After Prime Time: What type of childcare is best for children? Iona - - PDF document

After Prime Time: What type of childcare is best for children? Iona Institute seminar, 25 June 2013 Toby Wolfe, Acting Director, Start Strong

I was delighted to be invited by David Quinn to speak here today on issues arising from the Prime Time investigation, A Breach of Trust. It was a hugely important programme, and it is vital that we discuss it.

Start Strong’s approach

Start Strong is a coalition of more than 50 organisations seeking to advance children’s early care and education in Ireland. Our definition of “early care and education” encompasses all settings where young children (up to the age of 6) live, learn and develop. It includes children's own homes, the homes of childminders, centre-based services, as well as the infant classes of primary schools, which take in half of all 4 year olds and most 5 year olds. By “education”, we mean education in the broadest sense, including all aspects of children’s development: emotional, social, physical, cognitive.

“Care” and “education” are inseparable in early childhood. By that we mean both that children are learning from birth – indeed they are learning fastest in their first months and years – and that they learn and develop in all settings, and that “early education” must be caring and must be appropriate for young children. For example, Start Strong is arguing for a less formal approach to schooling in the infant classes of primary schools, with lower pupil-teacher ratios and smaller group-sizes. The inseparability of “care” and “education” is one of the reasons why – as a society – we need to put a much higher value on the work done by the carers of young children, both parents and carers outside the home. Caring for and educating a young child is one of the most important things that anybody can do, and it needs to be given a much higher value by society – and much greater recognition. It needs greater recognition both because early childhood is a special time that should be valued in and of itself, and because research evidence has demonstrated clearly how important children’s early years are for their later development. Early childhood – the first 6 years, and especially the first 3 years – are a critical period of life. Start Strong’s main purpose since we were established in 2009 has been to campaign for a comprehensive national plan for children’s early care and education – a plan that would encompass both supports for parents in the home and services for children outside the home. Prime Time The Prime Time programme was shocking and distressing. It was particularly distressing for parents. But should it surprise us? Perhaps not. I say this not because the mistreatment of children that we saw in the programme is common, but because we have no assurance of quality in early care and education

services, and because the quality is so variable. While there is excellent practice, there is also very poor practice, and there is everything in between. The reality is that we do not know how common such behaviour is. Even with the publication of inspection reports, we will not know, as they only touch the surface of what happens in terms of quality. Start Strong has argued all along that one of the biggest failings of our early care and education system has been the variable quality of services, and the lack of quality assurance. Just one month before the Prime Time programme was broadcast, we published our submission (called Shaping the Future) on the National Early Years Strategy. Our central recommendation was that the core objective of the National Early Years Strategy should be to ensure that no child is in a low quality service. The Prime Time programme demonstrated the importance of that

• bjective.

Should Prime Time surprise us? It should not surprise us if we consider the policy context for the poor practice that we saw in the programme – a policy context which shapes the actions of those working in early care and education services, and which shapes the State’s responses to their actions. By the policy context I mean features

• f our early care and education system such as:
• The working conditions of staff, which can lead to high levels of stress.
• Their low pay, and the low value placed on their work.
• The lack of support for the management and supervision of staff, with for

example insufficient use of the key worker system.

• Insufficient training of those working in early care and education services.
• An inspection system that only asks some of the questions that need asking,

focusing more on health and safety than on the quality of children’s experiences. Those weaknesses in our early care and education system are the legacy of a lack

• f policy attention to quality and the historic low level of investment in children’s early

care and education in Ireland. When money has been invested in early care and education, much of that money has gone into buildings and ultimately into the construction industry, rather than into upskilling and paying appropriate wages to those working with children. The research evidence – and implications for policy I would like to highlight three general conclusions of recent research on children’s early development, and to draw out some policy implications from each conclusion.

• 1. The early years are hugely important in children’s development.

We know, for example, that there are close correlations between measures of children’s development at 3 years old and their outcomes as adults, and there is much evidence of the negative, long-term impact of adverse experiences in early

• childhood. The research shows that above all it is the quality of children’s

experiences and interactions that shapes their early development – in all settings, both within the home and outside the home. Young children do best with care

(whether parental or non-parental care) that is warm and supportive but that also sets boundaries on their behaviour, and that positively supports their development, supporting their language and communication skills, their empathy, their resilience, creativity, and self-regulation. What are the policy implications? First, we need to prioritise young children in our investment decisions. Parents prioritise their children in their own domestic investment decisions. And, as a society too, we need to prioritise children – especially young children – in our public investment decisions. It may be a cliché to say that our children are the future of our society, but it is true. Secondly, we need to prioritise the quality of young children’s experiences – in all settings: in children's own homes, in the homes of childminders, and in centre-based services.

• 2. The home environment – what parents do – is the single most important

determinant of outcomes for children. The phrase “what parents do” accounts for much of what I just referred to as the “quality of children’s experiences and interactions”. It encompasses “parenting style”. (The Growing Up in Ireland study and other research have pointed to the importance

• f an “authoritative” parenting style that is loving and responsive but that also sets

clear boundaries on children’s behaviour.) And the phrase also encompasses what is

• ften termed the “Home Learning Environment”, which includes the vocabulary that

parents use when talking to their children, the exposure children have at home to the written word (through stories being read to them regularly, for example), as well as the opportunities they have at home for creative development, interactive play, and so on. The research evidence shows marked variation between children in their home learning environment, with strong variation by social background. The research also shows strong negative impacts of growing up in poverty. Poverty limits children’s opportunities and it increases parental stress, which in turn impacts

• n parenting. There is a close connection between parents’ well-being and children’s

well-being. What are the policy implications? First, parenting programmes and parenting supports are an essential aspect of our early care and education system. There is growing evidence of positive benefits arising from many parenting programmes and supports such as Incredible Years, the Triple P programme, the Parenting Plus programme, and the Community Mothers programme. Parenting difficulties arise in all families at different times, which is why it is important that parenting supports should be universally available. Making parenting supports universally available also reduces the stigma attached to them, which can be a real

challenge to overcome. There is also a need for additional, targeted supports for children and families with additional needs. On 1st July, Start Strong will be one of a coalition of organisations that is hosting a major all-island symposium on the need for a National Parenting Strategy. The Scottish Government recently published a National Parenting Strategy for Scotland, and we are arguing that Ireland needs to learn from the Scottish model. A speaker from Scotland will be one of the keynote speakers at the symposium. Secondly, we need to prioritise policies that help families move out of poverty. Such measures must include both financial supports – which is one of the reasons why Start Strong is opposed to any further cuts to Child Benefit – and a range of quality services for children and families.

3.

Non-parental early care and education (which includes both home-based childminders and centre-based services) can be positively beneficial for children’s development but only when it is of high quality. Low quality brings no benefits and can be harmful. With childminders and in centre-based services – just as in children’s own homes – the quality of early care and education lies above all in the interactions between adults and

• children. Those interactions must be positive, warm and nurturing – supporting both

children’s well-being and their development. The interactions shown on the Prime Time programme were the opposite of that, which is one of the reasons the programme was so troubling.

Commentators on early care and education often refer to the amazing positive effects shown in three longitudinal studies in the US: the HighScope Perry Pre- School study, the Abecedarian study, and the Chicago Child-Parent Center Program. All three studies have involved the tracking of participants in early childhood programmes through into adulthood, and all three have shown large benefits, with high economic returns to the investments made. Those three studies are important, but they are only of partial relevance to universal programmes in Ireland, both because the social and policy context in the US is different from ours, and because the three programmes only involved very disadvantaged children. Significantly, though, two features that all three studies shared were high quality provision and a combination of both early care and education services outside the home and parenting supports, such as home visits. The findings beg the question of what might be the impact of universal provision of early care and education services, such as we now have here in the Free Pre-School

• Year. Fortunately we now have a growing body of studies that are more relevant to

the Irish context, including for example: the EPPE study in the UK which has now tracked children through to the age of 14; and the NICHD study in the US, which included a large number of children from middle-class backgrounds, and which has now tracked them through to the age of 15. These studies conclude that participation in non-parental early care and education services brings positive, long-lasting benefits for a wide range of outcomes for children, but only if those services are of high quality. The positive benefits of such

services arise for children from the age of around 2 or 3 onwards, and part-time provision is sufficient to achieve the benefits. The benefits are greatest for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, though both the EPPE and NICHD studies demonstrate some benefits for children from all social backgrounds. The EPPE study also shows that children do better in socially mixed settings, which is one of the reasons why universal provision is important. At the same time, there is also evidence that early care and education services can have negative effects, primarily on children’s social and emotional development. The research shows that negative effects arise when services are of low quality; when very young children are in large groups for long hours; and particularly when it is very young children (under-2s and especially under-1s) who take part. Again, quality is critical. The NICHD study, which has now tracked participants through to the age

• f 15, recently found that high quality provision offsets the negative effects of long

hours in group care. What are the policy implications? First, we need to lengthen the period of paid parental leave – and it must be paid – at the very least to ensure that no child less than the age of 1 year old needs to be cared for outside the home. That first year is particularly critical in fostering the parent-child relationship and in supporting what is sometimes called “infant mental health” through early bonding and attachment with loving parents. Of course, the process of early parental attachment does not always run smoothly. Post-natal depression, for example, is a real challenge. That is why the work of Public Health Nurses and other health professionals is so critical, as well as other parenting supports. Crucially, parental leave must be paid if it is to be effective. Currently only 6 months

• f maternity benefit is paid in Ireland. Research has shown that only a small minority
• f parents use any of their unpaid leave entitlements, and that the main obstacle is
• financial. Start Strong is campaigning for an extension of paid leave from 6 months

to at least 12 months, and preferably even longer. The 12 months minimum is the recommendation of both UNICEF and the Marmot Review of Health Inequalities in England, published in 2010. Secondly, we needed to strengthen work-life balance policies. Work-life balance is a necessity for children, not a luxury for parents. It can reduce the pressure for children to be in créches for long hours, and it can reduce parental stress, which in turn impacts positively on child well-being. Work-life balance must therefore be a policy

• priority. Ideally parents with young children should have a right to part-time work. In

the short-term, Start Strong is calling for all parents with young children to have a right to request flexible working arrangements, including part-time work. We are campaigning for this measure to be included in the forthcoming Family Leave Bill. Thirdly, we need to regulate – and support – all paid childminders. By paid childminders I mean self-employed childminders who are providing regular day-care for children (i.e. not babysitters), and who are not relatives of those children. Approximately 50,000 young children in Ireland are cared for by paid, non-relative

childminders every day. The large majority of paid childminders are legally exempt from regulation, and are therefore also outside the scope of supports to enhance the quality of the care and education they provide. Paid childminders are not even required to be Garda vetted, which is extraordinary given the requirement for Garda vetting for voluntary work with children. Childminding can be great for young children – with very low child-adult ratios, continuity of care, and mixed age-groups with siblings remaining together – but again, the quality of a child’s experiences depends above all on the interactions between the childminder and the child. Start Strong advocates the regulation of paid childminders and an increase in the scale of quality supports provided to them. To help us develop our policy proposals

• n childminding, which we published in 2012, we brought the Scottish Childminding

Association over to advise us. Scotland has a working and very successful model of regulation for all paid childminders. Finally, we need to raise the quality of centre-based early care and education

• services. The research on centre-based services shows that high quality adult-child

interactions are most consistently found where those working with children are highly qualified, and where wages are sufficiently high to reduce staff turnover to a low level and to reward staff for the important work they do. We need to reduce the possibility of low quality provision through introducing minimum qualification standards, enhancing the inspection system, and introducing a mechanism to remove public funding when quality standards are low. We also need to push for higher quality in all services, especially through professionalisation. By “professionalisation”, I mean professionalisation of the whole early care and education workforce – from those in every room working directly with children, to managers and supervisors, inspectors, and those carrying out the training – as well as raising wages and improving working conditions, all features that were exposed as problematic in the Prime Time investigation. In 2011 a major European Commission report was published on competence requirements in early childhood care and education, known as the CoRe report. It argued that the key to achieving quality is not just competent practitioners but a “competent system”. The CoRe report specifically set a benchmark that 60% of those working in early care and education services should be graduates and that there should be qualified staff in every room. In Ireland the proportion of graduates is currently only 12%, and a significant proportion of staff remain unqualified, in particular those working with the youngest

• children. And neither those who provide the training nor those who carry out

inspections are required to be qualified in early childhood care and education. We know that professionalisation can work. Possibly the clearest example of this – and maybe the most relevant to Ireland – is New Zealand. Last year, Start Strong brought over Professor Linda Mitchell from New Zealand to discuss her experience as the lead evaluator on the official evaluation commissioned by the New Zealand Government of their recently completed 10-year national plan for early childhood

• education. The official evaluation showed a dramatic improvement in the quality of

services during the course of New Zealand’s ten-year strategy. The evaluation included detailed observations of the quality of practice in a sample of services. During the course of the strategic plan, the number of services in the sample evaluated as "poor" dropped to zero, while the number rated "very good" increased ten-fold. How did New Zealand achieve this? It was a wide-ranging strategy with many elements, but the central objective was to achieve a graduate workforce. The proportion of graduates doubled from 37% to 69%. A key mechanism to achieve this involved tying public funding for early care and education services to the number of graduates employed, and paying them wages that matched those of primary school teachers. The New Zealand model is particularly important because it shows what is possible in a mixed model of provision, with a mix of private and community services. The Prime Time programme raised particular concerns about the role of profits in childcare, so the New Zealand example may be very instructive. The New Zealand model also shows what is possible in a country that is similar to Ireland in many ways, and it shows how much progress can be made within the timeframe of a 10- year national strategy. Start Strong’s recommendations on the National Early Years Strategy Later this year the Government will publish Ireland’s first National Early Years Strategy, which is the main focus of Start Strong’s advocacy work. It will be a highly significant document because it will give the Government the opportunity to bring together all the issues I have raised here in one coherent, holistic vision for early childhood, and in one coherent national plan, drawing together issues such as:

• Better access to parenting programmes and parenting supports.
• The creation of a separate cohort of Public Health Nurses to work solely with

children and families.

• The extension of paid parental leave to at least 12 months.
• Stronger work-life balance policies.
• The regulation and support of paid childminders.
• The enhancement of the inspection system for pre-school services.
• The professionalization of the early care and education workforce.

Start Strong’s submission on the National Early Years Strategy, called “Shaping the Future”, includes our recommendations on all these issues. Of course, the sort of recommendations we are putting forwards will cost money, especially our recommendations around: paid parental leave, universal parenting supports, a stronger inspection system (especially if it is to cover childminders, as we strongly recommend), and professionalization of the early care and education workforce. But just as we need to stress the importance of parents’ choices, so there are some choices that we need to make as a society, and those choices include the

Government’s priorities for investment. Start Strong argues that the Government should prioritise investment in young children.