Promoting quality inclusion in early childhood care and education : inclusive practices for each and every child

The quality of early childhood services relies on the knowledge, expertise and skills of early childhood leaders and practitioners. However, despite this shared recognition, the shortage of a well-prepared workforce across many countries is a major barrier to ensuring quality inclusion. This challenging reality indicates that preparing and supporting a high-quality workforce to promote inclusive experiences for all young children is still a priority. The aim of this paper is to provide a synthesis of inclusive practices that can be used in Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) settings to promote equitable and inclusive learning experiences for all children. The practices are described within five areas: Learning Environments; Instructional Practices;Relationships and Supportive Interactions; Partnerships with Families; and Professional Collaboration. These practices, strongly supported by research evidence, are essential for achieving key goals of inclusion, such as development and learning; a sense of belonging and membership; and development of social interactions and friendships for all children. This paper will describe the practices that can be used in ECCE settings to support children’s inclusive learning experiences, and the benefits of using such practices for children, families, and early childhood practitioners. Additionally, this paper will consider the conditions that need to be in place for ensuring the successful implementation of inclusive practices. The field of implementation science has provided some useful research-based frameworks for understanding the drivers that support the adoption, implementation, and sustainability of evidence-based practices in early childhood. Using an implementation science framework, this paper will consider the drivers for supporting the implementation of inclusive practices in ECCE settings. Examples include building the capacity of the early childhood workforce to apply inclusive practices effectively across various learning environments; supporting leaders and leadership implementation teams in building an inclusive culture within ECCE environments and promoting continuous quality improvement through assessment systems that monitor the application of inclusive practices. Developing a shared understanding around high-quality inclusive practices and the drivers that support implementation can be an important step towards building consensus around a transnational professional development framework to support the application of quality inclusive practices in ECCE settings. This paper draws from international research evidence on quality inclusive practices at the early childhood level that are essential for ensuring quality inclusive experiences for all children and their families and will consider policy implications for building quality inclusion for all

Between Retrenchment and Recalibration: The Impact of Austerity on the Irish Social Protection System

This article analyzes the impact of austerity on the Irish social protection system. The analysis is situated in Ireland’s wider financial and economic crisis and its status as an ‘early adopter’ of an austerity response which has continued under European Union/International Monetary Fund intervention. We focus on how the crisis instigated a political narrative about the cost and design of the social protection system, leading to a programme of retrenchment and reform which has blended a politics of blame avoidance with credit claiming. Three core elements in this narrative— generosity, sustainability and suitability— are identified, and against this background, a pattern of multi-dimensional change in social protection across the life course dealing with working age, pensions, and child income supports is analyzed

Kerry Children’s Services Committee Workplan for Children & Young People 2014 - 2017

The purpose of the Children’s Services Committee is to secure better developmental outcomes for children through more effective integration of existing services and interventions at local level. The 5 Outcome areas for children in Ireland envision that all children and young people should be: 1. Active & healthy, both physically and mentally; 2. Achieving their full potential in learning & development; 3. Safe and protected from harm; 4. Economically secure & have opportunities for ongoing education & training; 5. Connected, respected & contributing to their world

Kerry Children’s Services Committee Workplan for Children & Young People 2014 - 2017

The purpose of the Children’s Services Committee is to secure better developmental outcomes for children through more effective integration of existing services and interventions at local level. The 5 Outcome areas for children in Ireland envision that all children and young people should be: 1. Active & healthy, both physically and mentally; 2. Achieving their full potential in learning & development; 3. Safe and protected from harm; 4. Economically secure & have opportunities for ongoing education & training; 5. Connected, respected & contributing to their world

Public Service Announcements and their Influence Upon System of Values of Children (Research of Concept of “Family” Formation)

AbstractThe paper focuses upon problem of public service announcements’ (PSA) influence upon formation of system of values in the child's consciousness. Today we can view the mass media as well as advertising messages as a powerful tool of the society's system of values formation, including children's system of values. Children are seen as members of the society with unstable self-consciousness and world-view that is why they undergo the influence of the modern information media to their fullest extent. The author builds a model of the concept of family as a crucial part of Russian conceptosphere, which is translated by the PSA texts

Transforming the Lives of Early Childhood Teachers, Autistic Children and their Families: Findings and Recommendations from an Evaluation of a Programme of Continuing Professional Development

In response to the exponential growth in the prevalence of autism in Ireland and 95% of all children availing of the universal free pre-school scheme, AsIAm delivered a continuing professional development (CPD) programme, to 311 adult learners. The paper reports on a multi-method evaluation of the impact of the programme on early childhood teachers’ capacity to effectively include and support autistic children. The findings underline the importance of government investment in lifelong learning and the potential of a focused CPD programme to transform both participants’ professional lives and the experiences they provide for the children in early learning and care services. Recommendations for future policy development are also suggested

Transforming the Lives of Early Childhood Teachers, Autistic Children and their Families: Findings and Recommendations from an Evaluation of a Programme of Continuing Professional Development

In response to the exponential growth in the prevalence of autism in Ireland and 95% of all children availing of the universal free pre-school scheme, AsIAm delivered a continuing professional development (CPD) programme, to 311 adult learners. The paper reports on a multi-method evaluation of the impact of the programme on early childhood teachers’ capacity to effectively include and support autistic children. The findings underline the importance of government investment in lifelong learning and the potential of a focused CPD programme to transform both participants’ professional lives and the experiences they provide for the children in early learning and care services. Recommendations for future policy development are also suggested

Ireland’s lone parents, social welfare and recession

This paper analyses recent changes to the structure of Ireland’s One-parent Family Payment (OFP) as an example of how austerity has not only impacted on Irelands most vulnerable but also structurally changed Ireland’s social welfare system. We use various analytical tools including gender typologies, feminist principles and economic and social human rights frameworks to make sense of recent policy developments for Irish lone parents and key social security features of austerity budgets and to examine the recent trajectory of welfare changes for Irish lone parents and how it is transitioning to a more conditional employment focused regime for lone parents. We conclude that, given Ireland has been relatively slow to embrace this type of regime; it is not too late to learn from lessons elsewhere which show that forced labour market participation of lone parents does not alleviate child or adult poverty