As of January 5th 2021, England is under a third National Lockdown. People must not leave their home other than where reasonably necessary for work - if you cannot reasonably do so from home - for education, open air recreation and essential activities such as medical appointments and to buy food. These restrictions are in response to rapidly rising Covid-19 cases and to help to limit the spread of the new variant of the virus.
At Croft Early Years, we feel it is vital to provide you, our parents and carers with the most up-to-date guidance and for us to continue to provide your child and our staff with a safe and secure environment. The children are very aware of how we’re keeping safe throughout this situation.

• Early Years settings (including nurseries and childminders) remain open.
• You must not leave, or be outside of your home except where necessary. If you do leave home for a permitted reason, you should always stay local to where you live. Although you may leave your local area for work.
• You may leave home to meet your support bubble or childcare bubble where necessary, but only if you are legally permitted to form one.
• You must not meet socially with anybody you do not live with or have a support bubble with.
• You may exercise on your own or with one other person, while maintaining 2m distancing, in public outdoor places.
• Non-essential retail outlets must close. Essential businesses, shops and venues can remain open and continue to operate in a COVID-Secure manner.
• Hospitality settings, such as bars, pubs, cafes and restaurants must close except for takeaway, delivery, drive-through and click and collect services.

For full important information on the restrictions, see the Gov.UK website and the Warrington Council website. Both provide full information on what you can and can't do within the current restrictions.

When visiting Croft Early Years, we ask you to please follow these guidelines:

• Face coverings to be worn by adults for dropping off at/collecting from Preschool/Nursery.
• All members of different households to maintain a 2m distance at all times.
• Clean or wipe down any items that move between home and school e.g. water bottle & lunch bags.
• We kindly request that no rucksacks are brought into the setting - for health and safety reasons (to limit virus transmission, and also as we have limited space; small lunch bags are fine); this is also stated in our fire, emergency evacuation and bomb policies.

As a setting, we continue to have regular contact with the Council so that the Department of Education are kept up-to-date with local situations. We would be grateful if any critical or keyworker parents could email details of their occupation as soon as possible, so that our Business Continuity Plan can be updated.
The Government have released guidance for the Early Years and Education sector on how we must operate this term. There are several precautionary measures that we must take in order to maintain a ‘Covid-safe’ environment to ensure the safety of children and staff whilst attending the Preschool/ Nursery.
Please note that these measures and plans which we have made may alter due to changes in rates of infection. For this reason, we ask parents to remain flexible and to keep up-to-date with the response to the pandemic. We intend to keep you updated as much as possible during these unprecedented times.

Important information and Absence Flow Chart

We have prepared 5 new documents which will give you complete details of how we plan to operate this term. These can be found to read and download on the Parents Zone page.
Please take the time to read all of these documents carefully.

Our Flow Chart will help you decide if your child/children should attend pre-school if they are unwell in any way. Please email any absences or other messages by 8.30am, or call/leave a voicemail.

The following links to pages on the Gov.UK website will be useful to help you to understand the guidance for parents, the steps we are taking and ways to support your pre-school children:

Gov.UK: What you need to know about the lockdown.

Gov.UK: Early Years and childcare This page contains links to various other pages of advice and guidance specific to early years settings.

Gov.UK: Education and Childcare guidance.

Gov.UK: Supporting your children's education

Gov.UK: Protective Measures in childcare settings.

You will also find news and advice in our Newsletters.

Stay safe and well.

Penny
Manager
On behalf of Croft Early Years' Management Team

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