Guest Posted June 10, 2006 Share Posted June 10, 2006 Hi I have been trying to sort out the staff hours for september. My problem is we are introducing a lunch club from september, we are a pre-school in a building where we have to set up and put away every day, we run a morning session and an afternoon session, children will have the choice of attending one session and the lunch club. My question is how do you staff them, do you have seperate staff for the lunch club, or do the staff work the sessions and lunch club. The lunch club will be in a back room, seperate from the pre-school rooms. Or do the staff work one session and the lunch club, the logistics of this at the moment seem a nightmare. It was a committee descision to introduce the lunch club but i now need to sort out how its going to be organised and staffed. I have been going round in circles all day. I now have some many screwed up pieces of paper!!!!!!!! I thought i might see how others do it if anybody wouldn't mind sharing, it may then give me some ideas. Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smiles Posted June 10, 2006 Share Posted June 10, 2006 We have a lunch club twice a week but this just follows on from the morning session. We have four memebers of staff daily and one goes home a 12.15 after some children are picked up at 12. We only have the use of the mainhall plus toilets and kitchen. Smiles Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 Some of my staff work the morning session, work the lunch time then go home. The staff that work all day have a half hour lunch break, in shifts, in a seperate room ie: 1 at 11:45, 1 at 12:15 and the last at 12:45. I have a minimum of 2 staff working lunch with the children. They support the children, sit at tables with them, but eat their lunch during their break away from the children. I made this rule because some staff were eating their lunch and not helping children, but getting paid. Lunch is in our main hall, we used to do it in a seperate room but we found that this took staff away from the children setting up and clearing up. Now the children lay the table ( already set up with table cloth, as the continuous snack bar), get their own plates and serviettes and lunch boxes and choose where they want to sit. They clear away too, and we are going to introduce the activity of them washing up their plates in September. Good luck. Peggy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hali Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 our lunch club is manned by the committee but we do have a member of staff onhand each week as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 11, 2006 Share Posted June 11, 2006 Hi Thanks for all your replies. Can i just ask do you have to have a level 3/supervisor/ running the lunch club, or in attendance at the lunch club. Or would it be ok if they are on the premises but having their lunch in a different room. Hope this makes sense? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 Hi Can i also ask what you charge, we are thinking of charging £1.50 a day, does this seem fair? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 (edited) At our lunch club, we have started to use volunteers more and more but there is always a level 3 qualified staff member supervising (usually me). £1.50 sounds fair to me! We charge parents £2.50 and we are situated in a 'deprived' area apparently! Although there is nothing deprived about children arriving at pre-school dripping in gold and wearing designer clothes... Edited June 14, 2006 by Clare Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 We have a level 3 supervising and also charge £2:50 for the hour. This is calculated by working out our session fees at an hourly rate, so to make a 'fair' charge for your parents, it would depend on how long your lunch time is and what your sessional charge is in your area. Peggy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hali Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 we charge 2.40... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 We definately want to start a lunch club. We are a sessional pre-school working out of a community hall with rubbish kitchen facilities. Can you all offer as much help/advice as possible even if you think it is obvious. I need to sell this at our staff meeting tommorow and if it is going to sound viable I have to know my stuff. Currently we offer 5 mornings and 2 afternoon sessions. Monday is a Rising 5s. Morning sessions run from 9-11.30 and afternoons from 12.30 - 3.00. Each session is full with 25 3/4 year olds. We take out and put away all equipment, furniture, admin equipment e.tc. from a garage each day. Also, I really can't get any good information on how to implement the extra hours the goverment expects us to cover next year. Anyone? Thank you for any information you can offer Carla Booth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 Hi Carla. We are in the same position as you: community centre, rubbish kitchen facilities etc. We ask the parents to provide the children with a healthy lunch (no crisps, sweets, fizzy drinks that kind of thing). Our sessions finish at 12:00pm most days and then lunch club runs for an hour after that. Parents pay the usual fees for the week, and the lunch club charge is payable daily, when the children attend. The prents prefer it this way as it is flexible for them. They haven't had to pay a week's worth of lunch club money if their child is only going to attend twice during that week. Hope this helps! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inge Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 we started our lunch club january. we too hall hire etc etc but run 10 sessions each week am & pm . We found that we had to have a break between sessions to stay as sessional as we could not go all day care which was our first choice as we do not have staff toilet facitlites . So we have 15 mins between am & pm sessions which ofsted were happy with. children have to book set days each week so we know the staffing numbers and pay weekly or termly if they prefer. we tried the flexible approach and ended up with no children but staff ro too many children for staff!! hence prebooked sessions. Our children bring a packed lunch with an ice pack which is put in a another giant cool bag from cash & carry in a cupboard, (in the hot weather last week we could feel the cold when we opened it.). a box would be ok for this. parents are advised about healthy eating and we do say no sweets, chocolate and fizzy drinks. Children who attend have really benefited, some have made firm friendships which they were not doing before, others speach and language improving ans well as a behaviour and eating problems some parent have has being helped bu example of other children and staff. it had been very populat this term in preparation for school and they are now helping each other open packets and drinks. well worth doing in our opinion. Other problem of extra hours is a real difficultly. Asking parents they do not want to pick up after 3pm, or start before 9am. so we will not be able to run the 2 sessions a day with those hours of 3 a session, no full days for us (parents offered a porta potti in the garden!!) Our one and only option is 8.45 start, but with staff tking children to school cleaning the hal before use, setting up every day we can see many difficulties which we are currently trying to overcome with little success. more ideas always welcome Inge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 we started our lunch club january. we too hall hire etc etc but run 10 sessions each week am & pm . We found that we had to have a break between sessions to stay as sessional as we could not go all day care which was our first choice as we do not have staff toilet facitlites . So we have 15 mins between am & pm sessions which ofsted were happy with. children have to book set days each week so we know the staffing numbers and pay weekly or termly if they prefer. we tried the flexible approach and ended up with no children but staff ro too many children for staff!! hence prebooked sessions. Our children bring a packed lunch with an ice pack which is put in a another giant cool bag from cash & carry in a cupboard, (in the hot weather last week we could feel the cold when we opened it.). a box would be ok for this. parents are advised about healthy eating and we do say no sweets, chocolate and fizzy drinks. Children who attend have really benefited, some have made firm friendships which they were not doing before, others speach and language improving ans well as a behaviour and eating problems some parent have has being helped bu example of other children and staff. it had been very populat this term in preparation for school and they are now helping each other open packets and drinks. well worth doing in our opinion. Other problem of extra hours is a real difficultly. Asking parents they do not want to pick up after 3pm, or start before 9am. so we will not be able to run the 2 sessions a day with those hours of 3 a session, no full days for us (parents offered a porta potti in the garden!!) Our one and only option is 8.45 start, but with staff tking children to school cleaning the hal before use, setting up every day we can see many difficulties which we are currently trying to overcome with little success. more ideas always welcome Inge Can i just ask what times you do your sessions, we do 10 sessions a week, and we are starting lunch club in september but finishing time is causing a problem as if we finish at 3.15 we are clashing with the local school finishing time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 14, 2006 Share Posted June 14, 2006 Hi Carla, I do 10 sessions a week, and lunch club. am or pm, am & lunch, lunch and pm or all day. We are open 8:45 - 15:15. Children can attend mornings 8:45-11:45 ( 3 hrs), 8:45-12:45 ( am + lunch = 4 hrs)) 12:15-15:15 ( lunch + pm = 4 hrs) or all day 8:45-15:15 (6.5 hrs) I was going to suggest you start at 8:45 and finish at 15:15, but I now see that 15:15 is difficult. The 8:45 to 12:45 would give you 3 hours per funded child 5 days a week = 15 hrs. You could then have 30 minutes for lunch time, but then the afternoon session would only be for 1.75 hrs Could you arrange a walking bus from the school to the preschool??? ( would most probably help school run congestion ) even to the school in the morning?? I make it clear when recruiting staff that I try to be as family friendly as possible but staff must make alternative arrangements for school runs, they need to start half hour before start of sessions and work half hour at end of day, setting up and clearing away. Our job is to provide a service so that other parents can get to work by 9 am. ( ironic isn't it, to be able to look after other peoples children we need to get other people to look after ours). Peggy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 you are all soooo fantastic, keep going this is great xxxxx simcity how does the 15 minutes break work so you can stay as sessional care?? this is one of the commitees concerns Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 you are all soooo fantastic, keep going this is great xxxxx simcity how does the 15 minutes break work so you can stay as sessional care?? this is one of the commitees concerns I know its one of my concerns at the moment, i'm still juggling the times. We were thinking of starting the 3 hr sessions but because the funding money is only for 2 and a half hours we were advised to leave it and stay at 2 and a half, as they said we would need to charge extra to cover it. Do you charge extra for the 3 hr session. This was the advise by our development worker when we asked the parents they said they wouldn't pay the extra and would take them out after 2 and a half hrs. We have been told the 3 hr sessions will not be coming in in 2007 by early years, we are confused and not sure what we are doing or whats going on at the moment. We were hoping to start in sept 2006 with 3 hr sessions so we were ready!!! But we have been advised against it. I just wish we could get some real guidelines! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inge Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 we only manage a lunch club for am session for half hour, parents chose if we did it for morning or afternoon sessions or for a mix of both. we wish we could have lunch club for both but time does not allow. so our times are 9.15 to 11.45 then lunch club 11.45 to 12.15 and than pm session 12.30 to 15.00 half hour is long enough for lunch and a story or books to look at if they eat quickly. parents pay for the half hour £1.50 and are very happy with that. being a committee they had input and chose timings etc so we just went with the flow. As most children do a mixture of afternoon and morning session they all have a chance to 'do lunch' sometime during the week. Staffing is easy as am staff stay for the lunch club or pm staff come in early but as we have 8 at most we only need 2 staff allowing those all day to have half hour break. As we eat with the children most only want to go out for a walk or sit in the garden for a short while but we do insist everyone has a break of some kind. Our ideal would be to allow pm children a lunch club from 12.00 but we would have to be full day care to do this as no break without children in our care so cannot. Inge Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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