In September 2022, the mum-of-two wanted to take her boys to school and pick them up each day, and attend some of their activities.
Here, in our latest Business of the Week feature, owner and founder of Phonics Spell Jenny Priestley talks all things phonics and why she decided to launch her own business after spending 20 years as an Early Years teacher.
If you would like your business to feature as Business or Trader of the Week, email heidi.summerfield@newsquest.co.uk
Phonics Spell owner Jenny Priestley
What’s the name of the business?
Phonics Spell
What’s the address?
I run all my classes at The Hayloft, Sandy Lane, Bold Heath
Are you the owner/manager?
Yes I am the founder and sole owner of Phonics Spell.
When did you open the business?
I started the business in November 2022
Has it always been in the same location?
Yes, I absolutely love working at the beautiful setting of The Hayloft and the barn room suits my small classes perfectly. The Hayloft not only has a farm, play area, tractor and train rides, but it also has a café which is a great place to visit after class. The staff are all so friendly and can’t do enough for their customers, including my own.
Phonics Spell is for children aged between two and five
Are you local to the area? Did you grow up here?
I moved to Warrington when I was four years old and have grown up and lived here ever since.
Tell me a bit about your business. What do you do? What services do you provide?
I run fun and educational phonics classes for children aged between two and five years old. My classes help little ones develop the necessary early reading and writing skills through exciting weekly themes. Each class is designed to help children with their social and emotional skills, improves fine and gross motor control, develops speech and language, encourages children to become more independent learners and make new friends. Not only do the children have fun, but all the adults love coming too and joining in with all of my activities. I have lots of grandparents that attend and the setting is perfect to spend time in after class. Each week, I plan a range of fun games, singing, dancing, play and craft activities which help children to explore a variety of different media through their learning. Class sizes are limited to 10 children, so I can provide more 1:1 guidance and this is perfect for adults with younger children who enjoy coming along too.
Why did you decide to open your own business?
In April 2022, I was working as a school teacher in a local Warrington school and I joined a Facebook group run by Sharon Cawley and Sarah Dunwood called Life After Teaching – Exit the Classroom and Thrive. The group gave me lots of support through videos, posts and I had a few chats with Sharon too. Sharon and Sarah – founders of Conexus Tuition – gave me the inspiration and confidence to set up my own business so that could work around the family life more. The group still gives me so much support and there are lots of networking opportunities throughout the year too.
In September 2022, I decided to leave my school teaching career of 20 years and started to design my own education toddler class for children aged between two and five years old from scratch. I wanted to make up my own business, so I had the flexibility of taking my two boys to and from school and being able to attend more of their activities throughout the week. The majority of my teaching career was in Early Years and in my last school I was lucky enough to specialise in teaching phonics across the school for six and a half years where I was employed as ‘The Phonics Fairy.’ This certainly was a dream come true and I designed and planned sessions for children that needed a boost with their phonics and created my own bespoke programme of teaching through fun themes. My classes catered the learning styles of each child and helped them to access phonics at their own level in a nurturing group. Phonics Spell actually isn’t the only business I run – I also run a very successful music school called Jenny Priestley School of Music, which delivers piano, flute and music theory lessons from my home.
What’s your business background?
I actually started teaching my local neighbours and friends’ children the piano and flute at 14 years old. After going to university and doing a music degree I decided to go into classroom teaching, obtained my QTS with music specialism and started working in a local primary school initially as a Year 1 teacher. Alongside my fulltime teaching job I continued to teach piano privately and this has slowly developed into now teaching a large number of children and adults of all ages. Starting up Phonics Spell was a real challenge at first as I had no experience of marketing and all the legal implications in setting up a business. I spent months researching what I needed to do and my first port of call was to ask my very talented logo designer friend Jo MacMichael from Joco Design if she would design me a logo. I was so pleased with how it turned out and it is so eye catching.
Classes help children with their social and emotional skills, improve fine and gross motor control, develop speech and language, encourage children to become more independent learners and make new friends
Why this type of business?
Teaching is in my blood, so my business just allows me to teach as I did before, but now I absolutely love working alongside all the parents and grandparents to show them new ways that they can help their children to read and write from home. I don’t spend a fortune on resources either. Most of my sessions use materials and things I have at home and I especially like recycling and re-using things too.
What makes your business different to others in the same area/field? What sets your business apart from your competitors?
I don’t think of other children’s activity providers as my competitors, in-fact the total opposite. We are all in the same boat and we support each other. We all offer different things and it’s great to recommend other groups to the children that come along to class too.
Why do loyal customers return to your business?
I think because I am a family orientated business and also a specialist teacher my customers love to see what I can do each week. I plan and create all my sessions based on the learning needs and styles of the children that attend. I get lots of comments on how the children are remembering so many letter sounds at home and I love receiving photos of writing they have done at home too. It is really encouraging to see how confident the children have been with their phonics starting school. I’ve had lots of positive feed-back from parents about their children exceeding the expectations of their teachers.
Jenny with her husband Matt and boys Arnold and Isaac
What’s next? What do the next few months hold for you and your business?
At the moment my 10am Monday class is fully booked, so I am looking at putting on another 11.15am class. I also run a class on a Thursday which is booking up fast so I am also hoping to extend that too.