Policies and Procedures
Organisation Structure
Gingerbread Corner is a charity run by a voluntary Management Committee, which delegates operational matters to the three members of the Corner’s Executive Management Team: the Chief Executive, Child Care Director and Finance Director. You can see all the members of staff, together with their job titles, on the Photo Board in the Lobby, and further details about staff will be available on our new Website. All parents are encouraged to become more involved in Gingerbread Corner by becoming Company Members of the charity. A member of the Executive Management Team can provide more information.
Health and Safety
Each staff member bears personal responsibility for Health and Safety and is required to read our Policy.
All accidents have to be recorded, examined by a qualified First Aider (see notice boards) and any serious accidents must be reported to a senior member of staff.
The fire doors must be kept clear at all times. In the event of the fire alarm sounding, everyone (including parents) must leave the building, assembling in the areas designated in the Health and Safety Policy, where the registers are taken. No-one is allowed to re-enter the building to search for any children or staff that may be unaccounted for.
The children are not allowed generally to touch the plugs or light switches; however in Out of School they may be given express permission in some cases, and the children are allowed to change the lighting in the Big and Little Dens. All empty sockets are covered with socket covers.
In the Early Years the staff are only allowed hot drinks in the rooms at snack time when all the children are sitting down.
Staff may not leave the building without informing the most senior person on duty – this is to ensure that there is sufficient cover in case of fire or other emergency, and also, in the case of emergency, we are aware who should be in the building. This applies to outings, lunch-breaks and leaving the Corner after work.
No one is allowed to smoke at Gingerbread Corner or any other premises at which we are working (including outside areas, except for the designated Smoking Area – currently the service drive) during open hours. Smoking in the minibuses is never allowed. The only exceptions, when smoking is allowed outside the building only, are during General Meetings, such as the AGM, when parents are responsible for looking after their own children, and staff training days, etc. Please see the Smoking, Substance Abuse & Alcohol Policy for further information.
Children’s Safety and Security
As with any child-care centre, there is a risk of abduction, by a stranger or by a known person, such as an estranged parent. In the past, Gingerbread Corner has had one abduction attempt which was successfully foiled.
PERIMETER SECURITY
It is important to maintain the culture of security –staff must always be alert to the possibility of abduction. Remember, it is a lot easier to keep someone out of our secure areas than remove them once they are inside.
Our main entrance door is left unlocked, unless the Reception is unstaffed, in which case the door is locked and visitors must use the doorbell, which rings to all phones.
However, all the gates to the play areas must be securely fastened with bolts on the insides at the top and bottom at all times.
No-one must be allowed to enter the secure areas unless they are known to staff and/or have proper and adequate identification - this includes clients, friends/relatives of clients, people from maintenance or utility companies and so on. This is to reduce the risk of abduction either by a stranger or perhaps an estranged parent. “Strangers” must wait in the Front Lobby until a staff member has vouched for them.
Gingerbread Corner will absolutely support any staff member who denies entry to our secure areas because they believe the person shouldn’t enter. Preventing them from entering whilst you go and check their credentials isn’t always easy, but experience shows that the vast majority of people will accept that the safety of all our children is paramount. However, should anyone wish to complain about their treatment, just give them a copy of our Complaints Procedure, and notify your Project Manager to expect a complaint.
If parents are concerned that their ex-partner may attempt to abduct their child, they must give us the name and a photograph of that person, one copy of which must be displayed on the inside of the Reception window and one put on the Out of School Register Clipboard. In addition, each individual member of staff must be told by the front doors of both the Out of School and Early Years. In the event that someone answering that description comes to one of the front doors, the door must not be opened at all.
Parents must be asked not to allow anyone to come through the security doors behind them, unless their entrance has been authorised by staff.
Out of School children are not allowed downstairs unless the garden is open or they are using the Sunshine Room. Because the Front Door is generally unlocked, under no circumstances are Out of School children allowed in the Early Years’ or Reception Lobbies alone. Staff must ring downstairs to check that a staff member will be there to receive any child that is being sent down.
SUSPICIOUS PERSONS
Outside the building:
Anyone seen hanging around outside Gingerbread Corner must be challenged, by a senior staff member if it is safe so to do, and/or reported to the police.
If you suspect someone is following a minibus when collecting from or delivering children to school or, even more importantly, if you have a concern about someone following the school walkers, the senior staff member present must use their initiative to reduce the risk. For example, the minibus could drive straight into a police station car park (South Norwood or Central Croydon are likely to be the nearest police stations); walkers should contact the Centre and/or the Police by mobile phone.
Inside the building:
If you see someone you don’t know inside the building, you must challenge them, by saying for example “Can I help you?” If they don’t give you an answer with which you are absolutely happy, you must immediately report their existence to a senior staff member. Senior staff must then decide what action to take; this may be just following up the challenge, or immediately calling the police – you must use your common sense, as it is not possible to cover every eventuality.
We would rather have 100 false alarms than one real incident.
RECORD-KEEPING
o In the event of an attempted or an actual abduction, the police must be contacted immediately.
o You should immediately make notes of anything you saw or heard, even if you don’t think it can be connected. This includes details of any car involved and about the appearance of the abductor, which way they went, etc. and of anyone seen in the vicinity.
o A full record must be made of the incident as soon as possible, and a copy sent to OFSTED.
PHOTOGRAPHS & FILMING
Recordings of significant events in children’s lives are valuable to us and to our families. Once missed, they are lost forever, so Gingerbread Corner often takes photographs of the children to give to parents, to display on notice boards, in scrap books and in the Annual Report, and for use in promotional leaflets. Gingerbread Corner also produces a DVD of the children at play for parents to buy, which we normally show at our Annual General Meeting.
Out of School was one of the first latch key schemes in Europe, and Gingerbread Corner is recognised throughout the UK for their child care projects, which provide good quality, innovative care for a uniquely wide range of ages. For this reason, Gingerbread Corner is approached from time to time by television companies and newspapers for interviews, photographs and/or film of the children.
Parents are asked, on their Admission Form, if they consent to their child being photographed or filmed for any of the above purposes, and the Form is flagged for any child who is not allowed to be photographed or filmed.
Parents may take their own photographs/film of events, from snaps of their child’s birthday party to recording one of the children’s performances.
Equal Opportunities
Our staff are highly committed to equal opportunities/diversity issues and are expected to have read and understood Gingerbread Corner’s Equal Opportunities Policy. There are other, related documents that might be useful, such as the Early Years’ Special Educational Needs Policy.
Gingerbread Corner staff must support the children in developing the necessary skills to combat prejudice and the abuse of power.
Racism
Even young children are influenced by ideas and attitudes which perpetuate prejudices. Black and minority ethnic children may feel excluded, rejected, angry, ashamed of their colour, their language and/or their way of life. Being constantly presented with a white world, they may find it more difficult to establish their own identity and self-esteem.
If white children see that racist remarks and attitudes go unchallenged they are more likely to develop insensitive, uncaring attitudes themselves, thus perpetuating the spiral of white children learning racism and hatred, and minority ethnic children being the target of that hatred and racism. At Gingerbread Corner, we make sure we practice anti-racist child-care so that no child, of whatever ethnicity, is damaged by racist behaviour.
Gingerbread Corner ensures that games and puzzles, dressing up clothes and dolls, etc. fully reflect an anti-racist approach and that themes and artwork reflect the ethnicity of the children attending our child-care schemes, and of the community. Staff take care to give positive responses to patois and other languages.
We ensure that food of other cultures and countries are reflected in our menus. Celebrating and learning about different festivals are essential because the more we know about each other's culture/race, etc, the less we will be divided by racism.
Racism must be recognised, challenged and eliminated. Each child's motivation must be encouraged by ensuring they feel fully included, personally, racially and culturally.
Sexism
Similarly to our anti-racism practice, Gingerbread Corner ensures that games, activities, toys do not reflect society's stereotyping of gender roles. For example, books and puzzles should not exclusively show mummies in the home and daddies working outside the home. It is better to have fewer books and puzzles which are non-sexist than to have a larger amount which provide stereotypical images.
Activities, games and sports must be anti-sexist. Staff must ensure that, for example, girls don’t feel excluded from computer games or playing cricket and that boys are encouraged to take part in cooking activities; boys will do washing up and be allowed in the home corner, etc; girls will play in the Romp Room and the Adventure Playground even if they get grubby. Time must be taken to explain our reasoning to any parent who is concerned about their child's gender role.
Staff are expected to be careful about the messages we might unconsciously transmit if, for example, we ask a boy to help lifting something, or a girl to take care of a younger child. Boys should be encouraged to express their feelings, just the same as girls.
Children with Special Needs
Gingerbread Corner believes that segregation of children with special needs is a devaluation of those children and of others, just as would be the case regarding exclusion on the basis of gender, class or race, etc.
All children have equal status and equal rights to appropriate support and to access to play-care facilities. If children are used to being in integrated groups, then there is less ignorance and fear that would otherwise prevent the acceptance of people with disabilities/ learning difficulties and/or challenging behaviour.
Gingerbread Corner staff are given support and training to work effectively with children with disabilities, e.g. sign language, physical care, help with behavioural difficulties, and so on.
Children with special needs may need special treatment. For example, behaviour which would be unacceptable in a child without a learning disability may not warrant punishment for a child with a learning disability or behavioural difficulties.
Positive images
Gingerbread Corner provides positive images. For example:
• Pictures, posters, photographs, etc. reflect positive images of minority groups living happy and successful lives.
• We continue to move away from the images of black people as athletes, entertainers, famine victims, etc.
• Children need to see men in caring roles, and women in career situations.
• We make sure that we don’t portray people with disabilities as deserving pity - or as heroes.
Questions about physical/cultural differences are answered honestly, not ignored or side-stepped.
Key-Workers
Apart from 11Plus, all the children have a keyworker. In Early Years, keyworkers are responsible for the children’s developmental records and reports etc. In Out of School, each keyworker is responsible for a small group of children, with whom they have monthly meetings.
Menus
The vast majority of our food is home-made, the eggs and meat free-range. We work to rolling seasonal menus, aiming to source our supplies from as close by as possible. Gingerbread Corner makes every effort to accommodate all diets. Everyone preparing, handling or serving food, or sitting with children who are eating, must wear a hat or hairnet at all times. As all staff may be involved in handling food, we aim to ensure that all our staff have a Food Hygiene Certificate.
Materials & Equipment Storage
No firm decisions have been made on storage sites and areas at the time of writing.
Late Collections
All children must be collected by 6.30 p.m. – parents are “fined” for any late collections and their child’s place may be withdrawn if they are late more than four times.
Discipline & Respect
There is no question of anyone physically punishing or being verbally abusive to children at Gingerbread Corner. Staff follow Gingerbread Corner’s Behaviour Management Plan, which includes Time Out (and parents can be supported to use the Plan at home). Children who misbehave are generally given Time Out (one minute for each year of the child’s life). Another disciplinary measure is banning from an activity or area for a limited period of time, the length of time depending on the misbehaviour.
Gingerbread Corner is committed to working with all our children and exclusion or withdrawal of a child’s place is a last resort, which we may need to take bearing in mind our duty of care to the other children and to our staff.
Unless agreed with the parent otherwise by the Child Care Director, we do not report all the children’s transgressions to them. The parents and their children need to feel good about seeing each other after a long day. Any major problems should be discussed with the parent in private and only by a senior staff member. On no account are parents greeted with complaints about their child’s behaviour.
Parents may not discipline other people’s children in any way.
There are few rules that the children must follow, but we do expect these to be kept to, including encouraging children to look after each other, reporting any bullying and helping an upset child. Behaviour such as hitting, spitting, kicking, etc. is unacceptable. Bullying and harassment are unacceptable, and are not tolerated. The Executive Management Team needs to be made immediately aware of any bullying or harassment issues or allegations of bigoted behaviour.
The children are expected to show respect for the staff, volunteers, each other, our resources and equipment and our building. We expect staff and volunteers to respect the children’s wishes, rights and abilities, regardless of their age, race, ability or disability, size, etc. We aim always to provide positive role models for the children.
Outside Play
The Outside areas comprise the Adventure Playground (which includes the turfed area), the Undercover Playground, Sunshine Courtyard and Early Years’ Gardens.
The Outside areas are always checked, using the appropriate Log, before children are allowed out to play.
The children are not allowed outside before 10.00 a.m. and between 1 - 2 p.m. to give our neighbours a break! When the sun is strong, the Early Years children must be inside or under cover between 11 - 3 p.m. Sometimes, the children are allowed to play outside once it gets dark.
Children and staff must be suitably dressed for being outside, and sun cream must be applied to all children whenever the sun is strong (and staff must ensure they also use sunscreen. Water should be readily available, to avoid any risk of dehydration.
Sand should be covered whenever staff close the garden and, at the end of the day, playgrounds are cleared of all toys, litter, etc.
Children are never allowed to throw stones, bits of wood, sand or bark chips - any child doing this will be banned from the garden for at least the rest of the day. Stone throwing must always be brought to the attention of senior staff. The children should not be allowed to scream and shout, for the sake of our neighbours.
Staff are expected to use their common sense about outside play – for example, if there is a swarm of wasps, the children must be brought indoors immediately. Similarly, if items are being thrown into any of the Playgrounds from outside – any such objects are left where they landed and a senior member of staff immediately informed. who they may decide to call the police.
Before Stay and Play or Early Years children use the Adventure Plagyround or Undercover Playground, a member of staff must ensure that our Head of Facilities is aware that he needs to keep the doors to the Portakabins locked. This is to ensure that nobody can access the tools and equipment stored in there.
