Must Have things! .. which you love in your setting

[newandlearning]

hello..

I've been buying and buying toys, resources.. you name it since October and am now nearly broke :laughing: .. well not quiet..

But.. I'm trying to get an outstanding on my inspection if I can and I wondered
how you guys had your settings set up.. and which toys/resources you found to be the most valuable to your setting as well.

I have a small house and don't have a dedicated room as such for my childminding.. I've made an area of my lounge a play area and have the dining room and garden. Do you guys have the same resources inside and out.. I don't have enough resources to do this and don't really want my dolls getting ruined in the sand pit.. what do you all do?

I'd be grateful for any advice.. thanks a lot. x

[avril]

Don't really have the problem with dolls as have nearly always looked after boys except for a few girls who like cars better!!
Taking cars outside - I have a few chunky plastic cars that are really made for beach/sand that were only about £3 for 2 in Asda then picked up bits and bobs along the way.
A lot of childminders use car boot sales and lots of bargains are definately to be found there. :thumbsup:

[Monkey1]

Definatly car boots sales are the way to go.........buy them cheep then it doesn't matter if they get broke grubby etc etc....and it doesn't break the bank when you notice a child is interested in something

[watgem]

I have hard babies outside that are ok to bathe/put in sand pit, as well as cars-got from tesco and they are their equivalent of hotwheels but much cheaper and the kids love them, I have a little tykes dollhouse, slide and kitchen and sandpit outside because they are well made and last for years, I have a wooden kitchen and dollhouse indoors. I only have tiny garden and can only use my living room as a play room so I keep toys all over the house. I get toys on ebay, from sales in elc,argos etc and I ask parrents if the want to sell/ donate any good quality toys-I also pass toys that don't get played with much onto my mindees if they like them. Although its expensive I try and buy the best I can such as Fisher price, little tykes, elc just because they are so well made that they last. Fave toys at my house are the little people small world things-you can add to this bit by bit-duplo,slide, rocker,kitchen,fridge phonics, ball poppa things,cars, wooden sound blocks,sand pit/water tray. Our preschools quite often have baby sales with fab toys too but storing it all is tricky. Hope this helps:)

[PixiePetal]

I have 4 dolls buggies - 2 for garden, 2 new ones for indoors. Got fed up cleaning them off.

Old toys get demoted to the garden - large fisher price garage, not needed indoors any more (too big to keep inside when my own kids out grown playing with it). Use the more tatty cars and car boot buys with it.

Plastic little tikes cooker now in garden shed for outside - got new wooden one for indoors. Bit smaller and lot smarter. Plasic one was DDs and she is 15 next week :)

Try second hand sales/carboot/charity shop/jumble sales for extra toys :thumbsup:

[TheBTeam]

I wouldn't be without my huge collection of fisher price little people stuff, children from 1 to 8 play with this and love it. I also have a huge amount of duplo (not the baby one, but the one like the large lego), this gets played with by all ages and right up to 11 year old boys, they prefer the quick build results you get compared to the small lego i have too!

My new aquadraw makes drawing available for little ones without the mess!

[The Queen]

for me its the boating lake and the soliders - the children really love playing with the soliders, makes it a concrete experience for them playing with the real thing

[sarah707]

for me its the boating lake and the soliders - the children really love playing with the soliders, makes it a concrete experience for them playing with the real thing

:laughing:

I wouldn't be without my Lego and 2 play boards and teh building blocks I got from a car boot sale for 50p. They are out every day.

For Ofsted you also need a range of multicultural / diverse things that are 'just there' ... so coloured people for your dolls house, a doll with an arm missing because she is disabled (not broken), a book featuring people from other cultures etc.

there are a few big threads knocking about with ideas... hang on..

http://www.childmindinghelp.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=41&highlight=multicultural

http://www.childmindinghelp.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=40&highlight=disability

http://www.childmindinghelp.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=211&highlight=multicultural

Hth :D

[michellethegooner]

I wouldnt be without my sand/water pit and duplo kids love em, the san/water pit we use loads. often adding jelly/ gloop/ shaving foam/ sand/ flour/herbs/ coloured/soapy water/ ice/leaves/soil/ hidden toys/treasure etc list could go on & on

[ORKSIE]

Little people are by far my Mindees fav.
Outside the Sand pit gets a good pounding:D

[sophiestars]

The play kitchen is always a fav for all ages, and like everyone else the sand pit/water tray/cat litter trays filled with various messy things- rainbow rice, porridge oats, gloop etc.

I bought an under the bed storage box (the type without wheels) for about £2.50 after seeing the price of tuff spots etc (trying to keep my ever mounting costs down!) and the kids love it - my 13 mth old mindee got in it the other day with the oats and little animals I had hidden!! Had to explain to Mum that she would probably be shedding oats for a few days!!

[Monkey1]

I got my tuff spot from wicks £15

[balloon]

The things I wouldn't be without are the big sand and water activity centre outside and my childsize Ikea round table and chairs for inside.

The sand table is in constant use when the weather is good enough for outdoor play (clay soil and 2 "crawlers 'n' climbers" do not mix well when its wet). The older kiddies love it in any weather, lol!

As for the table, it's used for snacks, meals, duplo, colouring, painting, rice and messy play etc for the mindees and when they've gone home, board games, snacks/meals etc for us

both were quite expensive tbh but well worth it. Much of the rest of toys etc came from charity shop, passed down from friends or boot sales...

[wellybelly]

We have 2 charity shops in our village and I buy so much from them. I cant afford to buy new as a) I broke (its a credit crunch) and b) my husband would kill me.

Ive bought numerous books from them that reflect positive images of diversity, a balamory josie jump doll (great for multicultural resources box), a tiny dolls pram great foir a toddler whos just started to walk and puzzles.

When I do buy new, only once a year, I make sure It can get my money back if I ever sold it, say on ebay. So Ive got thinks like ELC happy land play sets, brio train set, masses of musical instruments and percussion, mark making resources which are safe to be left out and accessible for the youngest child at the setting on that day, dressing up clothes.......

Im gonna stop coz I wont shut up.

Remember Ofsted also will be happy with a wish list of things you aim to get in the future if you cannot afford it now.