The health of all children at Early Beginnings is very important to us. Please do not bring your child to daycare if he/she is not well enough to participate in both indoor and outdoor programming.

If your child becomes sick during the day, a staff member will call you to make arrangements for pick-up as soon as possible.

If your child has a fever, he/she must stay home and they must be fever-free (without the help of fever-reducing medication) for 24 hours before returning to daycare. We have a “48 hour free” policy for diarrhea and/or vomiting. *Please note that the 48 hours begins after the most recent bout of diarrhea/vomiting.*

These policies are in place to protect the health of all children and staff at Early Beginnings as well as to try and prevent outbreaks of illness.

Daycare fees cannot be refunded or reduced to make up for days missed as a result of illness.

You must contact the daycare if your child will not be attending that day or will be arriving late (after 9:30 am).

We prefer that you contact us via email (earlybeginnings@earlybeginningsottawa.ca), but you can also call us (613-722-5157) or send a message via Seesaw.

Afternoon Pickup: Please plan on arriving and exiting the building by 5:30 PM. Parents should plan to reach the centre at 5:25 at the latest to ensure a quick and easy departure by our closing time of 5:30.

Late Policy:

Early Beginnings closes at 5:30 PM. If a child is picked up later than 5:30 PM, the parent will be asked to sign a late sheet and given a written copy of our late policy. Here are the details:

After 3 late pickups, parents will be charged $50.00.

For each late pickup after that, a fee of $20.00 will be applied.
If a child is continually picked up past our closing time, parents will be contacted by the Director, and if the situation cannot be resolved, discharge may be considered.

Important Note:

The closing time of 5:30 PM means that you should be leaving the daycare at 5:30. If you need to check your child's cubby for a particular article of clothing or have questions for your child's teacher or another EB staff member, please plan on arriving before 5:30 PM.

All children in the daycare have a two hour rest period. Each child will have their own cot with a fitted sheet, which is provided by us. During the sleep/rest time, the children will be asked to lay on their cot for one hour.

For our Toddlers, Junior, and Senior preschoolers, if a child remains awake after being on their cot for the first hour, the teacher may give him/her a book or some other quiet activity.

Celebrating a birthday is a very exciting time for a child. To help make your child’s special day memorable, we will provide a birthday cake and a special birthday hat. Birthdays are celebrated during afternoon snack time. Parents are welcome to join the birthday celebration.

No outside food, please: Due to being a kosher daycare and the possibility of children with severe food allergies, we request that no outside food be brought into the daycare.