Little Steps Early Childhood Education Centre Limited

1 ERO’s judgement of Little Steps Early Childhood Education Centre Limited is as follows:

For an explanation of the judgement terms used and of the evaluation process please refer to the last page of this report. These judgements are based on the evidence provided to ERO during the evaluation.

2 ERO’s Judgements

Akarangi | Quality Evaluations evaluate the extent to which early childhood services have the learning and organisational conditions to support equitable and excellent outcomes for all learners. Te Ara Poutama Indicators of quality for early childhood education: what matters most and Early Childhood Education (ECE) Improvement Framework (teacher led services) are the basis for making judgements about the quality of the service in achieving equity and excellence for all learners. Evaluations for improvement | Ngā Aronga Whai Hua is integrated across all of the above domains.

3 About the Service

Little Steps Early Childhood Education Centre Limited is a purpose-built early childhood service providing all day education and care. Children are catered for in three separate rooms by age - infants under two, toddlers over two and children over three years of age. The owner and centre manager oversee the running of the service. Three head teachers support the centre manager to lead a large team of staff. The centre philosophy of ‘I can, I am strong, I believe and I belong’ interweaves Māori values of aroha, manaaki, awhi and whanaungatanga.

4 Progress since the previous ERO report

The 2021 ERO report identified two improvement actions related to curriculum.  A good level of progress is evident in ensuring sufficient resources to offer a wide range of experiences, to enhance children’s learning and development. Budget provision enables resourcing to be responsive to the interests and needs of the learners in each room and resources are accessed independently. Good progress has been made to reflect children’s identities, languages and cultures through centre practices, documents and enacted priorities.

5 Learning Conditions

The learner and their learning | He Whāriki Motuhake

The enacted curriculum and embedded teaching practices clearly reflect the service’s philosophy.

• Parents and whānau engage in learning-focused partnerships, sharing their priorities and goals for their children. They contribute to their child’s learning through cultural events, daily conversations with teachers and online feedback opportunities.
• Children’s learning is enhanced by the well-designed, richly resourced learning environments that are appropriate for the age range of children. Infants and toddlers actively explore, engage and participate through rituals and routines that maintain an unhurried and calm slow pace.
• Assessment for learning practices actively take account of the perspectives of children, parents and whānau. Planning and assessment is yet to consistently reflect the valued learning outcomes of Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum.

Collaborative professional learning and development builds knowledge and capability | Whakangungu Ngaio

Leaders and teachers take responsibility for their own professional learning to increasingly implement a rich, responsive curriculum.

• Leaders and teachers within each learning space work closely together to build their professional knowledge and practice to enhance children’s learning.
• Teachers consider how effective their teaching practice is in promoting children’s learning and identify what improvement is required, through regular inquiry and evaluation.
• Knowledge and shared understandings of teaching approaches that promote success of tamariki Māori continue to increase within the teaching team. Teachers foster tuakana-teina (older-younger child) relationships and respond to whānau contribution.

6 Organisational conditions

Leadership fosters collaboration and improvement | Kaihautū

Leaders develop, implement and evaluate systems, processes and practices that promote ongoing improvement.

• Centre resources are well aligned to the philosophy, vision, goals and priorities for learning.
• Leaders continue to build relational trust across the centre, enabling a focus on improvement.
• Professional learning to guide a shared leadership approach throughout the centre is yet to be undertaken. Opportunities to meet formally as a leadership team and grow understanding of centre wide practices are limited.

Stewardship through effective governance and management | Te Whakaruruhau

Outcomes for children and their whānau are promoted by embedded organisational systems, processes and internal evaluation.

• Children’s learning and development is supported though responsive partnership with services, agencies and the wider community.
• A systematic, evidence-based process of internal evaluation is in place. This provides some information to leaders and teachers to identify improvements to operations.
• Ongoing review of policies and procedures supports shared understanding of expected teaching practices.

7 Management Assurance on Legal Requirements

Before the review, the staff and management of Little Steps Early Childhood Education Centre Limited completed and ERO 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 system for managing the following areas that have a potentially high impact on children’s health and safety:

• emotional safety (including positive guidance and child protection)
• physical safety (including supervision; sleep procedures; accidents; medication; excursion policies and procedures)
• suitable staffing (safety checking of staff, ratios)
• relevant evacuation procedures and practices.

All early childhood services are required to promote children’s health and safety and to regularly review their compliance with legal requirements.

8 Where to next for improvement?

Little Steps Early Childhood Education Centre Limited will include the following actions in its quality improvement planning:

• To more clearly and consistently articulate Te Whāriki learning outcomes through assessment and planning records.
• Implement processes to build collective leadership capability and consistency across learning environments.

Further information about how ERO evaluates early childhood services is available here.

Patricia Davey
Director of Early Childhood Education (ECE)

18 September 2024

10 Information About the Service

Description around ERO’s judgement terms

ERO’s judgements are based on Te Ara Poutama and the Early Childhood Education Improvement Framework (teacher led services).