Beau

Well, I'm glad you managed to sort that one out! It certainly sounded quite intriguing.

Oh Brenda, I do sympathise with you. There is nothing worse is there, and once it is annoying you it becomes impossible to block out. My husband is the type of person who would be inclined to turn round and ask them to shut up or take their private conversation outside, but I am not so brave!

That's great news bluestar, thanks for letting us know. If anyone else is thinking of linking up in some way then I suggest the Settings Exchanges forum is the place to head.

Don't forget the competition folks! Get your camera's out this week and upload any photo's of your fundraising into the gallery. The prize really is a super one!

There is always a bit of a debate about the merits and usefulness of stickers and rewards, with no real answer either way. Providing you have good rationale for using it and it is helping to improve practice I am sure OFSTED will have no complaints. However, you can't predict how individual inspectors may react. In this situation I would just stick to your guns and be ready with good justification that they would find difficult to refute!

I think if they are fixed, then you need to discount this as usable space but am open to correction!

A very happy birthday from me too.

Regarding space, it means the usable space available to the children. So you can't count toilets, kitchens, fixed cupboards or sinks, passageways or space used solely by staff. It has to be the space the children are actually going to use to play in.

I had already looked into that Susan. There are several excellent Secondary schools in the area and of course a number of people choose to send their children to a private school in any case. The secondary school in question had twice as many applications as places last year, but looking at the figures it seems that if you're within the catchment area and the school is your first preference then getting in won't be a problem.

I think I'm going to take the place for the older child, go through the appeals process and in the meantime look around at the alternatives.

Thanks for that Jacquie, that looks very useful.

I emailed the school back in January explaining that we were moving into the area, hopefully at Easter and enquiring about spaces for the girls. They emailed back to say that they did have spaces but that they were only allowed to hold them open for 4 weeks, so I should contact them closer to the time. We are now 4 weeks away from the end of term so I contacted them, but unfortunately whatever spaces they had left in Yr3 have gone - I think the last one was taken just last week.

My main issue is with the older of the two. She is not the resilient type unfortunately Rea! We have had lots of issues to deal with moving her once and have been preparing her for this next move very carefully to try to make it less stressful for her. With her being in Yr5 she only has another year and a term before moving schools yet again and I was keen that she settle in and make friends quickly so that this wouldn't be an issue. If we end up at a school out of our secondary school catchment area then any friends she makes will be going to a different secondary school to her which would mean starting from scratch all over again. I had to break the news to the girls about the school when I picked them up this afternoon and the older one has been breaking her heart about it. I have to say I feel like wailing myself.

Unfortunately the other schools that are the feeders for the same secondary school are some way distant - the closest being almost 5 miles away.

One of the reasons I was ruling out the other school was that whilst I know we would get into the secondary school based on our address, it doesn't make sense to send them to a Primary School where all their friends would be going to a different Secondary School to them.

We weren't offered a place, just told that they had places available when I enquired at the start of this year and that places could only be held for 4 weeks.

I don't know anything about the appeal system - do I do this through the council then?

I am so upset at the moment. We found a house we really liked and exchanged contracts on it last December. However, for various reasons we are not completing until the end of the month. The school in our catchment area has had places for both the girls, but were unable to hold a place for them longer than 4 weeks. We are now 4 weeks away from moving so I contacted the school only to find they no longer have places for both of them. My girls are in Year 5 and Year 3, and they have a Year 5 space. The school is an excellent one, which presumably is part of the problem. It was suggested that we try to get them both into another school a couple of miles further away in the opposite direction but having looked it up I find that it was given a notice to improve in 2008, so I don't fancy that one. Also, that one is in a different catchment area for the secondary school we would be in.

I got back in touch with the school and asked if they were likely to have places come up soon, but she said not. So what do I do now? Do I get one of them in Yr5 and hope that a space becomes available for the other one?

We already moved last summer, which entailed a move of schools too. We have been living in rented accommodation whilst finding a house but the girls have been aware that they would be moving schools again. I really don't want to have to mess them about again but then again I really really want them in this particular school.

A very happy birthday from me too.

Sorry Cait, I meant to pm you to let you know but having not been on the forum yesterday (shock, horror!) I spent 3 hours this morning catching up. By that time it was lunchtime and I completely forgot.

Perhaps it was the way I phrased it - 'I don't eat meat' rather than 'I am a vegetarian'. We all have our likes and dislikes in terms of food, and perhaps they just took it that I didn't like it, just in the same way that they didn't eat say tomatoes because they didn't like them.

I would definitely talk to your member of staff and explain that now you have been given the information you have no choice but to act on it, just as you would if it were a child in your setting. Give her the option of reporting it first but make it clear that if she doesn't you will. It's an awful thing to be confronted with though and my heart goes out to you.

Welcome to the forum and thanks for painting such a lovely picture of what you do. It looks like you are leading the way on this one, unless someone else has anything to share?

I've split this into it's own thread so that the two conversations don't get too confusing! And this way it's easier for others to find if they are having snail issues too.

I was in a playgroup, so no lunches to provide. I personally could not touch and cook dead animals so all snacks we provided were vegetarian, which is probably what most settings provide in any case. We did have lunch clubs, and obviously many of the children had ham, chicken and sausages. If they ever offered me any, or asked if I liked ham etc. then I would just explain that I didn't eat meat. Children tend to just accept these sorts of things without question and were never interested in any more detail. I certainly would never start preaching to them about my beliefs though. I am not a 'crusading' sort of person, as I think everyone has to right to make their own choices in life.

I like Facebook as it is keeping me in touch with all the people I left behind in Scotland when I moved last year and is an easy way to share things with family. I don't put anything on which is 'private' to me and have nothing to hide anyway!

My suggestion is to make yourself familiar with the privacy settings and if you get tagged in a photo you don't want to be then remove the tag and tell the friend. If they are a friend they will understand and remove it straight away.

What an awful thing to happen Rea and I'm so pleased that the outcome wasn't a worse scenario that you read about so often. Hopefully this is something you and your family will never have to experience again.

Well done - I will be starting with gusto again this week so hope to have some loss to report next week.

Sorry but it isn't. I have always worked in schools that were very comfortable with supporting the development of young children and able to use appropriate physical contact to comfort distressed individuals.

It's not just the PVI sector who have the monopoly on effective PSED support!

Absolutely Catma, and I'm sure there have been past conversations about this very issue happening with people in Nursery's and Playgroups too. It seems to be a policy that is adapted by individuals with a personal viewpoint, rather than laid down as policy by education authorities etc. and I think it is one that should be challenged. We all recognise the importance of the care and welfare of children alongside education. There is a world of difference between inappropriate touching and comforting a distressed child!

I'm going to move this into the 'Topics' part of the forum. It actually could go into 'Seasons' or 'Celebrations' but I'll stick with 'Seasons' for now!

They sound like a lovely family. What an awful tragedy but they're dealing with it in an amazingly thoughtful way. Thanks for sharing it with us too.