School and Nursery First Aid Training courses
All Schools and Nurseries need to be prepared should someone fall ill, or injure themselves.
Your School or Nursery has a duty of care over anyone that visits, from staff to pupils to parents and other visitors. Because Schools and Nurseries will have adults and children, and sometimes babies on site they need to meet not only HSE requirements, but also Ofsted or EYFS requirements, too. There is great overlap between the different types of courses, however there is not one single course that covers both requirements. Do get in touch with us as we can find a Training Provider that can run different courses in parallel, and even some of it online, reducing the hours that your staff are out training and needing cover.
As your School / Nursery has employees then you must also comply with the Health and Safety (First Aid) Regulations. For instance you may need to:
- Provide adequate and appropriate first aid equipment and facilities
- Provide a suitable number of qualified first aiders
- Appoint a person to take charge where first aiders are temporarily absent or the provision of first aiders is not necessary (due to the nature of the activities; the number of employees; and location)
- Inform employees and volunteers of the first aid provisions made – including the location of any equipment or facilities and the identity of the first aider(s) or appointed person(s).
Generally speaking, to determine what is required in your School or Nursery must carry out a Risk Assessment and draw up an appropriate plan to provide this cover. There is some useful information on the Health and Safety Executive website:
Health and Safety Executive (HSE)
https://www.hse.gov.uk/firstaid/
Early Years Foundation (EYFS)
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-years-foundation-stage-framework–2
Millie’s Mark
Millie’s Mark is the Gold Standard in Paediatric First Aid for childcare providers.
The aim of Millie’s Mark is to keep children safe and minimise risk and accidents by:
- Raising standards in paediatric first aid
- Increasing numbers of paediatric first aid-trained practitioners
- Increasing confidence and competencies in applying paediatric first aid – no matter what the situation
- Enabling practitioners to respond quickly in emergencies
- Raising the quality and skills of the early years workforce and helping them with day-to-day first aid issues, such as allergies
- Providing reassurance to parents.
To achieve Millie’s Mark, a childminder, pre-school, nursery school or reception class at primary school has to meet a minimum set of standards for childcare. It is the Gold Standard achievement for one of these settings. See the website for how to achieve this, one of the criteria being that 100% of staff that work directly with children have the full 12 hour Paediatric First Aid Qualification.
Which course to choose?
The main courses that you can choose for a typical School or Nursery are:
Emergency First Aid at Work, which covers the Workplace requirements, but doesn’t deal with looking after babies, nor does it cover medical events such as strokes (it does cover heart attacks).
First Aid at Work, which builds on Emergency First Aid at Work to include medical emergencies, bone and muscle injuries amongst other problems.
Emergency Paediatric First Aid which deals with children and infants. useful for Nannies, and nursery staff that are working towards their full Paediatric First Aid qualification. It does not meet the Ofsted / EYFS requirements (see below) for a Paediatric First Aider. Nor does it meet the criteria for meeting Millie’s Mark as that requires a Full (12 hour) Paediatric First Aid qualification for all staff that work directly with children.
Paediatric First Aid, which builds on the Emergency Paediatric First Aid course to include medical emergencies amongst other topics. This course is the one that meets Ofsted / EYFS requirements as well as Millie’s Mark.
Forest School / Outdoor First Aid are courses that meet the requirements for Forest School practitioners.
The Forest School First Aid course was developed from the Outdoor First Aid course. Whilst both meet the requirements, the Forest School First Aid course is more tailored to the School environment and the supervision of children. It is often combined with the 12-hour Paediatric First Aid should the learner need that Qualification.
Forest School First Aid on its own will not meet the criteria for Millie’s Mark, however if you combine it with the 12-hour Paediatric course (which a lot of providers can do) then the combined package will qualify.
The Outdoor First Aid course is good for School staff leading / running Duke of Edinburgh training and live events as well as any other off-site activities such as School camps, trips and treks.
School Staff First Aid is a course aimed at School staff where legal First Aider level requirements are already met within the School or Nursery. Additional staff can be trained up in First Aid so that teaching staff can have their breaks without interruption, for instance. It doesn’t meet Workplace or Ofsted First Aider requirements, but it does train the staff up in relevant skills, the skills that are actually likely needing to be required in a playground.
Mental Health First Aid. Working in Schools and Nurseries is demanding and issues can arise from time to time. Hours are long, and the work can be very intense. By providing Workplace Mental Health First Aiders they can provide support when required.
Contact us if you believe that you need any of these courses. Many can be run in parallel, reducing your costs and staff downtime – important if you are needing to cover for them whilst they are training.
When considering how many staff need training you must allow for not only staff / pupil ratios, but staff leave and sickness – as well as the First Aider falling sick or injuring themselves. Also consider the size of the School or Nursery, whether it is spread out over multiple buildings and consider spreading First Aid skills across departments – Reception, Kitchen, Teaching Assistants and each Key Stage etc.
Online Training – First Aid, Fire and Food safety, Anaphylaxis and asthma awareness, Staff Management and Customer Service etc.
Don’t forget our wide range of online courses for School staff, too!