Hedgehog House Early Learning Centre

1 ERO’s Judgements

Akarangi | Quality Evaluation evaluates the extent to which this early childhood service has the learning and organisational conditions to support equitable and excellent outcomes for all learners. Te Ara Poutama Indicators of quality for early childhood education: what matters most are the basis for making judgements about the effectiveness of the service in achieving equity and excellence for all learners. Judgements are made in relation to the Outcomes Indicators, Learning and Organisational Conditions. The Evaluation Judgement Rubric derived from the indicators, is used to inform ERO’s judgements about this service’s performance in promoting equity and excellence.

ERO’s judgements for Hedgehog House Early Learning Centre are as follows:

2 Context of the Service

Hedgehog House Early Learning Centre is a small privately owned service. Significant staff changes have recently occurred. A small number of currently enrolled children are Māori and just under a quarter are of Pacific heritage. Limited progress has been made on the key next steps in ERO’s 2018 report.

3 Summary of findings

Strong relationships underpin a curriculum that fosters children’s independence and choice within a mostly free-play environment. Infants and toddlers are effectively responded to through respectful approaches to care. Children experience tuakana-teina (older-younger child) learning as age groups interact together. Those who require additional support benefit from partnerships between adults to implement learning strategies.

A culturally responsive curriculum is being established. Children hear and see some aspects of Māori, Pacific and other cultures reflected in the environment and programme. Parents and whānau have multiple opportunities to engage in the daily curriculum, including sharing their cultural knowledge.

Planning and assessment for children’s learning promotes a curriculum that is responsive to their interests. Assessment considers the goals parents have for their children and is underpinned by Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum. Learning progression over time is not yet clearly visible, particularly in relation to valued learning outcomes of Te Whāriki.

Approaches to quality improvement are in the early stages. A focus on what is currently happening leads to some changes of policy and practice. Review of these, and monitoring of progress, is irregular and not collectively understood. Processes that enable staff to reflect on and improve their practice are in place for some. Leaders are beginning to redevelop conditions that enable collaboration for improvement with the new team.

Governance supports initiatives that contribute to positive social and community outcomes. A current focus is the selection and retention of qualified staff. Governors’ understanding of systems and processes that support continuity of operations and regulatory requirements is limited.

4 Improvement actions

Hedgehog House Early Learning Centre will include the following actions in its Quality Improvement Planning:

• Strengthen assessment to show how children’s learning is progressing over time, linked to the valued learning outcomes from Te Whāriki.

• Implement evaluation of the curriculum to understand how well curriculum planning and intentional teaching are promoting intended learning outcomes and the centre’s priorities for learning.

• Develop shared understanding and enactment of self-review to promote collaborative approaches to improvement.

• Build governors and leaders’ understanding of the systems and processes required to maintain regulatory compliance.

5 Management Assurance on Legal Requirements

Before the review, the staff and management of Hedgehog House Early Learning Centre completed an ERO Assurance Statement and Self-Audit Checklist. In these documents they attested that they have taken all reasonable steps to meet their legal obligations related to:

• curriculum

• premises and facilities

• health and safety practices

• governance, management and administration.

During the review, ERO looked at the service’s systems for managing the following areas that have a potentially high impact on children's wellbeing:

• emotional safety (including positive guidance and child protection)

• physical safety (including supervision; sleep procedures; accidents; medication; hygiene; excursion policies and procedures)

• suitable staffing (including qualification levels; safety checking; teacher registration; ratios)

• relevant evacuation procedures and practices.

All early childhood services are required to promote children's health and safety and to regularly review their compliance with legal requirements.

6 Actions for Compliance

ERO identified the following areas of non-compliance:

• suitable human resource management practices being implemented, including a system of regular appraisal.

[Licensing Criteria for Early Childhood Education and Care Services 2008, GMA7]

During the review, the service provided ERO with evidence that shows it has addressed the following non-compliances:

• The full names and qualifications of each person counting towards regulated qualifications, and a procedure people should follow if they wish to complain about non compliance with the regulations or criteria, are prominently displayed at the service for parents and visitors (GMA1).

Since the onsite visit, the service has provided ERO with evidence that shows it has addressed the following non-compliances:

• having a written emergency plan that includes all elements required by the licensing criterion and evidence of its review on an, at least, annual basis (HS7).

• ensuring all children’s workers are safety checked every three years by the employer or another person or organisation acting on their behalf, in accordance with the requirements of the Children’s Act 2014 (GMA7A).

7 Recommendation to Ministry of Education

ERO recommends the Ministry follows up with the service provider to ensure non-compliances identified in this report are addressed.

Patricia Davey
Director of Early Childhood Education (ECE)

21 August 2023

8 About the Early Childhood Service