🔑Key Person Policy
This policy was adopted on 30 August 2022 and is reviewed annually
Policy statement
At Natural Nurture Nursery we believe that having a Key Person for each child will help them settle into nursery and make them feel more secure. A Key Person has special responsibility for a small number of children: giving them reassurance, enabling them to feel safe and cared for, and building relationships with their parents.
The Key Person will:
Help children to become familiar with the setting and to feel confident and safe within it
Develop a genuine bond with their key children and offer a settled, close relationship
Meet the needs of each child in their care and respond sensitively to their feelings, ideas and behaviour
Talk to parents to get to know and understand each child
Take responsibility for the child’s learning journey: carrying out observations of the child and recording these using a secure online assessment tool (Famly), which parents can access. Progress is shared and discussed regularly with parents and more formal reports are produced termly.
Plan and implement next steps to support the learning and development of each child in their care, feeding these into weekly and termly planning.
The outcomes of having a Key Person are:
Children become more independent by being able to rely upon adults for reassurance and comfort.
Children will feel as confident and self-assured, as they are in their own home with family and familiar carers.
Children feel happy and secure with a familiar person, giving them confidence to explore and try out new things and move towards independence.
Time with a Key Person
Natural Nature Nursery offers daycare provision, which may mean that children are not with their Key Person at all times in an 8am – 5pm day, or portion thereof. Allocation of a Key Person will be decided at point of admission on the basis of who is staffing the setting on the days on which the child attends, so that the child and Key Person have maximum time together, particularly during their statutory funded hours in line with the requirements of the EYFS. We also take into account any natural bond the child may have with a member of staff.
Children engage with other adults throughout the day but will register with their Key Person at the start and end of each day where possible, allowing parental concerns to be discussed and the child’s day reported.
Parents must be aware that changing their child’s days at the nursery could mean a change of Key Person for their child.
Key Person Responsibilities
Ensuring they are available to be the first point of contact for parents to discuss key children.
Reporting to parents either face-to-face or through email (info@naturalnurture.org) or via Famly.
Disseminating information about key children to other staff members and the Nursery Manager where appropriate.
Assessing children in line with the EYFS and planning opportunities to do so.
Planning next steps for children to meet personal milestones.
Creating reports for parents more formally on a termly basis.
Keeping children’s developmental records, ordered, dated and current.
If the Key Person is absent
Each child is allocated a back up Key Person n to act as Key Person for the period of absence. The Nursery Manager may also take on some of the Key Person responsibilities for this period to ensure that there is no change in the key children’s level of care and comfort and that assessment and reporting arrangements continue as normal.
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