Stepping Stones has recently expanded and we now offer childcare across two sites. Our original building at Victoria Road operates with two dedicated buildings to our Jelly Babies and a separate building dedicated to our Jelly Tots. Our Viewfield road site operates for our 3-5’s and school aged childcare.
Enrolment Forms
If you wish to enrol your child with us, we can email you our Child Handbook and Enrolment Forms. You can either complete and return the forms to us electronically, or if you have access to a printer, you can print them and complete manually. Alternatively, you are welcome to call round to Nursery to collect an enrolment pack. If you are coming to see round our nursery soon, you can collect a pack then.
We recommend you return a completed enrolment form asap so we can allocate your child’s space. Once we have the completed enrolment form, we will allocate a couple of settling in sessions and allocate space. This is followed up with a booking confirmation letter which will give you all the necessary information (such as dates and start/finish times of sessions booked, holiday entitlement, fees and how they are calculated, payment details, etc).
We Pride Ourselves in our Flexibility
Since opening over 14 years ago, it has been important for us to be as flexible as possible in the service we provide to parents and try to cater for the varying needs of many parents and their circumstances while (of course!) meeting the needs of children at the same time. Our approach to bookings is very different to most nurseries and childminders in that we provide a flexible approach – if you need to change your booked days/hours from time to time, we do this at no extra charge (provided we have the space available to give you what you need). Most nurseries will charge you for your usual booked day/hours (even if you don’t use it) and charge you for the extra hours/day.
You can more or less choose the times you want your child at nursery (we don’t have set ‘session times’) although we do prefer a minimum of 4 hours for a session or 7 hours for a full day.
You are not required to take a minimum number of sessions/days per week (other childcare providers are unlikely to be more affordable as many insist on a minimum booking of 3 sessions/days per week; we also allow up to 9 weeks free of charge holidays – more information below under ‘Holidays’).
If you need to have a slightly longer day or additional sessions, we would do this if space permitted and you would only pay the extra hours you book. We also allow you to operate a different booking during term time to that during holidays if that suits your requirements as well.
We also operate an ‘as and when’ option but given how busy we are, it may be we won’t have the days/times you need. Under an ‘as and when’ booking, we ask you to give us the dates and times you need (preferably through email) and then we confirm which we can accommodate. Obviously the earlier you book, the more likely we can accommodate your request. However, sometimes we can alter the day/times a child is in if needed but we also operating a waiting list. Basically, if there is a day/session you need which is fully booked, we note that in our system and you are automatically contacted if the space subsequently becomes available. Any days/sessions booked would be invoiced to you monthly. By operating on the ‘as and when’ basis, it does mean you run the risk of not being able to get the sessions you need (unlike a fixed booking), but that does suit some people (especially those with family/friends who can help).
General Information
Stepping Stones Nursery is open from 8am to 6pm, Monday to Friday all year round with the exception of one week in July and 2 weeks over Christmas. Our Care Inspectorate Registration allows us to have a maximum of 108 children attend at any one time. We have a Baby building (Jelly Babies – for children up to 24 months old), Toddler building (Jelly Tots – for 2 year old children), both located on Victoria road, and our 3-5’s and school aged childcare building (Jelly Beans, has children aged 3 years and over), located on Viewfield Road. Our Baby Room operates with a maximum of 18 babies at any one time; Toddler room with a maximum of 30 while our Jelly Bean Rooms operates with a maximum of 60 children at any one time, 20 of which can be school aged. We have a large, off-road car park to the side of our building, together with some parking along the front of our building at the property on Victoria Road and ample parking at the property on Viewfield Road.
Settling in Sessions
We always recommend settling in sessions for children starting with us. Settling in sessions are designed to give your child the opportunity to get familiar with the environment, staff and other children. They are free of charge and would usually last around 2–3 hours depending on how your child is settling.
Famly
We use Famly Software as our main form of communication with parents. Once your child is enrolled and you receive your booking confirmation letter, you will receive an email inviting you to join Famly. We strongly recommend you download the ‘Famly’ app on to your device so you can send and receive information regarding your Child. One you have set up your login you can add/update information about your child and you can add additional contacts should you wish to do so. The best part of this app is it is much easier for parents to be involved in their child’s learning. We encourage parents to share pictures and information of their child with us via this system. Each day your child attends nursery, this system will keep you informed of your child’s time in nursery (what snack was and how much was eaten, lunch, nappy changes, sleeps, report incidents and accidents, etc). You can also send and receive messages direct from your child’s room and/or specific members of Staff.
Help with Childcare Costs
We would recommend you look at various options for help with childcare costs (the most common government scheme available to ALL parents/carers is the Tax Free Childcare – for every £8 you pay, the government will pay £2, up to £2,000 per year). We have many parents paying fees through their tax free childcare account. You can research online to see what help there is towards childcare costs and see which may apply to you. It’s worth visiting this website: https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk/
Fees
We don’t require a deposit upfront and instead ask for fees to be paid monthly in advance (or weekly if you prefer).
Jelly Beans (3-5 yr old’s) – any hours booked over and above funded hours will be charged at £6.70 per hour (regardless of how many hours are booked) – typical cost per hour if paying through tax free childcare is approximately £5.36/hr.
Jelly Tots (2 yr old’s) and Jelly Babies Full Time* £6.70 per hour (typical cost/hr if paying through tax free childcare is approximately £5.88/hr)
Part Time £7.35 per hour (typical cost/hr if paying through tax free childcare is approximately £5.88/hr)
Snack is charged at 55p per snack (maximum of 2 snacks per full day) and Meals are charged at £3 each if you choose to have them supplied by Nursery.
*Full Time is booked hours of 35 or more per week
You can choose whether you pay the same amount for fees every month (annualised fees paid over 12 equal monthly payments) OR if you want invoiced ‘actual’ fees each month (which means some months will be less than others). We ask parents to make payment direct to the Nursery bank account. If you add hours from time to time, we invoice those separately.
SCHOOL AGED CHILDREN:
Stepping Stones now provide after School care priced at £5.25/hr (minimum of 2 hrs per session booked) – includes snack (children collected from Craighill and Knockbreck Primary Schools).
We also offer holiday care and this is priced at £5.25/hr (minimum of 4 hrs/ session booked) – option to order meal @ £3.10/meal and snack charged at 55p/snack provided (max of 2 per day)
Nursery Lunches
Parents can choose to have nursery provide lunch for children or you can provide a packed lunch if you prefer. It’s entirely optional and you can book the odd days or all days that you want (there is no minimum order). Our meals are supplied by our local Restaurant in Tain called ‘Greens’. We will include the menu in your booking confirmation letter. Each meal ordered is £3.10 (which includes pudding) and the meals are mashed/mixed as necessary for younger children. If you want to order lunches, you will need to complete the order form available in each Cloak Room at Nursery. Orders must be with us by 6pm each Monday, for the following weeks meals and the orders must be accompanied by payment (cash). We provide the snack for children both in the morning and afternoon.
If you want a meal automatically supplied every week on each day booked, you can have that built in within the monthly fees payment and I can confirm what the payment should be (you won’t need to order each week).
Meals are automatically supplied each week for children utilising their Early Learning and Childcare Funding with us and this is included within the Funding (as are snacks).
Holidays
Unlike many nurseries and childminders, we have a very competitive ‘holiday’ package. You can have 5 weeks of holidays free of charge in the year (unless you are operating a term time only booking in which case you would have 9 weeks). In addition to the ‘free’ holidays, you can have a further 3 weeks at 50% (term time only bookings do not get additional holidays weeks at 50%). If you choose to utilise ‘holidays’ then fees for those periods are refunded direct to your bank account (or adjusted against normal monthly fee payment). If you choose to enrol your child with us, once we receive the completed enrolment form, we will follow up your booking with a confirmation letter which contains quite a lot of information and it also confirms the days and hours booked, fees and how they are calculated, how they are to be paid, uniforms ordering (optional!), holiday dates, etc.
Early Learning and Childcare Funding
Shortly after your child turns 3, they will qualify for the 1140 hours per annum of Early Learning and Childcare funding (this means you can have between 23 – 30 hours per week of ‘free’ hours at nursery depending on how you choose to use the funding). We operate very flexibly (we don’t stipulate your allocated times for use of the funded hours like some providers to). You can opt to utilise your funding across the course of the full year and in any way you wish (up to a maximum of 10 hours per day – this rule applies to all Nurseries delivering the funding). You can also opt to split your funding between us and another Centre should this suit your requirements.
Some 2 year old children are entitled to funding. More information is available via this link:
https://www.highland.gov.uk/downloads/file/20210/elc_2_year_old_funding_application_form
Key Workers
Stepping Stones Nursery operate a key worker system. This is where each child is assigned to a particular member of staff (a ‘key worker’). Key workers might work with your child on specific play activities or simply chat with your child individually or as part of their key worker group. This arrangement allows staff to support each child’s learning in greater depth, personalise their learning experience and plan next steps in their learning.
Nursery Routine
In nursery we operate a routine which allows for ample free play but also builds in time for snack, outdoor time, story and song time, etc. Children have a wide range of resources to choose from and these continuously change (as does the room layouts and displays) in order to keep the environment interesting for children. Feel free to have a look at our website or look us up on Facebook.