There are a myriad of different types of early years settings in the UK. These include nurseries, pre-schools, and nursery schools.
All childcare settings listed must be registered with Ofsted in England, CIW in Wales and Care Inspectorate in Scotland, apart from nurseries attached to independent schools which are inspected by the Independent Schools Inspectorate. In Northern Ireland, nurseries are inspected by Early Years Teams within Health and Social Care (HSC) Trusts.
Early years settings are sometimes referred to as PVI (private, voluntary and independent) reflecting the mix of ownership.
Here is a short video on the different types of childcare available in the UK
Day nurseries
Day nurseries are run by a whole range of nursery providers. These providers can be private and not-for-profit, charitable organisations as well as the NHS and the local authority. Day nurseries care for and educate children from birth up to five years old.
They operate all year round and tend to be open from 8am to 5pm, with some open for even longer. They are open from Monday to Friday with a few even offering overnight care to help shift workers.
Day nurseries can vary in size from as small as 20 places to over 200 places and they tend to be split into different rooms according to the age of the children. Some provide breakfast, lunch and tea and some include formula milk up to the age of one.
They offer a whole range of activities for children. These can range from forest school and beach school sessions to yoga and music and movement classes as well as French and Spanish. They all follow an early years curriculum which is different depending on whether the nursery is in England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.
Day nurseries will assign the child a key worker who the parent can liaise with.
Pre-schools
Pre-schools are often run by voluntary parent-led committees and charities and care for and educate children from the age of two up to the age of five. They tend to follow school term-times and so are not open in the school holidays. Some pre-schools are only open from 9am to 3pm Monday to Friday.
Some pre-schools operate out of community buildings such as church or village halls and have to set up and pack away their early years resources and equipment every day.
They are very reliant on the free childcare funding scheme for money although parents often pay the pre-school for extra childcare hours on top of their free hours from the government.
Many of them are run by voluntary parent-led committees and ask for parents to get involved, including fundraising for equipment, volunteering and contributing fruit for snacks. Parents may be asked to provide pack lunchboxes as some do not have the facilities to offer a cooked lunch.
Independent nursery schools
Some private nursery schools are attached to an independent school and offer a structured environment where children learn through play.
Many independent nursery schools offer extended hours where parents can drop off early and pick up late to fit in with their working hours.
They can also take advantage of the independent school’s resources and facilities.
Parents can still use the Early Years Free Entitlement Scheme and use their 15 hours of ‘free’ childcare for three and four year olds or 30 hours for working parents and top up if they need to.
Some nursery schools in the UK are run by private providers and these tend to only run in term-time. They are usually just for pre-school children aged three and four-years-old although some take children from two and a half.
Private nursery schools will have a trained teacher or headteacher in charge.
Maintained nursery schools
Maintained or state-funded nursery schools were originally set up by the state in deprived areas so all young children would be educated. All maintained nursery schools are required to employ a headteacher and professionally qualified teachers as well as a Special Educational Needs Coordinator as they have to meet the same standards as schools.
They are funded by the local authority and offer childcare to children under the age of five, usually from the age of two or three.
There are around 385 maintained nursery schools in England, with sixty-four per cent of them located in the 30 per cent most deprived areas in England.
The National Education Union (NEU) says maintained nursery schools ‘give our youngest children the best start in life, including those with special educational needs and disabilities – and ensure access to the highest quality provision for families in the poorest parts of the country’.
A nursery school follows the same terms as schools and is only open during school hours and in term time.
Children’s Centres
Children’s Centres tend to offer a range of support to families of children under the age of five.
As well as childcare, they can offer parenting courses, ante-natal and post-natal support, stay and play and breastfeeding support.
Now that you know more about the different types of settings, explore what your child will learn and do in early years childcare.
You can also find out when is the right age to start nursery here.
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