## **Butterflies Pre-School Didcot CIO End of Year Trustees Report**
## **2023**
Butterflies Pre-School is still seeing some of the longer lasting effects from COVID and lockdown. Staff retention has improved but lack of fundraising and the mental wellbeing of both children and staff are still very much at the forefront and noticeably children’s learning and development in the three prime areas have been significantly affected.
In January there were **40** children on the role call. It was a busy term back from the Christmas break. The children enjoyed our term book of the Gingerbread Man, and all activities involved based around the story including fragrant playdough. The children engaged in lots of group activities including some big mark marking activities and had fun learning about Chinese New Year and the year of the Rabbit. They learnt Makaton signs for “rabbit” and “red”, tasted noodles and made Chinese Lanterns. We also had two visits from Thames Valley Police where they got to try on some uniform and equipment and explore the Police van with the lights and sirens. The children thoroughly enjoyed these visits and had a great experience towards their Understanding of the World learning and development.
In February we had another lovely visit towards “People who help us” and teaching Understanding the World. This time it was from the Fire Service. The children enjoyed interacting with the firefighters and learning about some of the equipment and looking round the fire engine. We celebrated Valentines Day around a heart and red theme where the children explored lots of different activities including looking and drawing red objects in a basket, heart shaped colour matching and various red and textured crafts. Our term book was The Train Ride where we explored trains and making tracks, and lots of great role play in our made Train Station and Ticket office.
March was an extremely busy month, we started off by celebrating St David’s Day, observing, and painting daffodils and taking part in World Book Day where children and staff came into the Pre-School in their pyjamas and brought their favourite book with them. We had a visit from Didcot Library who read and sang with the children. We introduced our term book of The Very Hungry Caterpillar and welcomed our tiny live caterpillars where the children watched them grow with interest throughout the month before changing into Chrysalis and were excited to see them come out as Butterflies.
The month of March also brought some snow for the day. The children enjoyed snow activities and learnt about what makes the snow melt and
watched it change. Other celebrations we marked this month were St Patrick’s Day, Mother’s Day, and Ramadan, where the children looked at books and heard from children within the setting who were observing Ramadan, and what it meant to them and what traditions they were taking part in at home.
We had a final visit around “People who help us” from Nurses. The children had great fun learning about parts of the body, what to do if they felt unwell and how to look after ‘Teddy Bear’ when he hurts himself. The children also enjoyed taking on the role of paramedics, doctors and nurses in our role play ambulance. Finally, at the end of a very long term the Children had lots of fun and used various learning and developmental skills by taking part in the Easter activities and made their own natural Easter Eggs, from collecting natural items outside whilst exploring our garden. We said goodbye to a member of staff at the end of term.
April was a short month after coming back from the Easter holidays. Our new fee structure increase was implemented this term for all paying parents. Sessions were increased to £19 per session for 2-year-olds, £17 per session for 3 / 4-year-olds and £2.85 per lunch session. This was due to the increasing cost of living expenses and the national minimum wage increases. The children came back to a new construction area outside in the garden which saw lots of imaginative play and children extending their play further including road safety exercises. We celebrated St George’s Day where the children needed to use good pen control to make their flags. A new member of staff joined at the beginning of term putting us back up to full staff.
In May we celebrated the King’s Coronation by holding a royal picnic for all children. Children were invited to bring a small packed lunch to eat and together with Staff could dress up as Kings, Queens, Princes, Princesses, or anything red, white and blue. It was a lovey day! The children also learnt about the Coronation, designed their own crowns and bunting, and took part in their very own Coronation. We were also lucky to see a helicopter fly past and give a big wave, which was put on for schools and settings in our area.
We have been working hard on our veggie garden, ready for the children to start planting lots of different plants and vegetables, and requested donations from parents towards seeds, compost, and various materials etc.
At the end of the month, we had a staff training day where the staff were given training on how to use our new resources “Pegs to Paper” which will help early mark making. Staff member left at the end of term to go on maternity leave.
In June we held our first parent garden event, where parents could come in and take part in various activities in the garden with their children.
They made bug houses, natural spotters, planted seeds and beans, learnt about the life cycle of Sunflowers and some vegetable printing. Lots of fun and learning was had by all. We have also been learning Makaton for some jungle animals from our term book “Walking through the Jungle”. New staff member joined on maternity cover, putting us back up to full staff.
In July, our Sports Day was cancelled sadly due to the weather, but Didcot Library came to visit instead. The children planted flowers and plants into our sensory garden and continued to water and watch their vegetable seedlings grow before transferring into the veggie garden, with signs they had made identifying the vegetables. We also invited the school leavers parents towards the end of the school year for the school leavers presentation.
September was a new school year, and we welcomed our new children who settled in well. “Dear Zoo” was our term book which is great for encouraging early communication through animal sounds, minimal words, and lots of repetition.
In October, as part of our ongoing Safeguarding reviews, information was sent out to parents about the importance of our absence procedure. We also introduced our Snack Larder and sent a request to parents for specified termly snack donations. As a charity we receive food donations from the local food hub, but due to increasing cost of living demands, the donations we receive have sadly decreased. We celebrated success in our Veggie Garden and the children got to sample some of our grown produce in their snack time. The children coloured in/decorated their own Christmas picture for ‘My Child’s Art’.
November was a busy month with various activities. Children took part in fundraising activities for Children in Need – Pudsey picture competition and Pudsey Fancy Dress party together with lots of Pudsey activities to do. Children explored Autumn talking about how the season is changing and the differences they can see outside. We also celebrated Diwali, learning about the Festival of Light, and the children made their own Diva Lamps and had a special snack at the end of the week. We took part in World Nursery Rhyme Week learning new nursery rhymes and activities based around these rhymes together with learning Makaton for each Nursery Rhyme and sent home the song sheets for parents to learn and join in with the Makaton with their child at home. We sent a short ParentMail questionnaire out to parents to ensure we were utilising this tool to the best of our ability and efficiently.
December is our busiest month. Lots of Christmas activities including our Christmas Craft Session for parent. Parent were invited to join their children in making different crafts and activities and listened to their Children singing some Christmas songs using Makaton. Finally, we
finished the term with a Christmas Party for all the children. Staff member left this month to go on maternity leave.
We have seen a few staff members come and go, and a couple on maternity leave this year, and financially we have had to tighten our belts due to the long-lasting effects from covid and the increasing cost of living expenses. Again, we would like to praise both Management and staff for all their hard work throughout the year.
## **END OF YEAR TREASURERS REPORT – 2023**
All rent invoices are up to date from OCC (included in rent expenditure was an amount of £959 for rent review increase for 2022). At the time of writing all School (utilities) from April 2020 to March 2023 have now been paid. I have also deducted savings totalling £20,000.
**Carry forward £ 25,937.00**
## **Actual income and expenditure**
|**Actual income and expenditure**||
|---|---|
|Income|122,604.00|
|Salaries|100,770.00|
|Rent|6,889.00|
|Payroll Services|650.00|
|Utilities (school, rubbish collection & cleaning
agency)|6,552.00|
|Food + Materials
(food bank still used, also includes PP, SEND etc)|3,895.00|
|Insurance, DBS, Memberships etc…|1,650.00|
|Equipment (PP,SEND etc money has been used)|578.00|
|Maintenance (plumber, garden & photocopier
service etc)|2,165.00|
|Training|107.00|
|---|---|
|Phone|973.00|
|Others|3,410.00|
- See spreadsheet – savings need to be transferred into a saving account.
## **Butterflies PS 2023**
|**Income**|Jan|Feb|March|April|May|June|July|Aug|Sept|Oct|Nov|Dec|Total|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Fees**|£17,022|£4,264|£12,551|£24,453|£2,072|£17,772|£1,960|£1,812|£21,197|£3,603|£14,901|£997|122603.6|
|**Fundraising**|32.29|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|
|**Grant**|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|
|**Other**|0|0|5.6|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|
|**Other**|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|0|
|**TOTAL INCO**|£17,054|£4,264|£12,557|£24,453|£2,072|£17,772|£1,960|£1,812|£21,197|£3,603|£14,901|£997|£122,604|
## **Expenditure**
|**Salaries**|£8,131.15|£8,131.15|£7,763.34|£7,687.95|£8,288.99|£8,912.28|£8,153.16|£8,375.02|£8,319.10|£8,762.17|£8,810.64|£8,799.36|£8,767.12|£100,770|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Rent**||£0.00|£959|£0|£5,930|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£6,889|
|**Utilities**||£519|£522|£4,055|£538|£530|£75|£52|£52|£33|£52|£52|£74|£6,552|
|**Payroll**||£0|£0|£44|£544|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£62|£0|£0|£650|
|**Materials an**||£401|£161|£300|£42|£522|£995|£305|£15|£202|£468|£408|£77|£3,895|
|**Advertising/**||£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|
|**Insurance/Re**||£170|£859|£474|£0|£73|£0|£0|£0|£0|£25|£0|£48|£1,650|
|**Equipment**||£0|£0|£0|£0|£119|£0|£0|£0|£60|£0|£0|£399|£578|
|**Training**||£26|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£20|£0|£0|£0|£46|£15|£107|
|**other**||£85|£0|£460|£0|£180|£0|£2,055|£0|£0|£210|£0|£420|£3,410|
|**maintenance**||£0|£0|£0|£125|£30|£60|£1,740|£0|£60|£60|£60|£30|£2,165|
|**savings**||£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|£0|
|**Phone**||£76|£72|£75|£73|£83|£84|£82|£90|£80|£83|£94|£81|£973|
|**TOTAL EXP**||£9,408|£10,337|£13,096|£15,541|£10,449|£9,367|£12,628|£8,476|£9,197|£9,770|£9,459|£9,911|127639.4|
|Opening ba||£50,935|£58,581|£52,508|£51,969|£60,881|£52,503|£60,909|£50,240|£43,576|£55,576|£49,409|£54,852||
|Net Income||£7,646|-£6,073|-£539|£8,911|-£8,378|£8,406|-£10,669|-£6,664|£12,000|-£6,167|£5,442|-£8,914|-£5,036|
|Closing bal||£58,581|£52,508|£51,969|£60,881|£52,503|£60,909|£50,240|£43,576|£55,576|£49,409|£54,852|£45,937||
## **Still to pay**
savings 20000 **20000** Actual balance **£25,937**
Ber
Bookkee
in
and Pa
roll Servlces
Mrs Alison Berry FMAAT,2 Hill View Lane. Wootton, Boars Hill. Oxford. OXI 5JT
Tel.01865 730064107890 503392, E Mail -Ali
n@b
rr
Tracey Yeates
SupeNisor
29th July 2024
Butterflies Pre- School - Re istered Charit l 171056
To confirm that I have made an independent examination of the Pre-school accounts
for the year ended 31st December 2023
I have found thar ihese accounrs are a fair representation of their financial situatSon
at the Preschool.
Thank you
With Klnd Regards
Alison Berry