January 2021
Happy New Year everyone and hope all those who have managed to have a break are back refreshed and looking forward to great adventure in 2021.
Health Risks – Amoebic Meningitis
As summer is here and the water play and paddle pools are in use, please let the hose run before putting it into the children’s play equipment. Not only will this eliminate the risk of scalding a child with hot water, but it will also reduce the risk of water born bacteria such as Amoebic Meningitis coming into contact with the children. If you want further information on Amoebic Meningitis click here.
Updated Documents
The following documents have been updated on the website:
• NA-FRM-0039 Parent Acknowledgement of Volunteer or Student Placement
• NA-FRM-0018 (B) Specific Risk Assessment 23122020
If there are any documents that you cannot find, please don’t hesitate to let us know and we can upload them for you or email you a copy.
Office Processes
We are in the process of running through all our procedures to tighten up some things we have found cause both Admin and Educators some issues from time to time. Cancellation of Care form has been changed to include the date the child is ending care, and then you need to enter a date that we in the office can remove them from the system – that will ensure you can get your invoicing sorted and reduces issues we’ve experienced where we either give you time to get invoicing sorted, but then get complaints we haven’t removed them, or vice versa – we take them off and then we get complaints that they are gone from the system and the invoicing hasn’t been settled yet.
Booking changes – in the past if we received a booking change in the same week and the child had already been in care, we made the changes for the current week manually in the timesheet and then forward dated the changes to commence the following week to avoid you & parents getting OOPs’s. We will no longer be doing this. We will just approve the booking as of the date you have set it and if it falls within the same week and the child has already been in care, you will need to deal with the OOPs’s. It is best practice to get these done ahead of time.
Update on Requirements to have additional means of Communication – Outcome from Swimming Pool Announcement
There had been some confusion about VOIP not being able to call 000 but have discovered that provided you have 000 in your contacts, it will work. For those who intend using VOIP, please add 000 to your phone contacts. We will not have an implementation date until these changes to the legislation have gone through parliament and with an up-and-coming election it may not be until after March that the legislation is tabled. We will continue to keep you posted as information comes to hand.
Accident & Incident Reports
When completing these forms for any incident, please ensure that all the details are filled in and especially the child’s date of birth. These documents must be stored until the child is 24 years of age so it is important to have these details on the form so they can be filed under the appropriate year. Please send these reports through to info so they can be recorded. All serious incidents must be notified asap and within 24hours of the incident occurring.
Goodbye’s and Welcomes
We have sadly said goodbye to Peppa who had fitted into both the Admin and Educator Support role so nicely. Unfortunately for us, Peppa and her family have relocated to New South Wales. Nadia has joined the Admin team and has experience in FDC and administration, so we are very lucky to have her on board as Admin Assistant with Kylie. Ellie has taken over Peppa’s Educator Support role. We will be welcoming some new Educators to the service over the next months as well – Natalie Chadwick in Greenmount, Leith Blackman in Chidlow, Jasmin Garratt in Kununurra & Jennifer Kroeger in Kalgoorlie.
Visitors to Sign In
Just a reminder that all visitors to your premises, while you are operating your Family Day Care business, must sign your visitors’ book. At this time of the year, there will be new parents enrolling their children so especially important that you get the parents to sign the visitor’s book when facilitating site visits or interviews while children are in care. These scenarios are often forgotten, but it is a legal requirement and makes parents aware that anyone coming onto the premises is recorded. Please refer to Regulations 165 and 166.
Risk Assessments
Please continue to send these through on the new format, preferably in Microsoft Word, so they can be amended and signed electronically. The other clarification is Specific Risk Assessment and Benefit Risk Assessment. Specific RA’s are only used for something that is not of benefit to the child i.e., a swimming pool. Benefit RA’s are uses to cover beneficial pieces of equipment that could be potential hazards to children such as paddle pools, trampolines, climbable trees etc.
Sleep Routine
We have recently had an incident where a 20-month-old stopped breathing while sleeping. The educator, who has a baby monitor in the room and physically checks the children, heard the breathing pattern change and immediately went and checked. The child was not breathing and was turning blue. CPR was performed and the child was revived. All the appropriate practices were followed which has ultimately saved a child’s life. The Educator is now our greatest advocate in recommending CPR refresher every 12 months as instinct kicked in. How do you supervise your sleeping children? How often do you check on them? Please think about this scenario and how you would deal with an event like this.
Policies in Review
As we work through and update policies the following policies are due for review and we would be very happy for any input. The policies are: 2, 3.4,8,13, 21 & 24. Feedback to be received by the 29th January, if possible or please phone if you would like to discuss any other these.
Office Hours
Our office hours are 8.30am to 4.30pm. If you have a query outside of these hours, please phone and leave a message. If you need to speak with someone in an emergency, please ring Beryl or Sue and if your call is not answered immediately leave a message and they will call you back.
Phone Numbers: Kylie: 0431 449 567 (Mon–Thurs); Nadia: 0431 449 567 (Wed-Fri); Ellie: 0477 029 531 (Mon-Thurs); Joy: 0429 030 362 (Mon – Wed, Fri); Jo: 0477 029 132 (Mon–Thurs); Kinta: 0477 029 228 (Wed & Thurs); Sue: 0477 029 254 or Beryl: 0477 029 253.
To ensure that we respond to your emails promptly please send your queries to: info@naturealliancefdc.com.au
For the Start of the New Year – Life is like a beautiful Garden…. remember to pull the weeds and water the flowers!!!!!