Steps to Take to Become a Childminder
A childminder is defined as a person who is employed (paid) to look after one child or more, who are under the age of eight years old, for more than two hours per day. For people who love working with children, this is an ideal job. People can do childminding from their own homes, and you do not need a lot of set up or expenditure to get started with this. Read below, to find out more about the steps you need to take:
If you want to become registered with Ofsted as a childminder, this can take some months to go through the stages required.
- Paediatric First Aid Certificate – Before registering with Ofsted you need to gain a Paediatric First Aid Certificate. Places like St John’s Ambulance, and British Red Cross will offer these courses and there will also be courses run by your local authority.
- Childminder Training Course – After you have gained the Paediatric First Aid Certificate you will need to complete a childminder training course that has been approved by your local authority. Charities may run these courses too. The courses will cover things such as child safety, activities relevant to children, and working with parents.
- Register with Ofsted – At this point, after you have your paediatric first aid certificate, and have completed and passed a childminder training course, you are then ready to register with Ofsted. Ofsted monitor and ensure that standards are met with childminding. You must register on either the Ofsted Early Years Register or the Childcare Register or both. Your property will have an inspection, and you may also need to take a food hygiene certificate, and training in other areas.
DBS Check for Childminders
You will need an Enhanced DBS Check with Barred List. This will check unspent and spent convictions, official warnings, cautions, and request information from the local police for any information they hold on you, that they feel is relevant. You will also be checked against the government’s barred list. The barred list prevents people from working with children or vulnerable people based on their past behaviour. If you are on a barred list, you are banned from working with children.
If there are other people who live in your household, who are over the age of eighteen years old, they too will need an Enhanced DBS Check with Barred List. This is to ensure that you are not bringing children into an unsafe home environment where they would be at risk.
Insurance to be a Childminder
Once you have your DBS check back, then you need to gain childminder insurance. There are a wide range of companies you could get insurance with. Some of these include, Morton Michael, PACEY and UKCMA as well as others. You will not be certified by Ofsted unless you have insurance.
Once you have all these in place, then it will be a case of waiting for Ofsted to fully register you, this can take 2-3 months. The best way to ensure this goes smoothly is to plan ahead, get the qualifications you require, and be well prepared with the correct information you need for your DBS check, so that there are no delays there. You do not want your DBS to be rejected, due to lacking information (such as previous address history, or any other missing fields).