Business Development - School's out for summer

Nursery managers may feel they have enough to deal with simply juggling the demands of the early years, without also considering how to entertain those on the verge of secondary school. But, perhaps unsurprisingly, there is a huge potential holiday care market.

The vast majority - 87 per cent - of local authorities in England do not have enough holiday childcare to meet demand. It is a rise of 15 percentage points on last year, according to the Family and Childcare Trust's annual Holiday Childcare Survey.

The National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) - a quarter of whose 5,300 members provide holiday childcare - notes that nurseries are well placed to offer these services. NDNA chief executive Purnima Tanuku recommends working with schools in order to provide the care, as 'nurseries must be sure they can offer a great experience for, say, an 11-year-old, as their needs are obviously very different from a four-year-old'.

One nursery doing this is Fisherfield Farm, which runs a holiday club for three- to 12-year-olds at Caldershaw Primary School in Rochdale, Lancashire. The chain opened the club in 2006 following the success of an on-site beforeand after-school club, and while it doesn't have a nursery on the site it has two in close proximity, according to holiday and school club manager Christine Sykes. This, and the fact that the club is open to all schools, ensures a steady flow of children to the club, which looks set to fill about 50 of its total 72 places this summer - up from 30 - following a recent marketing effort. About half of these children come from schools other than Caldershaw.

'Children come through as babies from the nursery to the club', says Ms Sykes. 'We have a really good reputation as a nursery provider within Rochdale. When parents see the advert for the club they think quality, and the nurseries are quite close together so generally children will know a member of staff, which makes the parents more comfortable.'

Having the benefit of school facilities can be a bonus. 'The outdoor facilities here are fantastic. There's a large playground with climbing frames, a field for sports, and a wooded area with tree roots, which we use for role play and outdoor activities such as dinosaurs,' she says.

Being off the nursery site means different responsibilities. 'We don't have as much responsibility for the actual building and maintenance, so we can focus more on the activities. We work closely with the site manager about securing the school at the end of the school day and have a set of keys. It means we need to be aware of school issues - if there are workmen on site, for example,' she says.

When it comes to staff, Ms Sykes sees experience as more important than specific qualifications, though she adds that the company has a large continuing professional development budget. She says, 'Most of the staff have a Level 2 or Level 3 and have a certain amount of understanding of child development, and if you are used to working with children anyway you do pick it up as you go along.' Two of the holiday club's five core staff are also at university part-time.

Other holiday clubs do emphasise formal qualifications. At Cairellot Nursery, near Glasgow, all five staff members have a qualification enabling them to work with children up to 16, and two also have a playwork Level 3 qualification.

An out-of-school club, for ages five to 14, has been running since 1993, with the holiday playscheme established two years later. 'Many of our parents had used our nursery provision, then as their children progressed to school age we opened an out-of-school service to support their beforeand after-school care needs - which then naturally led to a holiday playscheme service,' says founder and lead practitioner Rosemary Elliott.

Like many of these clubs, activities are mainly decided by staff in advance, but because a lot of the children are known to them activities are sometimes tailored around the preferences of the children.

The benefits include 'additional partnership services to parents', Ms Elliott adds. The idea that 'parents with varying ages of children can bring their older children to the same trusted establishment that they are bringing their youn- ger children to for nursery makes the practicalities a little easier for them'.

Aside from schools and nurseries, other holiday clubs have chosen to operate in community buildings. Seesaws, (right and below), which has been running a holiday club in Birmingham for 16 years, now takes between 30 and 50 children in the four to seven and eight to 11 age groups in a church hall. It runs 'in days' two days a week, and 'out days' to local parks, castles and town centres for the remaining three.

Lady Jayne Ackers, principal, estimates that about a third of children have never been through one of the chain's five nurseries but come through marketing or word of mouth. She adds, 'A lot of children who come through the nursery have older siblings as well. You have a captive audience. Children make their own friendship groups and when they leave it is a very sad time and a lot of parents ask automatically about a holiday club.

'We try to operate an agenda that would be as close as parents would be operating if they weren't working. We have flexible booking system - parents can take as many days as they want.'

The club is now registered with Ofsted as it is a separate entity to the nursery. Seesaws also runs a holiday club out of a 53-place nursery in Wolverhampton.

What about profitability? The NDNA advises that 'it can be very difficult to make out-of-school care sustainable on its own'. Ms Sykes says the ability to move staff from the nursery to the holiday club at Fisherfield Farm helps keep the club profitable. 'If numbers are particularly high or we have a lot of children, we use nursery staff in addition, and if nursery is quiet we send staff to the holiday club.'

For Lady Ackers, when it comes to profitability, 'occupancy is key'. But, she adds, 'it is very different running a holiday club than a nursery'. 'A four-year-old is very different to a nine-year-old and staff need to understand the differences in child development and personal, social and emotional development.'

Cairellot's 25-place holiday playscheme is supported by the setting, which gets a small Out-of-School Care Grant each year for equipment and activities from Renfrewshire Council. According to Ms Elliot, 'the main funding of staffing, resources, activities and administration comes from the setting itself and the fees charged'.

But, she points out, increased competition from temporary, lower quality holiday clubs is having an impact on the viability of the holiday club sector as a whole: 'There are a range of short-term 'pop up' holiday clubs opening up to offer families a range of options that can be cheaper; however, these clubs do not need the same criteria or requirements such as registration or qualified staff, nor do they incur the same level of costs that a permanent registered service has.

'This means that we have to charge a higher daily rate to ensure we are covering our minimum level of outgoings, but with numbers lowering as parents opt for the cheaper options, it is fast becoming a service that's only financially viable on a long-term basis, which may become a wider ranging issue as fewer registered and high-quality care services offer playscheme services.'

BOOKS FOR YOUR SHELF

Global Childhoods (Critical Approaches to the Early Years)

By Monica Edwards

(Critical Publishing, paperback, £18)

For practitioners with an interest in the early years across the world as well as students studying 'global childhoods'. How do culture and society shape childhoods? What is the meaning of childhood? The historical, cultural and social views of childhood and children, families and parenting, including the roles of race, class and gender, are explored here. The reader is challenged to reflect on how global perspectives can be used to support an understanding of inclusion and diversity in their practice.

Time to Move

By Trudi Fitzhenry Karen Murphy and

(Bloomsbury, paperback, £12.99)

Many practitioners are clued up on Personal, Social and Emotional Development and Communication and Language, but recent studies have indicated a potential blind spot over Physical Development, Yet this prime area underpins much of a child's later educational advancement. Without good co-ordination, core stability and gross motor skills the fine motor skills needed for writing may not fully develop. This book contains activity ideas, with practical, easy-to-follow suggestions linked to the ages and stages of the Early Years Outcomes.

30 Ways to Engage Parents in Children's Learning

PACEY (Paperback, £6.99 for members or £14.99 for non-members)

An illustrated guide featuring 30 tips and real-life examples from leading childminders and childcare professionals about how they choose appropriate methods of communication, pitch messages, deal with transitions and are honest with parents about challenging subjects.