The EYFS Ratio Guidelines:
As one member of staff: You may care for a maximum of six children under the age of eight at any one time. Of these six children, a maximum of three may be young children, and only one of these three young children can be under 1 years old.
đ A child is a young child up until 1st September following their fifth birthday.
Let's visualise this in a table ...
Maximum 6 children... | Of these 6 children... | Of those 3 children... |
..under 8 yrs old | ..3 can be under 5yrs old | ..only 1 can be under 1yr |
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OR
These ratios include your own children who havenât yet started school, even if there are other adults on the premises during business ours, unless theyâre registered as an assistant with tiney.
Have a try on our Ratio Calculator to check if you need to apply for a variation
In some circumstances, exceptions can be made to the usual ratios when it has been demonstrated to tiney that youâre able to meet all childrenâs needs, and this is called a ratio variation. You can apply for a ratio variation through an application form, and the process for this can be found by clicking on the button above. It is important to note that not all applications to vary ratios are successful and going over the EYFS ratios without approval from tiney would be a breach.
FAQs
FAQs
How does working with an assistant impact my ratios?
If your setting is full, but you want to offer more places, you could decide to work with a tiney assistant. Each tiney assistant enables you to work with an additional six children under eight years old and the same restrictions around the ages of children apply to your assistant as well as you. Remember that assistants must be aged 17 years old and over to be included in your ratios.
We've also provided this handy ratio management chart to help you to keep within your ratios when working out scheduling and your availability for new business.