Barnardos Early Learning Homebased Canterbury One

1 The Education Review Office (ERO) Evaluation

KidStart Christchurch One is one of four Barnardos home-based networks that operate in Canterbury. The service contracts educators who use their own homes to provide care and education for up to four children at any one time.

Barnados provides initial and ongoing support and training for educators, along with detailed guidelines outlining procedures and expectations.

Visiting teachers, who are qualified early childhood teachers, visit educators and children in the educator's home regularly. The visiting teachers are responsible for making sure that the homes meet health and safety standards. Educators are well supported, and children receive the care and education they need.

The manager, visiting teachers and educators have successfully retained and built on many of the positive features detailed in the service’s September 2008 ERO report.

The service has been restructured and a practice leader appointed to help promote high-quality care and education.

The Canterbury earthquakes have had a significant impact on many children, their families, educators and Barnardos staff. The service has been very responsive to the circumstances and needs of children, families, educators and staff.

The additional learning experiences the service creates for children have been extended and now include a literacy group as well as play and music groups.

Positive features of the care and education the service provides for children include:

• the suitably varied range of learning experiences children take part in, both within and beyond, the educator’s home
• the focus adults place on building on children’s interests
• the way adults often skilfully support children’s learning through play
• the extent to which children’s sense of well-being and belonging are fostered.

Barnardos staff provide educators with helpful guidance and support them in ways that promote a strong sense of partnership.

Leadership and management practices foster good-quality care and education and help to support ongoing improvements to the service.

Areas for development and review relate largely to building on existing practices in ways that:

• improve the quality of assessment, planning and programme evaluation
• extend the self-review programme and practices to increase their usefulness for promoting ongoing improvements to teaching and learning.

Future Action

ERO is confident that the service is being managed in the interest of the children. Therefore ERO will review the service again within three years.

2 The Focus of the Review

Before the review, the management of Christchurch One was invited to consider its priorities for review using guidelines and resources provided by ERO. ERO also used documentation provided by the centre to contribute to the scope of the review.

The detailed priorities for review were then determined following a discussion between the ERO review team and the management and staff. This discussion focused on existing information held by the centre (including self-review information) and the extent to which potential issues for review contributed to positive outcomes for children at Christchurch One.

All ERO education reviews in early childhood focus on the quality of education. For ERO this includes the quality of:

• the programme provided for children
• the learning environment
• and the interactions between children and adults.

ERO's findings in these areas are set out below.

The Quality of Education

Background

Since the service's ERO review in September 2008, there have been changes in management, staff and ongoing professional development. Management, visiting teachers and educators have continued to seek ways of building on the best of past practices to promote ongoing improvements to the quality of education and care practices for children.

Areas of strength

Programme

Educators provide children with a suitable and varied range of learning experiences. Their programmes:

• provide children with appropriate opportunities to follow their interests and to have their immediate needs met
• include a good mixture of activities both within and beyond the home
• give children suitable options for playing either on their own or with others.

Reviewers observed children happily engaged in a variety of exploratory play activities, often for sustained periods.

A recent focus on improving assessment practices is helping educators to better notice and recognise children’s learning. More emphasis is now being placed on considering how to further promote each child’s learning.

Interactions

Reviewers observed adults interacting with children in ways that were responsive, respectful, supportive and caring. Relationships between educators and children are clearly helping to foster children’s sense of belonging and well-being.

Children were keen to have their educators and visiting teachers involved in play. Adults used a variety of good practices to help promote children’s learning including:

• giving children many opportunities to make choices
• playing alongside children in ways that prolonged their interest and encouraged creativity
• providing additional resources to extend children’s learning.

Environment

Home environments visited by ERO helped to support children’s learning and development. For instance they provided children with:

• a wide range of easily accessible activities and resources, both indoors and outdoors
• a variety of well set out and “inviting” spaces that helped to engage them in play
• interesting displays, in most homes, that included information about children’s experiences and aspects of their learning.

Educator selection, support and training

Educators are well supported, particularly by visiting teachers, in their efforts to provide good quality care and education for children. For example:

• recruitment systems give suitable emphasis to making sure educators can meet the expectations associated with their role
• induction processes and ongoing training for educators that provide them with regular opportunities for learning and development
• the ongoing affirmation and support they receive from visiting teachers helps them to feel valued and increases their confidence

Barnardos-initiated activities such as workshops, group activities and social events, give educators good opportunities to meet with, share ideas and make links with other educators.

Areas for development and review

Enhancing assessment, programme planning and evaluation

To further support children’s learning and development:

• educators should build on assessment initiatives and focus more on identifying the next possible steps for children’s learning and development
• visiting teachers' contact records should more consistently note the learning that is occurring for children, the suggestions made for improving learning and teaching and the actions taken to address issues raised in previous visits
• teachers and educators should explore further ways of evaluating the effectiveness of programmes in fostering children’s learning and development.

Leadership and Management

Areas of strength

Aspects of leadership and management

Leadership and management practices that are helping to foster good-quality care and education for children include the:

• useful guidelines, (including handbooks, policies and procedures) that set out expectations
• way team building and teamwork is being promoted
• efforts made to promote reflective practices, professional learning and ongoing improvements.

Partnership building

Visiting teachers promote a sense of partnership between themselves and educators. They work in ways that reflect the service’s emphasis on empowering others.

The manager and visiting teachers communicate regularly, and in a variety of ways, with educators and parents. Increased opportunities for parents, educators and managers to meet socially and for further education, are also helping to create a sense of partnership.

Areas for development and review

Self review

The value and usefulness of self review for evaluating and improving the quality of care and education could be enhanced by:

• extending guidelines and opportunities for professional development in relation to self review
• making greater provision for evaluating the quality of programmes, teaching and learning
• increasing the involvement of educators and parents in review processes.

3 Management Assurance on Compliance Areas

Overview

Before the review, the management and staff of Barnardos KidStart Christchurch One completed an ERO Home-Based Care Assurance Statement and Self-Audit Checklist. In these documents they attested that they had taken all reasonable steps to meet their legal obligations related to:

• administration
• health, safety and welfare
• personnel management
• financial and property management.

During the review, ERO checked the following items because they have a potentially high impact on outcomes for children:

• emotional safety (including behaviour management, prevention of bullying and abuse)
• physical safety (including behaviour management, sleeping and supervision practices; accidents and medication; hygiene and routines; travel and excursion policies and procedures)
• staff qualifications and organisation
• evacuation procedures and practices for fire and earthquake.

4 Future Action

ERO is confident that the service is being managed in the interest of the children. Therefore ERO will review the service again in three years.

Graham Randell

National Manager Review Services Southern Region

28 May 2012

About the Service