Sustaining Quality in a New Preschool Landscape

1. Sustaining Quality in a New Preschool Landscape CSER Early Childhood Care and Education Seminar Dublin Institute of Technology April 4th 2011 Professor Nóirín Hayes School of Social Sciences and Law, DIT, Centre for Social and Educational Research noirin.hayes@dit.ie

2. Children proverbially live in the present; that is not only a fact not to be evaded, but it is an excellence’ (Dewey)

3. Pillars of quality • People • Place • Pedagogy

4. People • Well trained and engaged practitioners • Young children who are ‘ready, willing and able’ [Carr] • Strong, reciprocal interactions between adults and children and between children themselves • Close collaboration with parents and and wider community

5. Place • Appealing settings – • inside and outside • Learning environments that are • respectful, reflective and risk rich • Sometimes less is best • Challenge and choice • Variety and quality of materials • Collaborative arrangements • Showcasing the lives of children • Reflecting the cultures and community

6. Pedagogy The quality of children’s interactions with adults and with the environment plays an important part in the quality of their learning at all ages. Effective early learning environments are nurturing and the adult rolein early education is critical to children becoming competent and masterful learners from the earliest age. Well-educated early years practitioners contribute to and sustain quality early education, which in turn, yields positive short and long-term benefits for children.

7. Pedagogy Practice should be both respectful and reflective and combined with a sound knowledge base in content areas and in child development. Such a pedagogy presumes that all minds are capable of holding ideas and beliefs which, through discussion and interaction, can be moved towards some shared frame of reference; it is child-sensitive and respectful of children’s own rolein their development.

8. Nurturing pedagogy • I refer to this shift in practice as a shift to a Nurturing Pedagogy – where nurture captures the educative nature of care and caring nature of education. • To nurture children’s learning as part of the educative process it is crucial to allow for: • non-intrusive planning, • a learning environment that supports and extends children’s own learning • quality interactive opportunities. • To nurture requires an engaged, bidirectional level of interaction and confers on theearly years teacher an enhanced, educational role.

9. Changing Landscape • 1996 – 2006: • Focus on women in work • Targeted versus universal approach • Centre-based institutional childcare • Parental funding rather than sectoral support • Childcare versus early education [Hayes, 2006]

10. Resources to assist • Síolta – national quality framework • Aistear – national curriculum framework • Workforce Development Plan • Free Preschool Year • Various subsidies • Strategic investments • The active NGO/NVCO sector

11. Government commitment • We will maintain the free pre-school year in Early Childhood Care and Education to promote the best outcomes for children and families. • We will improve the quality of the pre-school year by implementing standards and reviewing training options. • As resources allow, this Government will invest in a targeted early childhood education programme for disadvantaged children, building on existing targeted pre-school supports for families most in need of assistance such as the youngballymun project.

12. The challenge • Maintain the gains [structural and resource] • Utilise the supports • Focus on the integrated nature of early childhood • Demand training and aim high • Revisit the 1996 EU Quality Targets • Evaluate from a process as well as a product [outcomes] perspective

13. The challenge • Strive for high quality • Research and publish • Drive the debate for children and the sector from within • Raise the vision and aim high • It is not all about money - - - -

14. Thank You  noirin.hayes@dit.ie