare Committee. New services taking part in the scheme will receive their contracts by the end of June/start of July. The OMCYA will distribute information leaflets to the parents of children who will qualify for the scheme in September. August: A list of services in contract for ECCE/CCS will be provided by the OMCYA to the County Childcare Committee. August: Information packs re September 2010 ECCE/CCS electronic returns will be issued by the OMCYA to all participating services September: The week of September 6 th - 10 th will be the reference week for returns.

5 Active Pre-school Research has shown that the best time to establish healthy lifestyle habits is the first six years of a child s life. As a childcare provider you have the opportunity to create a healthy environment and aid in the fight against an increase in childhood overweight rates. The Health Promotion Department, HSE South worked in partnership with South Tipperary County Childcare Committee to support 11 pre-school service providers to engage in the Active Pre-school Pilot Project. The overall aim of this initiative is to ensure that kids are supported in the pre-school environment to achieve the minimum requirement of 60 minutes per day of physical activity for health and wellbeing. The key aims of the project are: Adopting a whole school approach to the promotion of physical activity Providing a supportive environment conducive to the promotion of physical activity Encouraging more kids to be more active inside and outside school providing kids with positive physical activity experiences Catering for the needs of every child Encouraging and promoting links with the community. Catherine O Loughlin, Regional Health Promotion Officer supported by the South Tipperary Local Sports Partnership Co-ordinator facilitated three physical activity policy development workshops for the 11 selected service providers from October 2009 through to February Catherine and Ger Boland, STCCC then visited all of the pre-schools involved to support each in the process of finalising and implementing an active preschool policy for their service. A Certificate of Participation was awarded to each participating service. The current status of the initiative is that Catherine is feeding back to each service on their draft policy in order to finalise the policy and be formally adopted by management. The next step will be implementation of the finalised policy although many providers are currently providing a range of activities and meeting the minimum guidelines for physical activity for children. Congratulations to all the service providers involved for their commitment and good work. For more information on this initiative please contact Catherine (details below) or Ger Boland. Catherine O'Loughlin Regional Health Promotion Officer - Physical Activity Health Promotion Office HSE South South Tipperary Community Services Western Road Clonmel Co.Tipperary Tel: Mobile: Fax:

6 THE OFFICIAL OPENING OF BRIGHTSPARKS CHILDCARE CENTRE IN BALLINGARRY BY MR. BARRY ANDREWS Pictured above; Sally Ivers (Brighsparks Manager) presenting a locally made mirror to Minister (OMCYA) Barry Andrews Pictured L-R, Sally Ivers (Brightsparks Manager & STCCC Chairperson), Marian O Riordan, (STCCC), Elaine McGowran (STCCC), Minister Barry Andrews (OMCYA), Ger Boland (STCCC), Carol Knox (STCCC), Gerry Hickey (STCCC) HSE Family Funday Held in Carrick on-suir pictured below A Recent visit to Cahir Parent and Toddler Group, Pictured Below

7 Pictured above: Little Rascals Pre-school Carrick-on-Suir., learning the Rules of the Road Pictured above:elm Park Area Childcare Clonmel Community Garda presents certs. Pictured below: Stepping Stones Crèche and Montessori Clonmel Deirdre says STOP Pictured below: Sugradh Crèche Carrick-on-Suir, the importance of road safety Pictured above: the work carried out by Clogheen Community Playgroup. A big thank you to all of the services that participated in the Beep Beep day on the 24th June 2010, Ger Boland. Pictured below and bottom right: Little Rascals Preschool, Carrick-on-Suir & Bobby Tobin from Stepping Stones Crèche & Montessori stops at the red light!

8 TRAINING FOR CHILDCARE PROVIDERS South Tipperary County Childcare Committee has had a very active training programme for the first six months of Courses covered ranged from Occupational First Aid to Managing Challenging Behaviour. Our training schedule for the Autumn is being organised at present and will be available by the end of the Summer. Many thanks to everyone who has taken part in the programmes so far this year. For further information, please contact Elaine on or elaine@southtippchildcare.ie Pictured above are some participants that took part in the Buntús Start programme with their tutors, Valerie Connolly STSP and Carol Knox STCCC Contact us Childcare Employment and Training Support (CETS) scheme Full and half-day childcare services in the county are being asked to reserve places from September, for children of people who are partaking in eligible VEC and FAS courses. The places will be funded by the Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs. For more details, please check our Website: South Tipperary County Childcare Committee, Unit 5, Ground Floor, Hughes Mill, Suir Island, Clonmel, Tel: Fax: Office hours, 9am - 5pm Staff Members Gerry Hickey - Manager gerry@southtippchildcare.ie Mobile: Ger Boland - Childcare Development Officer gerardineb@southtippchildcare.ie Mobile: Elaine McGowran - Childcare Development Officer Elaine@southtippchildcare.ie Mobile: Carol Knox - Childminding Development Officer carol@southtippchildcare.ie Mobile: Marian O Riordan - Administrator marian@southtippchildcare.ie FIND US