The government have re-issued the guidance for information sharing, this is a vital piece of documentation for settings with relation to safeguarding and vital if children who attend the setting share their time over several provisions.
Settings must ensure that all staff have read the documentation and are fully aware of the requirements, which can be found here.
We have some wonderful new and existing donors who have given us so many great resources for our members and Day Pass pickers. Because of their generosity and to save the resources going to landfill we have been able to support many activities in Birmingham through providing access to resources. Schools, Nurseries, Children Centres and Childminders, Art Projects and Crafters etc have benefitted from their membership by coming along and filling their bags (and the boot of their car!)
We were invited to have a stand at a recent NEC event for crafters where we displayed examples of the resources we can supply and talked to people at the show about recycling and re-use. Many of the crafters attending the show gave us lots of new ideas which we can use for the future and will incorporate in our displays and on social media to inspire you to make use of what we have on offer.
We recently held a Workshop which was a great success. We invited the lovely Philippa England to come and show participants how to make her wonderful Moths. (Photo) The workshop took place on a Saturday in November at the Jewellery Quarter store and it was so well received we are planning more workshops for the future. Watch this space!
We have a number of volunteers who come in to help us on a regular basis and support us to display, sort, cut fabrics, wind resources onto bobbins etc etc. Their work is tremendous and we couldn’t offer the service we do without their support.
We are soon to be participating in a Swap in Gloucester where we take some of our resources which we perhaps haven’t got room for or that we can get a huge amount of, and Swap it with other stores so that we can increase the variety of what we offer to our members.
Our Morsbag Pod is going from strength to strength and we have avid morsbaggers who generously supply us with Morsbags for events. The Morsbag movement is growing internationally and it is such a worthwhile cause which recycles scrap fabric into useful bags and reduces the need for plastic! Please get in touch with us if you would like to join in. We can supply fabric and labels- all we need from you is the total of bags that you make to add to our Pod count. All the information on Morsbags can be found at www.morsbags.com . We are approaching 2000 bags made by our wonderful morsbaggers which probably means that 10,000 plastic bags are not in circulation because of our Pod.
We are coming to the festive season and we have lots of festive resources to help your projects.
We are regularly collecting from donors and re-vamping the 2 stores so that they are full and ready to support your creative and play opportunities. Simply phone to book an appointment and we look forward to seeing you.
When the budget was announced last month there were no changes that were significant to effect the out of school sector. However the announcement of the National Minimum Wage was given, each setting is resposible to ensure that all staff are paid the correct houlry rate from the start of April 2019. So make plans now to ensure that the increase is reflected in your income and expenditure for the new financial year.
The increases are as follows:
Adults aged over 25 and over £8.21 (an increase of 38p)
Adults aged 18-20 £6.15 (an increase of 25p)
16-17 year olds £4.35 (an increase of 15p)
Apprentices £3.90 (an increase of 20p)
