Daycares Editing and Proofreading Services

A two-year-old comes home with a bruise on her cheek and a note in the bag saying she had a small accident at nursery and was comforted. Her parents spend the evening imagining what happened. In fact she ran into the corner of a low table while chasing another child, a practitioner saw the whole thing, she cried for two minutes, and there is nothing to worry about — and every one of those facts was available and none of them was written down.

We edit what nurseries and childcare providers produce — accident, incident and injury notes to parents, existing injury and body map records, behaviour and biting incident communications, daily and settling-in reports, admission, policy and parent handbook content, illness, exclusion and medication documentation, safeguarding and concern recording guidance for staff, complaints and concerns procedures, fee, notice and funding communications, and staffing and key person information. Our editors work on the note that goes home in the bag.

The accident note is the highest-frequency piece of writing a nursery does and the one most likely to be reread, and its failure is euphemism plus omission. A note saying a child had a small accident tells a parent nothing except that something happened. We write these so the note states what happened in the order it happened — what the child was doing, what they came into contact with, and where — since parents reconstruct the event whatever the note says and an accurate reconstruction is kinder than an imagined one; so whether it was witnessed is stated plainly, because "she was found crying" and "I saw her run into the table" are completely different pieces of information to a parent; so the child's response and recovery is described with a duration, given that "she was comforted" is what every note says and "she cried for about two minutes and went back to the sand tray" is what a parent actually wants; so any first aid given is named with who gave it and their qualification; so what to watch for at home is stated where relevant, with the threshold for seeking advice; so the follow-up is named — whether anything has changed in the room as a result, such as the table being moved — as this is what reassures a parent that the nursery noticed; and so the note is signed by the person who saw it rather than the person on the desk at pick-up. Notes written this way remove the evening of imagining.

Everything you send is treated in confidence, including incident records, policies and parent correspondence. We are editors rather than childcare, safeguarding or regulatory advisers, and we offer no view on incidents, care or compliance. What we can do is replace the evening of imagining with an account.