Consistent team training, from one simple monthly price.
Give your whole team the training they need, with a manager dashboard, progress tracking, certificates and standard learner reminders—all for one simple monthly price. Your managers stay in control, and you can add managed parent or policy services whenever you need more help.
- £54 per user per year paid annually, or £7 per user per month
- Minimum five users
- 12-month minimum term
- 14 staff = £98 per month
compared with buying the equivalent training individually for a five-person team.
Estimated individual course value, not a guaranteed saving.
What that gets your team
The 50 included courses have an individual value of more than £600 per person — over £3,000 for a five-person team, against £35 a month for the same five staff.
That is before accounting for monthly webinars, the manager dashboard, progress tracking, certificates, Stages 4 Ages basic Parent Hub access, onboarding and learner support.
Everything included in Essential
Want more help? Add a managed service.
Essential gives your managers the tools. If you would like us to take on more of the work, you can add either of these managed services to Essential. Both are already included in the Premium Partnership.
Managed Parent Hub
A managed parent engagement service: you add and manage the parents connected to your setting, and they receive included resources and selected free courses through you.
- Add parents to the managed system on their behalf
- See at a glance which parents are registered
- Add new parents and remove families who leave the setting
- Parents receive included resources and selected free courses through your nursery
- Manager login and access for your team
- Where suitable, your own secure private community space for your setting
- Only authorised parents and managers for your nursery can access your private area
- Stepping Stones retains appropriate oversight and moderation access
Essential already includes Stages 4 Ages basic Parent Hub access, where parents register themselves. The Managed Parent Hub is a different, managed service run through your setting.
Policy & Procedure Hub
One organised home for your policies and procedures, with AI-assisted review, a human review from our team, and staff training created for you.
- Organised policy and procedure storage, with version history where supported
- AI review against relevant current requirements, including EYFS and Ofsted changes where applicable
- AI highlights possible gaps, outdated wording and suggested improvements
- AI-assisted rewriting so you can apply the changes yourself
- Submit the final document to Stepping Stones for a human review
- Stepping Stones creates and uploads the staff training version into your training portal
- Clear document status showing when a policy is live for staff
- Policy and procedure templates to start from
- Write your own knowledge-check questions, or ask us to create them
- Staff management: who is registered, new starters and leavers
- Tell us about a new starter so their training access can be arranged
- Group access: setting managers see their own setting, a central administrator oversees them all
You never have to turn a policy into staff training yourself — once you are happy with the document and we have reviewed it, Stepping Stones builds and uploads the training for you.
Take both hubs together
Individually the two hubs are £130 per setting each month. Taken together they are £100 per setting each month.
Hub pricing is per setting and is not affected by the multi-site offer, which applies to training seats only.
How Essential works
Book a demo
A friendly walkthrough with Grace or Emily plus a two-week individual platform preview.
Add your team
Register your setting and add your users during onboarding.
Get learning
Enrol staff, track progress from your dashboard and let standard learner notifications and reminders support them along the way.
Your 50 essential courses
Essential comes with 50 courses — your essential courses. Your staff choose the courses that suit them from our catalogue, covering mandatory and core early years training.
See the platform in action
Prefer to see it before you commit? Book a demo for a live walkthrough with the Stepping Stones team.
A steady training foundation for smaller teams
- Small nurseries, preschools and childminders
- Teams who need consistent, on-demand training
- Settings ready to move away from ad-hoc individual course purchases
- Managers who want simple oversight without heavy admin
Essential vs buying courses individually
Individual courses work well for one-off purchases. Essential is designed for whole teams who want ongoing, consistent training and simple oversight.
Individual courses
- Buy per learner, per course
- No manager dashboard
- No learner notifications or reminders
Essential Pathway
- 50 essential courses per user
- Two manager seats and progress tracking
- Standard learner reminders, monthly webinars and Stages 4 Ages basic Parent Hub access
You can upgrade to Premium Partnership at any time.
Unlock unlimited courses, advanced progress tracking, unlimited manager and reviewer access, policy support, bespoke webinars and 15% off qualifications and programmes.
Essential FAQs
Ready to get your team learning?
Book a friendly demo and receive a two-week individual platform preview, or register for Essential directly.