Guest Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Hi We are currently registered for 20 children a session. Why/how this figure was originally arrived at I don't know - before my time. However, we operate a sessional pre-school for children aged 2 to 5 yrs and have a massive church hall with sundry side rooms too. At a recent meeting of local providers I realised other settings with less space than us are actually registered for more children. I have therefore got the necessary forms from Ofsted to expand/ our registered number. Before I do it, however, I wanted to ask you lovely lot if you have done this and if so are there any possible pitfalls I need to be aware of.... eg Ofsted needing to inspect again (yikes!). Any comments gratefully received! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunnyday Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Oh Cait has - sure she'll be along soon with some good advice! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cait Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Yes, how many toilets have you got? We've got square meterage for LOADS more children, but because we've only two 'loos' we can only have 20 children. In spite of the fact that a third of those children are in nappies at any one time!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Apart from space - I thought the number of toilets was another factor in deciding how many children you could be registered for - I believe it's 1 toilet per 10 children, plus a toilet for adults to use. Have you got enough toilets ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
narnia Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 and wash basins..................the 'O' people like wash basins too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inge Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 toilets is the issue.. was with us, 1 for 10 children since eyfs though the toilet for adult use is no longer a requirement, but a good practice thing..( or whatever the phrase is.. ) we could not be full time pre eyfs because of this.. since it was introduced we changed to full time and not a problem any more.. Inge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Inge you have made me feel so much better. I'm not sure how but we have been registered for 40 children forever with only 3 toilets and the staff use one of those. At least we don't still need that as a separate thing. In reality we do have one separate as the children use the other toilets exclusively, but that said we still don't have 1 toilet for every 10 children. I wonder how we ever got our registration as we did and why no one has ever picked up on it when we've been inspected. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laura Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 We were registered for 40 children with only 2 children - this was 20 years ago! There was no issue when we moved to full days. At our last oftsed (jan08) the inspector did say we should have at least one toilet or we might have to reduce our numbers, but not sure how this wold have happened as it wasn't put in our report. So we applied for funding and renovated the toilets so we now have a 3rd toilet. No separate one for staff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Thanks Laura. Our registration is about the same age as yours so maybe it is some historical thing. We have 3 toilets in total, one is the gents but we use it for staff and visitors and the other 2 are in the ladies which is the children's toliet during the session. Will stop hyperventilating now Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 Hmm, think we can tick that box - 2 boys toilets and 2 sinks, and the same for the girls plus a disabled loo and changing area which the staff use as their loo too! One of the benefits of a fairly modern church building methinks! So are you all saying that I should be ok...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cait Posted January 19, 2010 Share Posted January 19, 2010 We were registered for 40 children with only 2 children - this was 20 years ago! There was no issue when we moved to full days. At our last oftsed (jan08) the inspector did say we should have at least one toilet or we might have to reduce our numbers, but not sure how this wold have happened as it wasn't put in our report. So we applied for funding and renovated the toilets so we now have a 3rd toilet. No separate one for staff. Did you need planning permission? When I suggested this to our plumber he said we'd need it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laura Posted January 20, 2010 Share Posted January 20, 2010 (edited) Cait, We had to get building regs. We rang council and explained what we were doing and they came and had a look. It was very easy. We completely took out the kitchen and existing toilets to create a smaller kitchen and a third toilet with disabled access. As we weren't changing the size of the building i think this was the reason we didn't need planning permission. Laura Edited January 20, 2010 by laura Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alison Posted January 20, 2010 Share Posted January 20, 2010 (edited) I think there's a limit on the number of children in one room regardless of size that was 26 children so alot of preschools would have massive halls, plenty of toilets but where limited to 26 children (havent checked what eyfs says about this) we have a massive hall 3 toilets and where registered for 26 children for years then one year had an inspection and they noticed there was only 2 sinks so they reduced our numbers to 20 then at our last inspection I pointed out that we now had an additional toilet and sink in the new extention and could we increase our numbers accordingly and it was aggreed during the inspection to vary our conditions of registration to put the numbers back up to 26 children I still had to put it in writing but in the past when Ive needed to request a variation to our registration unless its somethig major( we had to move premessis for a few months while they built an extention) in general OFSTED tend to ask "have you done a risk assessment and does it comply with EYFS?" if you can say yes to both of those questions then they might not need to come out to inspect. Edited January 20, 2010 by Alison Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inge Posted January 20, 2010 Share Posted January 20, 2010 from reading these and your post I would suggest go for it... unlikely they will visit for a variation, they didn't when we changed to include lunch club or when we went full day... only time they did was when they added after school club, but it was a visit to approve it not an inspection. Inge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted January 20, 2010 Share Posted January 20, 2010 Thank you for all your helpful comments! After reading them carefully and speaking to our Early Years Development Officer the committee are keen for me to apply for a variation... I'll keep you posted. Incidentally, the D.O. said that she didn't think the variation would trigger an inspection. Apparently the most likely trigger at the moment is the inspection of the local school - her opinion is that means that other providers in the vicinity might get their inspections too.... Thought that was worth sharing!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rachelllps Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Interesting post. We are registered for 24 children at any one session and I had always believed that it was due to the space allowance in the hall, can't recall the exact square metres but believe it changes due to childrens age. If it was down to number of toilets (we have one disabled , one female, one male plus two urinals, three sinks) i think we could be registered until we felt like sardines! Rachel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inge Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 Interesting post. We are registered for 24 children at any one session and I had always believed that it was due to the space allowance in the hall, can't recall the exact square metres but believe it changes due to childrens age. If it was down to number of toilets (we have one disabled , one female, one male plus two urinals, three sinks) i think we could be registered until we felt like sardines! Rachel Its both... many settings have laods of space but not enough toilets... others like yours load of toilets and less space... they are both taken into account when allowing numbers.. Inge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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