
At Little Cedars Nursery in Streatham, government-funded childcare hours for eligible children will be ‘stretched’ over 51 weeks of the year, starting from the 1st of September 2025. It means that, if your child is eligible for government-funded childcare hours at Little Cedars Nursery, they will be able to use them over virtually every week of the academic year starting in September 2025. In practice, that’s childcare provision every week, apart from the Christmas/New Year week, bank holidays, and three inset days. That aligns funded childcare provision with the standard working weeks that Little Cedars Nursery operates. It will provide more consistent childcare to families over virtually the entire year. This will alleviate the stresses associated with accessing funded childcare, especially during school holidays, which are not usually funded in the more standard 38-week model. Read on to learn more.
Our 51-Week Working Calendar
For 2025-26 Childcare Provision at Little Cedars Nursery
The coloured areas of the calendar below indicate days when Little Cedars Day Nursery will be open during the academic year 2025-26, with the new 51-week ‘stretched’ provision aligning with those weeks. Take a look:

Background to ‘Stretched’ Funded Childcare Provision
When people refer to a “30 Hours” childcare funding scheme, it’s known as such because it’s based on 30 weekly childcare hours taken over just 38 weeks of the year (total: 1140 annual hours). It’s similar for ’15-hours’ childcare funding schemes, which are usually taken as 15 hours per week over 38 weeks of the year (total: 570 annual hours). As we all know, however, there are 52 weeks in every year. That leaves a substantial 14 weeks of the year where families would not usually be able to access funded childcare hours. That could cause many issues and potential expense as parents try to find alternative childcare provision, or have to reduce working hours. Both would effectively cost households money. With this in mind, Little Cedars Nursery will implement a new 51-week ‘stretched’ provision for the academic year 2025-26. As the name suggests, this stretches the funded hours over more weeks of the year. This is achieved by reducing the number of funded hours used each week.
How Many Funded Hours Eligible Children Can Get Each Week
With Our ‘51 Week’ Stretched Provision
By stretching the free hours over more weeks of the year, it results in a different number of funded hours in any given week:
- Children on a ‘15-hour’ scheme (570 funded hours per annum) will instead take just over 11 hours per week, over the 51 weeks of the year.
- Children on a ‘30-hour’ scheme (1140 funded hours per annum) will instead take approximately 22 funded hours per week, over the 51 weeks of the year.
Please contact the nursery for more details.
Nursery Places at Little Cedars Nursery, Streatham

If you would like to explore the possibility of sending your baby, toddler or preschooler to Little Cedars Day Nursery in Streatham, please get in touch. We provide a high-quality weekday childcare service to families in Streatham as well as Tooting, Furzedown, Balham, Norbury and Colliers Wood. The nursery is rated as a Good Provider by Ofsted and supports several Government-led childcare funding schemes for eligible families. Indeed, from September 2025, children as young as 9 months of age will be able to access the 30-Week scheme for eligible working families. But don’t miss the application deadline if you’re thinking of applying for the scheme. Choose an option to get in touch today:


Work at least 16 hours or more per week at the National Minimum Wage
Last year,
As well as helping families financially, the scheme expansion should help children begin their early years education even earlier, for many, which has been shown to be hugely beneficial to them. The free childcare provision will also help many more women back into the workforce. Children, families and the economy should all benefit.


With Universal Free Childcare, children aged 3 or 4 can receive up to 570 hours of free childcare over the course of the year.
With Extended Free Childcare, eligible 3- and 4-year-olds can receive up to 1140 hours of free childcare per year instead of only 570.
Some disadvantaged children aged 2 can also receive up to 570 hours of free childcare over the course of the year.
For those that are eligible, up to £2,000 in free childcare is available each year to children aged 11 or under* through the Tax-Free Childcare scheme.
You can sacrifice up to £55 per week of your earnings, which will be free of National Insurance and Income Tax, to fund Childcare Vouchers.
Following the Spring Budget 2023, childcare funding through Universal Credit is to be improved with nearly 50% more generous funding becoming available from July 2023.
Those already claiming for childcare costs via Working Tax Credits may be able to obtain up to £122.50 for one or £210.00 for more than one child each week.
2-year-olds may be eligible for the ’15 Hours’ scheme from April 2024.
Up to 85% of childcare costs incurred by students may be claimed, up to a maximum of £188.90 per week for 1 child or £323.85 for 2 or more (correct for academic year 2023-2024).
Up to £160 per child is available each week for those living outside London.
While it’s not designed to fund childcare, it can be used to do so in some circumstances.