Making childcare cheaper and better?

Liz Truss was interviewed on BBC Breakfast this morning and made the astonishing statement that "safety doesn't depend on the number of children and carers but on the carers' qualifications". Given that the qualifications now required are, as JessM points out, a C grade in GCSE English and Maths, it is hard to understand what she is talking about.

The new plan also wants nurseries to teach children to read and write "rather than just care for them". Has this woman ever visited a nursery? Does she have children? Have her children ever visited a nursery? Does she know anything about child development?

Oh, of course, Michael Gove, salvation of the education system, is her boss.

It's impossible for the children to get the same level of attention if the child/adult ratio is increased. The GCSE level won't make up for the detrimental affect that will have. Nurseries need people who understand and can relate to small children. They're not going teach them advanced maths.

Phonics and reading already forms part of nursery provision so it just goes to prove that Liz Truss had no idea what she was talking about.

Is this the thin edge of the wedge? How long before they change the 30 child maximum class size for reception and KS1? This is nothing to do with improving education but everything to do with making it appear that nursery/school places are increasing.

I was horrified to hear this on the news this morning. It is blatant cost cutting. This drive to make childcare cheaper is understandable but wrong in my opinion. Do people want the cheapest option for their children? A friend often says of people "they know the price of everything but the value of nothing". Small children need to build relationship with carers, they need to have lots of one to one conversation and interaction. That is much more important than "teaching" them at one, two and three years old! The smaller the adult to child ratio, the more likely they will have that interaction. That's how they learn - being acknowledged, listened to and chatted with and, dare I say it, cuddles. That needs enough adults available to respond to them individually. Common sense, surely.

Just been listening to a discussion about this. Yes, they do things differently in France, and many other countries where 'early years' education is very important and children don't start school until they are SEVEN. And even then, they don't sit them down and teach them stuff at the age of FOUR. It's time the UK decided whether nurseries are principally child care or principally education and recognised that little children need time to develop!

Other countries have cheaper childcare, usually because of state subsidy...

Jessm I agree that time is the most important thing for little children. If the government wants mums and dad to work then THEY should invest in good nursery care by way of subsidy. It is an investment with a huge payoff in bright happy children who will grow into secure happy adults. It seems we live in an age of short term solutions. Cheap childcare then let another government pick up the pieces when these children grow up. I know I sound like a grumpy old woman but I think it is so sad that so many children are never listened to and chatted with. Just look around you on the streets and see how many mums / dads / carers are on mobile phones while the children try to get their attention! Then they say their children are attention seeking! Rant over - I will go and do something calming.

That remark from Lynne Truss is very naive. Qualifications prove nothing. I am not denying that proper knowledge base is important but the right attitude and commitment to the job is vital, however well qualified.

A lot of child care from ordinary "unqualified mum's" is instinctive or learned at mother's knee. the proper ways of talking and interacting with babies and toddlers come naturally to those mothers who have experienced it.
I would be rather more worried about those mums who have been deprived of good early nurturing being able to do this.

I have this feeling that maybe the best way of selecting candidates for nursery staff training, would be to put them into a group of babies and toddlers and just closely observe how well they interact Then pick the ones for training.

I may be a bear of simple brain but:
If the adult/child ratio is adjusted to allow a carer/nursery nurse/teacher to 'look after' more children then that may allow more children to attend the nursery school BUT how will that make things cheaper for parents?
The provider would earn more in fees without having to employ more carers, but (and you can bet your bottom dollar) would be unlikely to drop the cost to parents.

Oddly enough DD and SIL have this morning been visiting a childcare centre in Sydney to see about putting down their twins' names to start NEXT January! They say it's lovely, and the girls had a great time there, and unlike lots of others they can do just one day a week rather than the usual minimum of two. Just as well. It will cost aus$100 a day per child.

Michael Gove is pushing through "reforms" in all areas where he has ministerial responsibility as fast as possible with a view to completion or near-completion before the next election regardless of whether they work (teaching nursery children how to write before they have adequate hand eye co-ordination), are unwanted (some free schools and academies), cause extra problems (English Bac and A level changes in the same year) or cause potential harm (smaller staff to tinies ratio). Other ministers are failing to get their "reforms" (e.g. Jeremy Hunt) or policies (e.g. George Osborne) under control at the same rate. The man is making a leadership bid.

NellieM, don't confuse the early years minister Liz Truss with Lynne 'Eats shoots and leaves' Truss. I somehow think the latter wouldn't be flattered.

This has had my blood boiling!
I took part in an Early Years debate 20 odd years ago when politicians felt they could interfere with this highly complex subject. The bottom line to us ...staff of a Pre-School Playgroup...was that if you had a class of 24 children between 3 and just 5 and the legal minimum of 3 staff members you were always stretched. Each staff member could have had a list of qualifications as long as your arm (and many did) but you would still end up at any one time with one staff member doinging something domestic (toileting/providing food etc) one 'maning' a craft/art/creative activity and one either outside or organising some other physical activity that needed strict saftey protocols. All you needed was one 'accident' or upset and a member of staff could be needed at the drop of a hat to deal with that. We always used to say, when criticised by those not in the know that no amount of graduate or higher education could prepare you for sobbing children, grazed knees or dealing with an intoverted child who needed a fair bit of one to one. I must admit we did get our group up to a very high standard, we had our own premises that were quite well adapted (no real blind spots, dangerous stacks of hall chairs etc that many groups have in shared premises) and all our staff were fully qualified some going on to do graduate/teaching qualifications. But, untill the powers that be realise that child care is a complex and highly emotive topic that cannot be fixed by just tweaking one area (in this case upping the lower limit of staff qualifications). To be honest all those who I came across in this field who were inspirational and good at their job tended to have a natural talent, they would be full of good common sense, a calm caring nature and a natural empathy with children and parents. Children under 5 learn best through well constructed play based activities led by staff who support the children to grow and develop - their minds are not ready for'sitting down' learning that tend to be easier to organise and require fewer adults. I can always remember the journalist who wrote an article about her physicist son who spent his time at pre-school mainly at the sand tray!

Exactly Oldgreymare Private nurseries are businesses and out to make as much profit as possible just like other businesses. Except they have our children and grandchildren in their care. I don't think Increasing the ratio of children/staff will do anything at all except encourage nurseries to take in more children while employing the same amount of staff. There is no way this will result in a fee reduction for hardworking parents.

Hilda I do so agree with you. I too worked in a playgroup for many years and I do think calm, sympathetic, loving staff are far more important than highly qualified staff at that age. I can remember having conversations with mums who would say "can you teach him his colours" and I would try and explain that at that age everyday life was a teaching opportunity and lots of chatting about the colours of things in the supermarket, in the house, on the beach etc would do the job quite naturally. They are too little for "sitting down" type education. I must move off this thread because it is something I feel very strongly about and I get angry at the lack of common sense in government thinking. Everything seems to be about targets and not about developing children.

Good discussion on Womens Hour on R4. Made the point that in countries where day care is state subsidised and state run it is cheaper. We have gone for the privatise everything model and it does not seem to be working well for childcare. Worth a listen.
The school i was involved in ran a post 16 NVQ type childcare qualification. This was in a school that really struggled to get its targets in 5 a-cs including English and Maths. Very few of the kids that opted for child care had English and Maths grade Cs.
In order to attract those who do have good GCSEs, pay and status need to be higher. This reminds me of the time about 10 years ago when a big report suddenly declared that in order to teach basic skills to adults you had to have a level 3 qualification in the subject yourself. In other words the equivalent of A level. So you were not allowed to teach basic numeracy for every day life if you could not do calculus...
Result - shortage of people to teach basic skills.
I believe in some Scandinavian countries being an early years educator is a respected graduate profession. Instead in this country parents are handing their kids over to poorly paid and often very poorly educated people. A relative was shocked to discover that her GD's nursery near London not all staff spoke English.

I heard Woman's Hour, too. It would be great if the Scandinavian model is adopted in full. I have a young friend who now lives in Norway. Parents get one day a week each to spend helping with the childcare, so they each help out at the centre where their two children go. The support and involvement of parents helps to keep costs down, their parenting skills improve from being involved, and they get to see more of their children.

Having been to a couple of Scandanavian countries recently I can say their education provisions are impressive. From pre-school to University and with much of the cost met by the state. However, their tax system would make your eyes water. They have become used to a far higher level of social funding which leads to a much lower ratio of disposable income. They are used to it and on the whole accept that if you want paid for education you have to pay the price. Mind you try buying a glass of wine there!!!!

Absolutely agree with you all, as an ex child minder, and early years tutor, I struggle to see how allowing you to have a 1:6 ratio makes children safer,and having academic qualifications does not make you best suited to childcare! Some of the highly educated professional mums I minded for lacked basic common sense - the only person that actually asked to see my registration certificate during the 11 years I was a child minder was a 17 year old single mum....

Remember - this is the same government whose first action was to abandon the vetting and barring scheme and registration, so we still have unchecked private tutors working 1 :1 with young children unsupervised , and visiting foreign school students able to lodged with convicted sex offenders.....

I will now descend from my soap box

I remember reading a child psychologist saying that under threes need a one to one relationship with someone who loves them - who it is isn't so important. How does this add up to cutting the number of carers? They also need to be talked to a lot rather than taught to read and write.
You are right about common sense susieb755 I used to live next to the headmaster of one of the big public schools and he couldn't do anything practical. Couldn't change a light bulb or drive a car - but a brilliant mind! Of course you'd never leave him in charge of a small child.

The reason they lack common sense is they never left school. They go from school to college/uni to school.

If the government are trying to save money they might scrap the HS2 rail line and use that 32 billion in education and the NHS instead.

You could build a lot of lovely nurseries and run them for a decade for 32 billion couldn't you.

True JessM, but when we 'built' the pre-school I ran it was done on a tiny budget with a lot of donations and parents mucking in. WE ran it on a shoe string too. A good nursery is much more about good dedicated staff and a willingness to do the best for the children. If you dont genuinely believe in what you are doing no amount of government rules and regulations can make it work.

Thought this was funny and true! www.telegraph.co.uk/education/9834812/The-nursery-education-changes-wont-benefit-children-or-parents.html

great quotes from mums net forum in that article. on the nail.