119 Apirana Avenue, Glen Innes, Auckland
View on map|
Not well placed |
Requires further development |
Well placed |
Very well placed |
BestStart Apirana Avenue is well placed to promote positive learning outcomes for children.
ERO's findings that support this overall judgement are summarised below.
BestStart Apirana provides education and care for 70 children, including up to 20 under two years of age. The purpose-built centre caters for local families from Glen Innes and the surrounding suburbs. The centre provides for children in three rooms. Kākano is for infants and toddlers, Tipu for children who are two to three years old, and Rākau for children up to school age. Kākano children have an outdoor play area which is separate from that shared by children in the Tipu and Rākau rooms.
The centre is part of the BestStart charitable trust. The organisation has re-branded all its early learning services. BestStart provides an overarching governance and management framework to support operations and curriculum delivery in individual centres. Business Managers (BM) and Professional Services Managers (PSM) facilitate staff professional development and provide strategic guidance.
The curriculum is underpinned by the principles of Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum, bicultural practices and partnerships with parents/whānau. The recently reviewed centre philosophy emphasises establishing a welcoming, respectful environment that nurtures each child as a unique learner. It aims to promote collaborative partnerships with parents and whānau to enable all children to grow up to be confident competent learners.
BestStart Apirana has undergone significant changes in staffing. BestStart managers have worked closely alongside centre personnel to address needs and plan for the future. Staffing is now more settled and future focused.
BestStart managers are working to address the next steps identified in the 2016 ERO report. The new centre manager has responsibility for progressing these priorities.
This review was part of a cluster of 10 reviews in the Upper North Island region.
Children are settled, happy and engage freely with each other in cooperative play. The new improved learning environment supports children to explore in meaningful play. Teachers provide inclusive high-level care for children with additional needs.
Care of infants is sensitive to their age and respectful. Teachers are responsive to these young children and follow their lead to meet their needs. The calm and slow-paced setting supports infants to feel secure.
The centre manager has introduced curriculum planning templates directly linked to Te Whāriki. These guide teachers to develop a learning programme that focuses on the strengths and interests of the child. Children are given choice and a range of activities that encourages their independence. Improved resourcing has extended opportunities for children to learn through play at their development level. Teachers support children's play while promoting language and learning development in positive and meaningful ways.
The centre manager's collaborative approach with BestStart managers, staff and the community are promoting ongoing centre development. The newly appointed head teachers are supportive of the centre's new direction. The recently reviewed centre philosophy is becoming increasingly evident in practice. Improved communication approaches are helping to strengthen learning partnerships with parents.
National, regional and centre operations are guided by strategic and annual plans, and a shared vision which monitor quality and promote ongoing improvement. These are linked to BestStart strategic goals, which promote a sense of belonging to a wider learning community and support more widespread collaboration amongst teaching teams. Professional learning and development have a focus for building capabilities and has impacted positively on teaching practices. The service provides opportunities for leadership within the team.
Key next steps are to:
A comprehensive action plan to help managers and teachers make these improvements has been developed. BestStart managers should continue to provide support and monitor progress towards addressing these priorities.
Agreed next steps for the organisation are to continue to strengthen:
bicultural understanding and practice
risk analysis management systems, processes and procedures for excursions
appraisal processes to support teachers’ continuum of professional knowledge and practice.
Before the review, the staff and management of BestStart Apirana Avenue 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:
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.
Steve Tanner
Director Review and Improvement Services (Northern)
Northern Region - Te Tai Raki
20 May 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 |
Glen Innes, Auckland |
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Ministry of Education profile number |
25393 |
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Licence type |
Education & Care Service |
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Licensed under |
Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008 |
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Number licensed for |
70 children, including up to 20 aged under 2 |
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Service roll |
46 |
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Gender composition |
Girls 25 Boys 21 |
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Ethnic composition |
Māori |
1 |
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Percentage of qualified teachers |
80% + |
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Reported ratios of staff to children |
Under 2 |
1:4 |
Better than minimum requirements |
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Over 2 |
1:8 |
Better than minimum requirements |
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Review team on site |
January 2020 |
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Date of this report |
20 May 2020 |
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Most recent ERO report(s) |
Education Review |
June 2016 |
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Education Review |
April 2013 |
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Education Review |
March 2010 |
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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 ERO’s Approach to Review in Early Childhood Services.
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.
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Not well placed |
Requires further development |
Well placed |
Very well placed |
ERO's findings that support this overall judgement are summarised below.
Edukids Apirana is licensed for up to 70 children and serves the culturally and socio-economically diverse communities of Glen Innes and its surrounding suburbs. It offers a pick-up and drop-off van service that supports about 20 local children to participate more regularly in early childhood education. The centre is part of the national BestStart Education and Care Centres organisation, which provides an overarching governance and management framework, as well as personnel, to support individual centres.
The centre provides for children in three rooms; Kākano for infants and toddlers, Tipu for children who are two to three years old, and Rākau for children up to school age. Infants and toddlers have an outdoor play area, which is separate from that shared by children in the Tipu and Rākau rooms.
An acting manager and three head teachers provide leadership in the centre and are supported by the BestStart professional services and business managers. Registered teachers in each room are supported by unqualified relief staff and the centre also employs a cook and administrator.
In 2013 ERO reported that relationships in the well-resourced centre were positive and respectful, and that babies received good care. ERO noted that ongoing staffing challenges had limited centre progress and that teaching practices needed to be more responsive to children's interests. Since 2013, the centre has had several managers who have not stayed long. The teaching teams have worked hard to continue improving their provision for children's learning and to maintain their good relationships with whānau. They have made some progress with improving their assessment and programme planning practices. BestStart managers continue to support the centre and have recently appointed a new centre manager.
Relationships in the service promote children's sense of belonging well, and care routines for babies are appropriately individualised. Teachers listen carefully to children, especially in the Kākano and Tipu rooms. Respectful, one-to-one interactions support children's participation in programme activities. Children play well together and approach adults confidently when they need support.
Families' cultural backgrounds and languages are included in displays and teachers' commitment to including te reo Māori is also visible. Teachers in Kākano and Rākau have reviewed their bicultural practice, with a view to continual improvement. The head teacher in Tipu also has a goal to increase her team's understanding of Tātaiako: Cultural Competencies for Teachers of Māori Learners, a Ministry of Education resource for supporting cultural responsiveness.
Indoor play areas are well presented to support children's learning. Displays show children's engagement in the programme and reflect teachers' recent focus on identifying and responding to children's developing dispositions for learning. Teachers' partnerships with whānau are increasingly visible in children's assessment records, particularly since the introduction of an online communication and sharing tool. The service offers parent information evenings, and teachers continue to explore strategies for more regular communications with whānau whose children use the van service.
Teaching teams have made good progress developing and adjusting processes for programme planning and evaluation. They continue to explore ways to enrich records of children's learning and to refine planning systems so they work well for teachers, children and families.
Although there have been several changes in centre management, BestStart support and professional development has helped the three head teachers to develop improved understandings of their leadership roles. They are working more collaboratively and are confident to seek support from BestStart managers. There has been a deliberate focus on team building and there is a growing sense of being part of a wider professional family.
BestStart has useful systems for monitoring service operations. These include regular management meetings and an internal audit process (QEC), which is used to identify challenges and develop plans for improvement. In addition, the centre has a strategic plan that is linked to the BestStart vision and strategic plan, as well as the centre's philosophy statement, an annual management plan and QEC action plans for each room. Teaching teams make good use of templates to review routines, environments and aspects of the programme. They should continue to deepen their reflection about the quality of their teaching practices and increase the rigour and evaluative nature of their self review.
BestStart managers and head teachers agree that next steps for the service include:
continuing to improve children's access to high quality resources and learning environments
identifying, implementing and evaluating teaching strategies that use older children's individual and shared interests to support more purposeful, complex and extended learning over time.
working with staff to align and simplify the long-term strategic plan, the annual plan and QEC plans
refining policies and procedures so they are more readily accessible for whānau and staff
strengthening centre-wide internal evaluation to support coherence, shared understandings and consistent teaching approaches across the three rooms
The new manager should continue building collaborative leadership and common teaching approaches across the centre. It would be worthwhile to include all staff, including long-term relievers, in planning for quality improvement.
ERO recommends that BestStart managers continue to work closely with the centre, during the transition to a new centre manager, and to help teachers consolidate and build on recent improvements.
Before the review, the management of Edukids Apirana 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:
administration
health, safety and welfare
personnel management
financial and property management.
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 practices, managers should strengthen links to the Practising Teacher Criteria in teacher appraisal processes.
The next ERO review of Edukids Apirana will be in three years.
Graham Randell
Deputy Chief Review Officer Northern
8 June 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 |
Glen Innes, Auckland |
||
|
Ministry of Education profile number |
25393 |
||
|
Licence type |
Education & Care Service |
||
|
Licensed under |
Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008 |
||
|
Number licensed for |
70 children, including up to 20 aged under 2 |
||
|
Service roll |
85 |
||
|
Gender composition |
Boys 49 Girls 46 |
||
|
Ethnic composition |
Māori Pākehā Tongan Niuean South East Asian Samoan Chinese Cook Island Māori Indian Latin American Middle Eastern other |
19 27 7 5 5 4 3 2 2 2 2 7 |
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Percentage of qualified teachers 0-49% 50-79% 80%+ Based on funding rates |
80% + |
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|
Reported ratios of staff to children |
Under 2 |
1:4 |
Better than minimum requirements |
|
Over 2 |
1:8 |
Better than minimum requirements |
|
|
Review team on site |
April 2016 |
||
|
Date of this report |
8 June 2016 |
||
|
Most recent ERO report(s)
|
Education Review |
April 2013 |
|
|
Education Review |
March 2010 |
||
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.