291 Grey Street, Hamilton East, Hamilton
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Not well placed |
Requires further development |
Well placed |
Very well placed |
EEW Homebased Education - East is well placed to promote positive learning outcomes for children.
ERO's findings that support this overall judgement are summarised below.
EEW Homebased Education East (EEW East) provides homebased education and care for children from birth to six years in Hamilton and surrounding areas. Children are placed in a family home with an educator who can be responsible for a maximum of four children at any one time. The network is licensed to cater for 60 children, aged from three months to six years of age. The current roll of 43 includes 11 children of Māori descent. The service offers flexible hours to meet individual family needs.
EEW East is a standard funded network operated by Early Education Waikato (EEW). EEW is a limited liability company with charitable provisions that is owned by the Waikato Kindergarten Association. It provides governance and strategic direction for a number of early childcare centres, as well as the homebased care networks.
The chief executive officer (CEO) manages Early Education Waikato with the support of an experienced leadership and administration team. An experienced education manager has delegated responsibility for overseeing the network; with visiting teachers and administrator managing the networks. The two visiting teachers are experienced, fully qualified, registered early education teachers, who also hold qualifications in adult training and learning. While some educators are trained early childhood teachers, the majority are in various stages of gaining Homebased Education qualifications. EEW encourages educators to undertake ongoing professional learning and development.
EEW's vision (whakakitenga) is 'every child reaching their full potential (kia eke ia tamaiti ki tana pito mata), with the aim of creating a sustainable organisation that provides quality education and care to enrich the lives of children and families. EEW’s philosophy aims to nurture children’s individual strengths and interests to develop them as capable and competent lifelong learners.
Since the last ERO review in 2015 the network has relicensed to a standard network. The service has responded well to the key areas for development identified in the previous report.
Children’s interests and needs are effectively responded to by educators and visiting teachers. Caring and nurturing relationships are evident between educators and children. All children are empowered to be involved in learning experiences that build a strong sense of belonging, independence and social competence. Learning is contextual to real life experiences. Children are encouraged to follow their interests and lead their own learning.
An effective curriculum, underpinned by Te Whāriki, provides positive learning opportunities for all children. Experiences outside the home regularly provide children with opportunities to learn in different contexts. Children experience a rich programme where they are listened to and encouraged to become confident and successful learners and explorers. Māori children experience aspects of te ao Māori through waiata, karakia and resources.
Educators and children attend regular playgroups, in an attractively presented, well-resourced learning environment. Children's play is recognised and valued as meaningful learning.
Children with additional learning and development needs are well supported through inclusive practices and personalised learning and development plans. Transitions in to and out of the service are flexible and responsive to the needs of individual families. Infants and toddlers benefit from nurturing interactions with educators, who recognise children's verbal and non-verbal cues and respond effectively.
Planning for children’s learning is well supported by visiting teachers. Assessment reflects the learning that is happening in the homebased setting. Parents and whānau are able to access and comment on their child's learning through online portfolios. Further strengthening of assessment practices should enhance greater understanding of the breadth and depth of children's learning.
The visiting teacher and educators work collaboratively to identify and respond to children’s individual interests and needs. Monthly home visits, coaching and mentoring provides educators with ongoing learning and support. A robust induction process assists new educators into the service. Educators are actively encouraged to continue to upskill and engage in professional learning opportunities.
A clear vision and strategic priorities guide the direction of the service. An established support network provides effective resources and expertise. The philosophy is currently under review. Establishing agreed priorities for children's learning in consultation with parents and whānau should contribute usefully to this review. Self-review follows a framework and leads to change and improvement. Leaders acknowledge a useful next step would be to strengthen the focus on positive learning outcomes for children within internal evaluation.
A key area for development is, for leaders to continue to develop consistency in assessment, planning and evaluation across the network that shows:
progression in children's learning over time linked to the learning outcomes of Te Whāriki
the language, culture and identity of all children
learning focused partnerships with parents.
Before the review, the staff and management of EEW Homebased Education - East completed an ERO Home-based Education and Care 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:
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.
To improve current compliance practice, the early childhood service management should: review its emergency procedure to include lockdowns and ensure educators consistently carry out all emergency drills on an at least three-monthly basis.
Darcy Te Hau
Acting Director Review and Improvement Services (Central)
Central Region - Te Tai Pūtahi Nui
19 June 2020
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.
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Location |
Hamilton |
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Ministry of Education profile number |
34064 |
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Institution type |
Homebased Network |
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Licensed under |
Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008 |
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Number licensed for |
60 children, including up to 60 aged under 2 |
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Service roll |
43 |
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Standard or Quality Funded |
Standard |
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Gender composition |
Male 22 Female 21 |
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Ethnic composition |
Māori |
11 |
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Number of qualified coordinators in the network |
1 |
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Required ratios of staff educators to children |
Under 2 |
1:2 |
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Over 2 |
1:4 |
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Review team on site |
March 2020 |
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Date of this report |
19 June 2020 |
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Most recent ERO report(s) |
Education Review |
March 2016 |
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Education Review |
October 2011 |
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Education Review |
September 2008 |
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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 the draft methodology for ERO reviews in Home-based Education and Care Services: July 2014
The overall judgement that ERO makes will depend on how well the service promotes positive learning outcomes for children. The categories are:
Very well placed
Well placed
Requires further development
Not well placed
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.
|
Not well placed |
Requires further development |
Well placed |
Very well placed |
ERO's findings that support this overall judgement are summarised below.
EEW Homebased Education provides home-based education and care for children from birth to school age in Hamilton and surrounding areas. Children are placed in family homes with one educator, who can be responsible for up to four children at any one time. The network is licensed to cater for 60 children. Its current roll of 56 includes 14 children of Māori descent. It offers flexible hours to meet individual family needs.
EEW East is operated by Early Education Waikato (EEW). EEW is limited liability company with charitable provisions that is owned by Waikato Kindergarten Association. It provides governance and strategic direction for a number of early childcare centres, as well as the homebased care networks. Prior to May 2015, EEW's homebased care networks were owned by Hamilton Childcare Services Trust. EEW East is a Quality Funded network. This is the first ERO report for this network under the governance of EEW.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) manages EEW with the support of experienced leadership and administration teams. As licensee, she is responsible for the overall quality of education and care, self review, marketing, compliance, and property, financial and human resource management.
An Education Services Manager (ESM) has delegated responsibility for managing the network with the support of an EEW lead visiting teacher, and a visiting teacher responsible for this network. The ESM, lead-visiting teacher and visiting teacher are fully qualified early childhood teachers.
The visiting teacher's role is to guide and support educators to:
She regularly visits children in their educators' homes and sees children at frequent playgroup sessions. As EEW East is a quality funded network, all of its educators have completed some formal early childhood training. The service encourages educators to attend workshops and undertake training to support them in their role.
EEW's vision is 'every child reaching their full potential', with the aim of creating a sustainable organisation that provides quality education and care to enrich the lives of children and families. Leaders have identified the need to develop a specific philosophy for EEW's homebased education and care service.
The programme includes regular playgroups with children and educators in other EEW homebased services. In addition, children experience visits within the local community to parks and libraries, musical experiences and a planned programme of movement and gymnastics.
Children experience a wide variety of learning experiences in educators' homes. They also have many well-planned opportunities to work with and alongside children of diverse ages and abilities, and to form trusting relationships with adults in family-like environments.
Records about children's learning in educators' homes indicate that they are settled, work well with other children and solve problems together. Assessments reflect children's love of music, dancing, and imaginative play. Visiting teachers frequently contribute learning stories about outings and playgroup experiences which parents can access electronically at home. There are good examples of educators effectively supporting Māori and other children's language, culture and identity.
Children and educators benefit from the visiting teacher's high level professional knowledge and experience in homebased education and care. The visiting teacher, in collaboration with her colleagues, highly values and promotes learning through play, exploration and everyday experiences in home settings. The visiting teacher knows children very well. She takes the time to get to know families, ascertain their aspirations for their children and access specialist support as required.
Visiting teachers have established strong partnerships with families based on acceptance, genuine respect, and a willingness to listen and respond. Some families regularly contribute to their children's digital learning portfolios. Other families would appreciate more opportunities to discuss and contribute to planning for their children's learning.
EEW playgroup and gymnastics sessions, and excursions, provide high quality opportunities for educators and teachers to network, and for children to interact with a wider group of children, and other educators.
Visiting teachers use these programmes and regular visits to educators' homes to model effective teaching practices, with a strong focus on supporting children's emotional wellbeing. At playgroup, educators share their knowledge and ideas and work collaboratively to support the learning of all children. Gymnastics sessions include valuable cultural and music experiences.
Visiting teachers have established highly responsive and trusting relationships with educators. These relationships underpin the support and guidance provided for educators, which enables them to collectively contribute to high quality outcomes for children. Effective support for educators enables them to:
EEW, as a governing body, is strongly focused on improving the quality of outcomes for children through the quality of self review. The organisation ensures that appropriate professional development opportunities are available for visiting teachers and educators. The CEO, ESM and visiting teachers are highly committed to the organisation's vision of ensuring that 'every child reaching their full potential'.
The CEO has developed an interim strategic plan focused on sustainability and long term viability of the service. The ESM and the visiting teachers have collaboratively developed an annual plan that covers many aspects of the service's operation. They could further strengthen annual plans by more clearly identifying outcomes for children, and linking these to self review and teacher appraisal findings.
ERO and EEW leaders agree that useful next steps for this network are to:
Before the review, the staff and management of EEW Homebased Education - East completed an ERO Home-based Education and Care 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:
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:
All early childhood services are required to promote children's health and safety and to regularly review their compliance with legal requirements.
The next ERO review of EEW Homebased Education - East will be in three years.
Lynda Pura-Watson
Deputy Chief Review Officer
2 March 2016
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 |
Hamilton |
||
|
Ministry of Education profile number |
34064 |
||
|
Institution type |
Homebased Network |
||
|
Licensed under |
Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008 |
||
|
Number licensed for |
60 children, including up to 0 aged under 2 |
||
|
Service roll |
57 |
||
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Standard or Quality Funded |
Quality |
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Gender composition |
Girls 33 Boys 24 |
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Ethnic composition |
Māori Pākehā Indian Chinese Samoan Other Pacific Other |
14 28 5 2 2 2 4 |
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Number of qualified coordinators in the network |
1 |
||
|
Required ratios of staff educators to children |
Under 2 |
1:2 |
|
|
Over 2 |
1:4 |
||
|
Review team on site |
November 2015 |
||
|
Date of this report |
2 March 2016 |
||
|
Most recent ERO report(s) |
Education Review |
September 2011 |
|
|
Education Review |
September 2008 |
||
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 the draft methodology for ERO reviews in Home-based Education and Care Services: July 2014
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.