All three and four year old children are entitled to 15 hours of funded Early Years (EY) education and childcare per week, across 38 weeks of the year.
You can choose to take this Funded Entitlement at any of the following registered ‘providers’:
Children will receive the funded provision from the term after their third birthday as follows:
A child born on or between |
can access a funded place from |
---|---|
1 April and 31 August |
the beginning of the Autumn term |
1 September and 31 December |
the beginning of the Spring term |
1 January and 31 March |
the beginning of the Summer term |
The funded entitlement can be taken flexibly within the following limits:
You can take the funded entitlement at a maximum of two sites per day. Many providers will allow you to take the provision flexibly, in a pattern that meets your needs.
For example, your child could have nine hours at a nursery or reception class and six hours with a playgroup, day nursery, childminder or independent school over the course of 3 days or more.
The stretched offer is for children who ONLY take up their funded entitlement i.e. they do not access more than 570 hours childcare across the year and are not paying for additional hours. The stretched offer is not to be confused with spreading a parent’s bill over 12 equal monthly payments so they pay the same amount each month.
Children can access their funded early education place in one of three ways:
PLEASE NOTE:
Your provider will be able to give you more details on how to claim your funded entitlement place.
Some providers may charge for meals, snacks or optional extras as these may not always be included within the funded entitlement. If you take more than 15 hours per week or more than 38 weeks per year there will be a charge from the provider for these additional hours. Please check with your provider for full details of any additional charges.
All registered providers deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum and are inspected by Ofsted for the quality of their early years provision. These reports are available for you to read either from the provider, at a library or on the internet (www.ofsted.gov.uk).
To access a childminder’s report you will need to obtain their Ofsted unique reference number. Some providers may also have achieved or be working towards a quality assurance award such as the City of York Council’s ‘Steps to Quality’ scheme, or the National Childminding Association’s ‘Children Come First’ network. Speak to the provider for further information on this.
For more information about the free entitlement or about providers in the York area, please contact the Local Area Teams Information Service (formerly York FIS).
Extra funding is available for your Early Years provider to further enhance the early years provision for your child – supporting their development, learning and care. Please see the parent factsheet under the useful documents section for further details.
From April 2017, the government has introduced the new targeted early years Disability Access Fund of £12.5m, to enable a fixed lump sum payment of £615 per eligible child per year to be paid to early years settings that are providing a funded entitlement place for 3 and 4-year-olds. The fund is to support early years providers to make initial reasonable adjustments and build the capacity of their setting to support disabled children. Additional funding for providing ongoing support for disabled young children will continue to be available from the high needs block, including for children with Education, Health and Care plans (EHCP). Children with SEND who are not in receipt of DLA will be able to access support from the local SEN inclusion fund. If you think your child might be eligible for DAF please speak to your childcare provider.