New Shoots Children's Centre - Pakuranga

1 Evaluation of New Shoots Children's Centre - Pakuranga

How well placed is New Shoots Children's Centre - Pakuranga to promote positive learning outcomes for children?

New Shoots Children's Centre - Pakuranga is well placed to promote positive learning outcomes for children.

ERO's findings that support this overall judgement are summarised below.

Background

New Shoots Children's Centre - Pakuranga is licensed for 125 children, including up to 48 under the age of two years. It is one of 10 purpose-built centres owned and managed by New Shoots Children's Centre Ltd.

Children play and learn in six rooms. Each room caters for a different age group and has a teaching philosophy to guide practice. The roll includes 20 percent who identify as Māori, and 38 percent with Asian backgrounds. The cultural diversity of staff reflects the community they serve.

The organisation-wide philosophy places strong emphasis on providing a child-led, play-based curriculum. This is the Pakuranga centre's first review.

The Review Findings

Infants and toddlers play and learn in two separate rooms. They have their own outdoor space that incorporates thoughtfully placed safe areas for babies learning to crawl and walk. Children experience nurturing, responsive relationships with attentive teachers in the calm, unhurried environments. Teachers place strong emphasis on the dignity of each child by ensuring children's routines are individualised and child-paced. They sensitively support parents as children move into and through the centre.

Older children confidently approach adults and choose their learning activities. They experience respectful relationships with each other and their teachers. Children share their ideas and explain their needs. They show a strong sense of belonging to their learning environments as they work with and alongside others.

Children lead the learning programmes. They have many opportunities for long periods of uninterrupted play. Teachers purposefully integrate care moments and meal times into the daily programme. This allows children to complete their work and choose when they participate in routines. Teachers closely monitor children's nutrition and care needs.

Children make good use of their individual portfolios to revisit learning. Teachers work purposefully with children, using a range of approaches to foster their language development.

Teachers offer a wide range of attractively presented natural and other resources in each room. Children have easy access to open-ended resources to foster problem-solving, creativity and innovative thinking. The oldest children have regular visits to the nearby bush as part of the centre's local curriculum.

The professional leader supports teachers well to build their capability. She models practice, and works with teaching teams to reflect on and challenge their own practice. Appraisal is a useful process that also helps teachers to reflect on their practice. Teachers regularly participate in internal and external professional learning opportunities.

Internal evaluation is well established. Leaders use the outcomes from evaluations to build teacher capability and inform decision-making. There is clear alignment between the centre's annual strategic plan, internal evaluation, appraisal and professional learning provision.

Directors provide strong governance structures, a comprehensive policy and procedure framework and personalised support to guide leadership and centre practices. They have developed well-considered curriculum values that underpin teaching and learning approaches across the organisation.

Key Next Steps

Leaders agree that the key next steps include:

• strengthening bicultural practice and the use of Māori concepts and values in key documentation

• increasing the consistency of assessment, planning and evaluation to ensure that:

  • there are clear expectations for writing assessments for children's learning
  • planning is future-focused and relates to learning and teaching
  • evaluation is based on learning outcomes and examines teaching approaches and the quality of programmes for children

• strengthening support for children's preparation to transition to school.

Management Assurance on Legal Requirements

Before the review, the staff and management of New Shoots Children's Centre - Pakuranga 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.

Steve Tanner

Director Review and Improvement Services Northern

Northern Region

23 May 2019

The Purpose of ERO Reports

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.

2 Information about the Early Childhood Service

3 General Information about Early Childhood Reviews

ERO’s Evaluation Framework

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.

ERO’s Overall Judgement

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.

Review Coverage

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.