1 Cracroft Street, Otahuhu, Auckland
View on mapAkarangi | 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 Blossoms Educare Riverside are as follows:
Outcome Indicators(What the service knows about outcomes for learners) |
|
Ngā Akatoro Domains |
|
Learning Conditions
|
Whāngai Establishing |
Blossoms Educare Riverside is one of 12 services in the Blossoms organisation. A qualified centre manager leads a team of 11, that includes seven registered teachers. Most children are of Pacific heritage. Blossoms’ organisational leaders provide professional guidance and support to their services.
Children are nurtured through caring and responsive relationships with teachers. They are treated with gentleness and respect. Infants and toddlers experience a calm, unhurried routine that supports them to take increasing responsibility for their own wellbeing.
Kaiako integrate te reo Māori and tikanga Māori into their daily teaching practices. The curriculum provides opportunities for parents to contribute and share celebrations of their culture. These approaches help to build a strong sense of belonging for children and their families.
The curriculum is based on children’s interests and strengths. Children engage in meaningful experiences in environments that promote learning and play. Assessment records are yet to identify progress and learning over time for children, in relation the outcomes of Te Whāriki the early childhood curriculum.
Leaders and kaiako implement policies and practices that aim to promote positive outcomes for children. There are systems in place for internal evaluation that contribute to improvements. Kaiako should continue to monitor and evaluate the impact of internal evaluation processes on outcomes for children.
Organisational governance and management systems operate with a high level of collaboration and relational trust. Kaiako are provided with a range of professional development opportunities and ongoing mentoring. Leaders proactively seek ways to enable children and whānau to access early childhood education. Blossoms leaders need to monitor that licensing requirements are being maintained at individual services.
Blossoms Educare Riverside will include the following actions in its Quality Improvement Planning:
To develop assessment and planning in relation to the learning outcomes in Te Whāriki, that shows individual children’s progress and learning over time.
To implement internal evaluation processes that monitor and evaluate changes made to practices, policies, and procedures and how these have impacted on children’s learning.
Organisational improvement actions are:
To implement a process of internal evaluation at an organisation level that contributes to ongoing improvement.
To monitor and regularly evaluate progress towards long-term goals with a focus on how well improvements made have impacted on children’s learning.
Before the review, the staff and management of Blossoms Educare Riverside 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.
Since the onsite visit, the service has provided ERO with evidence that shows it has addressed the following non-compliances:
Ensuring heavy furniture that could fall or topple and cause serious injury or damage is secured (HS6).
Including the method of travel in excursion records (HS17).
Patricia Davey
Director of Early Childhood Education (ECE)
24 October 2023
|
Early Childhood Service Name |
Blossoms Educare Riverside |
|
Profile Number |
46498 |
|
Location |
Otahuhu, Auckland |
|
Service type |
Education and care service |
|
Number licensed for |
54 children, including up to 15 aged under 2 |
|
Percentage of qualified teachers |
80-99% |
|
Service roll |
67 |
|
Review team on site |
July 2023 |
|
Date of this report |
24 October 2023 |
|
Most recent ERO report(s) |
Education Review, February 2017 |
|
Not well placed |
Requires further development |
Well placed |
Very well placed |
ERO's findings that support this overall judgement are summarised below.
Blossoms Educare Riverside is a new privately owned centre located beside the Tamaki River and close to Otahuhu. The service provides full day education and care for up to 64 children including up to 15 under two years old. There are separate indoor areas and adjoining outdoor spaces for each age group. Most children on the roll are of Māori, Indian or Pacific heritage and they are supported by a culturally diverse teaching team. This is the first review of the centre.
The centre is one of eight in the South Auckland area operated by the owner. The service focuses on increasing participation in early childhood education by providing an affordable service. Children of families in need are fully subsidised to attend the centre. Staff are well supported by the organisation's support team that visits frequently to foster the quality of teaching and learning, help with resource development and monitor centre operations. This team is building the capability of staff to operate the centre more independently with specific procedures aligned to the organisation's policies and goals.
The owner, two support team leaders and seven staff members are registered teachers. Centre staff have an external appraiser and mentor who supports their ongoing development and monitors their achievement of goals. Teachers also participate in professional development focused on strengthening bicultural practice and enhancing the quality of teaching and learning.
Centre practices are underpinned by the Blossoms philosophy of providing uninterrupted play, enabling children to self-regulate and build reciprocal relationships.
This review was part of a cluster of four education and care reviews in the Blossoms Educare group of centres.
Children are confident and happy in the centre. They have trusting and respectful relationships with teachers and are developing social skills as they play cooperatively with their peers. Children know about making choices from easily accessible resources and benefit from sustained periods of uninterrupted play. Children are also learning to manage their snack and meal times independently.
Infants and toddlers enjoy nurturing care and the close attention of teachers as they explore resources indoors and in the playground. They are well settled and benefit from frequent interaction with older children. This supports them to transition into the larger environment when they are two.
Teachers enthusiastically engage in children’s play. They encourage children to play cooperatively and develop independence. Teachers affirm children’s endeavours, some using questions effectively to foster ideas and prompt children’s use of equipment. They also regularly include cultural activities in the programme which often involves parents and whānau sharing their skills and knowledge. Teachers, could now focus on deepening children's learning through fostering group skills and raising their expectations of children’s competence.
Teachers continue to develop their planning, assessment and evaluation processes. They regularly observe and discuss children's interests and have successfully documented children's recent exploration of art and craft materials. While teachers provide a wide range of resources and activities to support planned topics they should improve their focus on planning that will guide their teaching practices. They could draw on the best examples of teaching and learning within the Blossoms group to develop a profile of an effective teacher and use this to help grow their skills and knowledge. Taking leadership responsibility for curriculum areas such as literacy, numeracy and science could help teachers to enhance children's communication skills and complex learning opportunities.
The service leaders are planning further development of the environment. While the outdoors is attractively designed, the owner recognises the need to better utilise space, provide further challenges and reduce the extent of barked areas. The leaders also plan to enhance the range of natural materials indoors and maintain ongoing reviews of play areas.
The owner provides sound leadership for staff. She provides an inclusive environment, regularly consulting teachers and involving them in decisions about strategic goals, the service’s philosophy, policies and vision. The owner strongly encourages professional development which has significantly helped teachers to extend their understanding of self review, learning stories and biculturalism. The relatively new centre leadership team is being supported to take collaborative responsibility for the centre and guide teacher development. Centre leaders agree they should continue to enhance their internal evaluation processes and strengthen their strategic planning.
The Blossoms management team is committed to the ongoing development of all centres in the organisation. The team leaders have begun developing an action plan to address the key next steps identified in the current cluster of centre reviews. They are taking responsibility for mentoring and guiding staff while strengthening their expectation that centre managers and teachers will continue to review programme planning, learning extension, internal evaluation and bicultural practices. The management team has plans to further develop its strategic plans and to provide an appropriate appraisal process for the centres' owner.
Centre leaders agree that the key next steps for centre development should include:
developing teachers’ capability to extend children's learning
continuing to strengthen assessment, planning and evaluation in order to more effectively guide teaching practices
deepen self review to focus evaluations on the effectiveness of practices and procedures
ongoing development of bicultural practice's.
Before the review, the staff and management of Blossoms Educare Riverside completed an ERO Centre 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; police vetting; teacher registration; ratios)
evacuation procedures and practices for fire and earthquake.
All early childhood services are required to promote children's health and safety and to regularly review their compliance with legal requirements.
In order to improve current practices centre leaders should shield the window behind the carpentry table.
The next ERO review of Blossoms Educare Riverside will be in three years.
Graham Randell
Deputy Chief Review Officer Northern
24 February 2017
The Education Review Office (ERO) is the government department that, as part of its work, reviews early childhood services throughout Aotearoa New Zealand. ERO’s reports provide information for parents and communities about each service’s strengths and next steps for development. ERO’s bicultural evaluation framework Ngā Pou Here is described in SECTION 3 of this report. Early childhood services are partners in the review process and are expected to make use of the review findings to enhance children's wellbeing and learning.
|
Location |
Otahuhu, Auckland |
||
|
Ministry of Education profile number |
46498 |
||
|
Licence type |
Education & Care Service |
||
|
Licensed under |
Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008 |
||
|
Number licensed for |
64 children, including up to 15 aged under 2 |
||
|
Service roll |
63 |
||
|
Gender composition |
Boys 35 Girls 28 |
||
|
Ethnic composition |
Māori Pākehā Samoan Indian Tongan Cook Islands Māori Asian |
8 1 21 16 9 5 3 |
|
|
Percentage of qualified teachers 0-49% 50-79% 80%+ Based on funding rates |
80% + |
||
|
Reported ratios of staff to children |
Under 2 |
1:3 |
Better than minimum requirements |
|
Over 2 |
1:7 |
Better than minimum requirements |
|
|
Review team on site |
November 2016 |
||
|
Date of this report |
24 February 2017 |
||
|
Most recent ERO report(s)
|
No previous ERO reports |
||
ERO’s overarching question for an early childhood education review is ‘How well placed is this service to promote positive learning outcomes for children?’ ERO focuses on the following factors as described in the bicultural framework Ngā Pou Here:
Pou Whakahaere – how the service determines its vision, philosophy and direction to ensure positive outcomes for children
Pou Ārahi – how leadership is enacted to enhance positive outcomes for children
Mātauranga – whose knowledge is valued and how the curriculum is designed to achieve positive outcomes for children
Tikanga whakaako – how approaches to teaching and learning respond to diversity and support positive outcomes for children.
Within these areas ERO considers the effectiveness of arotake – self review and of whanaungatanga – partnerships with parents and whānau.
ERO evaluates how well placed a service is to sustain good practice and make ongoing improvements for the benefit of all children at the service.
A focus for the government is that all children, especially priority learners, have an opportunity to benefit from quality early childhood education. ERO will report on how well each service promotes positive outcomes for all children, with a focus on children who are Māori, Pacific, have diverse needs, and are up to the age of two.
For more information about the framework and Ngā Pou Here refer to ERO’s Approach to Review in Early Childhood Services.
The overall judgement that ERO makes and the timing of the next review will depend on how well placed a service is to promote positive learning outcomes for children. The categories are:
ERO has developed criteria for each category. These are available on ERO’s website.
ERO reviews are tailored to each service’s context and performance, within the overarching review framework. The aim is to provide information on aspects that are central to positive outcomes for children and useful to the service.