Professional_Development

Task (100% of total marks): Produce an appropriate professional development plan based on your appraisal (2500 words) During the 1990’s the care and education of children in early year’s settings were seen as two different job roles. The nursery nurses were there to provide for the physical and health needs of children, whilst teachers were seen as the educators. Nursery nurses formed part of an expanding workforce that were expected to perform on a professional level but at the same time were not appropriately qualified, were undervalued and were also severely less well paid in comparison to teachers. Since the introduction of the School and Children’s Workforce Initiative (2006) the role of the nursery nurse has changed dramatically. It is now recognised that the job is multidisciplinary and crosses the boundaries of health, education and social care. This has resulted in nursery nurses now being called childcare practitioners. According to the Rumbold Report (1990) the early years are a time of “rapid growth and development, both physical and intellectual. At this stage children’s developmental needs are complex and interrelated” (1990:7) This report made the government realise that it had to up skill the millions of nursery nurses that were working throughout the country so that they received acknowledgement for the vital role that they played in society. In 2001 the Labour government recognised that there were very few childcare practitioners that were qualified to a level four or above and so introduced the new Early Years Foundation Degree (EYFD). This type of degree would not only provide practitioners with a graduate level of education earned through assessment and work based learning and but also give them recognition for their skill and knowledge. Due to the fact that early years workers were not very well paid, and were expected to fund this course themselves very few of them took up places. The Labour government was so determined to increase the educational standards of its workforce and in turn improve the quality of care and education given to children in early year’s settings that it introduced the Graduate Leader Fund (GLF). This was a fund of £305 million that would enable workers in early year’s settings to take up places on the EYFD course at no extra cost to themselves and would also provide settings with funding for replacement staff cover. The government also pledged that by 2015 there would be a minimum of one practitioner with Early Years Professional Status (EYPS) in every setting throughout the country and in severely deprived areas there would be two. Whilst not all practitioners will embrace change easily, it is vital for us as individuals to recognise the connection between being a highly educated and skilled professional and the quality of service that we provide. One way of doing this is by engaging in Continuous Professional Development (CPD). This is an on-going process in which people take responsibility for their own learning and development by becoming involved in a cycle of reflective practice. (CDP) does not follow a set format and all settings will have a different approach, however the main objectives should always be for individuals to highlight their own strengths and weaknesses and then be able to move forward by setting specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time bound (SMART) targets so that these obstacles can be overcome. According to Waters (2005) Donald Schon identifies two types of reflective practice: “Reflection-in-action - This is the kind of reflection that occurs whilst a problem is being addressed, in what Schon calls the ‘action-present’. It is a response to a surprise where the expected outcome is outside of our knowing-in-action. The reflective process is at least to some degree conscious, but may not be verbalised. Reflection-in-action is about challenging our assumptions (because knowing-in-action forms the basis of assumption). It is about thinking again, in a new way, about a problem we have encountered. Reflection-on-action - This is reflection after the event. Consciously undertaken, and often documented.” As an early years practitioner reflective practice is a vital part of my working life, not only does it allow me to think on my feet and adapt any situation to become a valid learning opportunity for myself and the children in my care, but it also allows me to review my day to day practice and then plan on how I would improve it. The Ways in which I reflect on my practice are by completing a reflective practice journal, in it I ask myself such questions as: what were my goals for the day, did I achieve them, what hindered me as to why I couldn’t achieve what I had set out to do and finally how would I react differently the next time. I was faced with a similar situation. I also belong to an online community of practice which is a group of individuals who are based around the world and whose common link is working within the early year’s profession. We use our internet forum to share our knowledge and skills amongst ourselves so that we learn from each other’s practice. It is essential that organisations commit to the developing and training of its workforce. Companies that have a successful (CDP) policy in place attract and retain a higher quality staff team, employ a better qualified and more competent workforce and also maximize staff potential by linking learning to everyday actions and putting theory to practice. The benefits of (CPD) to an Early Years Practitioner are immense; it allows them to increase their knowledge and skills, which will in turn have an impact on their confidence, motivation and their ability to work as a professional. (CDP) also encourages people to cope positively with change by constantly updating their skills and it can also help them to progress in their chosen career at a speed which is comfortable to them. As I discussed earlier no two settings deliver (CPD) in the same way and in the last year my setting has established a new format. It is now laid out in a much more user friendly way and concentrates on giving positive feedback and constructive criticism rather than highlighting a person’s weaknesses and then not offering any solutions as to how these can be best overcome. The new format which my organisation is now using has allowed me to become aware of what my main weakness is. During my recent appraisal I realised that I find it difficult to express my thoughts and ideas to members of the management team. The reason for this is that I lack confidence when approaching people who are in a higher position than me, in case they see my opinions as irrelevant or invalid. An example of this happened recently, there had been a list put up in the staff room indicating some important room changes throughout the whole nursery. The leader of the room that I work in was being moved to another room and to me the most obvious choice for her replacement was myself, not only because there had been many occasions over the previous months that I had stepped in to fill the room leaders position when she had been away or off sick, but I also felt that the effort I put into my job everyday warranted some kind of recognition. However the management team instead chose someone that was unqualified and had also been disciplined for her time keeping and record keeping in the previous year. It just compounded how I felt about myself, I kept thinking that if the manager I had worked under for the past twenty years didn’t think I was good enough to be room leader, then what chance had I of being a manger when I passed my Foundation Degree. I was distraught, I asked my colleagues and my fellow students even my lecturer what should I do about the situation and they all said that I should approach the manager and have a discussion with her about it. No matter how I tried I could not broach the subject, I just kept assuming she thought I wasn’t up to the job. So I waited until the end of my appraisal when she thanked me for my hard work and said that she was surprised I hadn’t gone for the recent deputy’s position that had been advertised, my confidence at that point was souring so I asked her why I had been passed up for the promotion if she thought all those things about me. Her response was that initially I had been first choice for room leader but being as I am such a key player in my team she had considered moving me into a room that needed some stronger characters to raise the standard of care that was being delivered. However by the time she realised that she didn’t want to move me she had already told the other person that they would be room leader and so was unable to retract her decision. The end result of this conversation was that at the 6 monthly rooms change review in May 2011 my manager has assured me that I will be promoted to room leader. I think that having been qualified for nearly 20 years my lack of confidence is a bad thing as it has stopped me from applying for promotion on many occasions because I think people will not see me as a good leader. I also feel that my lack of confidence impacts on the people working around me because I often have very worthwhile and relevant ideas that would help my setting but because I fail to put them across my colleagues don’t always benefit from my experience or knowledge. After discussing this issue with my manger she has assured me that not only does she value and respect my contribution to the team, she is also now looking for me to transition in to the role of room leader and be the person that liaises between her management team and the practitioners that work within my room. From this conversation I have highlighted to my manager that I feel I need some training to boost my confidence in my own ability and also that I would benefit from some leadership training to be able to fulfil my new role as room leader. My manager and I have set an interim timescale of 3 months for her to investigate how to best meet my training needs, and an overall target of six months for me to have completed all the relevant training that I have requested. Looking back over my reflective practice journal, I can see that I have lots of strengths that make me a good early years practitioner and given the right training and experience I also feel that I have the potential to be a good manager. Firstly and most importantly I have a fantastic relationship with the children in my care, I am aware of what their individual needs are because of my attention to detail when completing their Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) profile books. I then relate this to my practice by planning and executing activities that I know will help to promote the children’s development. I also feel that I am able to work on my own initiative, I do not need direction and if I see a task that needs completing then I will assess the situation and deal with it accordingly. This is a very good trait as it means that the manager of my setting can concentrate on other tasks knowing that the room I work in is not only running efficiently but also providing for all the needs of the children in the room. I am also a very well organised person who copes well under pressure and is not easily fazed. An example of this is when a child in my care recently fell over in the garden and received a deep cut to her chin. I initially administered first aid by putting an ice pack on to the gash to stem the bleeding and also control the swelling. I then asked a colleague to locate the manager and tell her what had happened, when the manager came to see how the child was I explained that I thought the child needed hospital attention and maybe further treatment, so I was asked to escort the child to casualty and wait with her until her parents came to take my place. I am also very aware of the settings policies, procedures and code of conduct for its staff, so I try at all times to follow them accordingly. This in turn helps me to act as a positive role model to the other younger and less experienced practitioners because I am modelling the behaviour that my manager expects from the whole staff team. At the moment I feel that I lack some of the confidence and skills that are necessary to become a good leader. However over the next 6 months I aim to use the strengths I do have to create a solid foundation from which I can build on to enable me to reach my goals. One of the most effective ways this can be done is by engaging in the process of deliberate practice. This method will allow me to continuously and deliberately work on my strengths in order to improve my all round performance. One way in which I aim to do this is by using my organisational skills to adapt the way in which the Toddler room is currently laid out, as I feel it is not conducive to being a good learning environment for the children. The room itself is very large and quite open planned and this allows the children who are very active to run around. However I feel that if we used the furniture to divide the room into the 6 areas of learning it would not only give the room some definition but prevent the children from having so much free space to run around inside Also owing to the fact that I am consistently praised by the management team for the outstanding quality of my key children’s early years profile books I aim to demonstrate to the other practitioners in the room how I complete my record keeping so they will hopefully adopt the same approach and in turn this will produce a more effective way of recording keeping and improve the planning and provision of activities in the room. In conclusion I feel that good (CDP) benefits both the individuals and the organisations they work for. It provides practitioners with the opportunity to assess whether their career is progressing how they want it to and it also highlights to team leaders and managers what the training needs of their staff team are. It was during my appraisal in 2009 that I highlighted to my manager that I felt I had become stagnant in my career and that I was no longer finding my job a challenge and so it was through my employer’s commitment to developing its workforce that I found out about EYFD course. This course is a fantastic opportunity for me and millions of others that qualified as nursery nurses in the 1990’s as it will enable me to refresh my knowledge and update my skills as well as learn new ones through research and reflective practice. As someone who started her career as a nursery assistant and who has progressed up through the ranks to nursery officer and now childcare practitioner, I feel that completing my foundation degree is a natural progression in my career path as it will give me the confidence to begin leading a small team as room leader and then continue striving for forwards for promotion until I eventually reach my goal of obtaining Early Years Professional Status. and owning my own nursery. Bibliography Macleod-Brudenell, I. and Kay, J editors (2008) Advanced Early Years For Foundation Degrees &Levels 4/5 Essex:Heinemann Vernon, J. and Smith, C (1994) Day Nurseries at a crossroads London: National Children’s Bureau Miller, M. Cable, C and Devereux, J (2009) Developing Early Years Practice Oxon:Hodder Paige-Smith, A and Craft A (2008) Developing Reflective Practice in the Early Years Maidenhead:Open University Press Daly, M. Byers, E and Taylor, W. (2009) Early Years Management in Practice 2nd Ed England:Heineman Websites Schon and Reflective practice available online at: http://www.resources.scalingtheheights.com/Schon%20and%20Reflective%20Practice.htm accessed on 17/11/2010 The Rumbold Report (1990) available online at http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/rumbold/rumbold01.html accessed on 17/11/2010 References Rumbold Report, Department for Education and Science (1990), Starting with Quality: The Rumbold Report of the Committee of inquiry into the Quality of Educational Experience Offered to 3 and 4 year olds. London:HMSO