Evaluation of equality and diversity in childcare Essay

The evaluation has just been publish of the Pre-School Education Initiative for Children from Minority Groups. The initiative, which the Government funded by the Dormant Accounts Fund, relate training and mentoring for early childhood educators in sort and e timbre commit, using the Anti-Bias Education woo. The evaluation found the approach to be very efficacious in achieving positive change. The anti-bias approach supports educators to reflect critically on their practice. In Ireland it informed the development of the ist project, which in turn influenced the recent initiative. Its goals are to frequent childrens identity (individual and group) and their sense of belonging. Foster childrens empathy and support them to be comfortable with differences between children. Encourage each child to think close form and bias.Empower children to stand up for themselves and others in difficult situations. Its an approach that fits well with both the Solta national quality example a nd the Aistear curriculum framework. The principles of Solta state that comparison is an essential characteristic of quality early childhood care and education, and that quality settings respect diversity and have their individual, personal, cultural and linguistic identity validated. Similarly, nurturing equality and diversity is one of the 12 principles of Aistear, and identity and belonging is one of its four themes. Fundamentally, the anti-bias approach does not focus on additional supports for children from minority groups, but on changing mainstream practice so that the uniqueness of every child is prize and supported, and so that the differences between all children are respected.Thats why equality and diversity are so central to high quality practice they benefit all children. The Pre-School Education Initiative involved training and mentoring of faculty in 160 early care and education settings, spread across nearly all counties, in 2011-2012. Building on the work of th e equation and Diversity Early Childhood Network (EDeNn), the initiative was implemented through the City and County Childcare Committees, and was the first time the training was delivered at a national level.