Planning & Observation In Childrens Centres

[Guest]

Hi, have just started as a family support worker and need to plan for stay & play sessions amongst others. Does anyone have any examples of planning. Do you have to do weekly, medium term etc. OFSTED are due to visit and I want to ensure that the planning is up to standard. Thanks

[catma]

I think the difference with this type of provision is that you are not going to have the same children returning necessarily so you are not planning for their progression as such. Also the focus is a balance of both parents and children. Most stay and plays I see have a sense of the 6 areas but then within that model interesting, often simple, activities that parents can also replicate easily at home. The role of the staff member is also to model and support the parents. Do you know who will be coming along beforehand? Many stay and plays are drop ins anyway so you may have diffferent ages staying each week. I would plan for flexible open ended provision that will be of interest to any age.

 

cx

[Guest]

I think the difference with this type of provision is that you are not going to have the same children returning necessarily so you are not planning for their progression as such. Also the focus is a balance of both parents and children. Most stay and plays I see have a sense of the 6 areas but then within that model interesting, often simple, activities that parents can also replicate easily at home. The role of the staff member is also to model and support the parents. Do you know who will be coming along beforehand? Many stay and plays are drop ins anyway so you may have diffferent ages staying each week. I would plan for flexible open ended provision that will be of interest to any age.

 

cx

Thanks. Age range is 0-5yrs. Think I will do focused activities for stay & play sessions. If you have any ideas of activities etc I would really appreciate them:)

[Guest]

Hi, I also am required to plan for these sessions in a childrens centre, I currently set up the room in the area's I do for a playgroup sessions (ie areas that link with the eyfs) but will adapt each so it is more widely suitable but that run alongside my long tem planning for example i would have a creative activity such as corn flour along side a table covered in paper for free painting, i turn the "quiet / book area" into an enclosed area with baby toys and cusions etc, the home corner is theme based role play linking with the topic, IDK if that helps? I dont have a weeks plan to hand to upload ATM but could get hold of one.

With regard to the next steps we evaluate each session and as part of this we look at what activities were popular we then identify development of this activity as next steps IE we had the toy library in and the beebot proved popular so the the identified next steps was to provide a range of IT toys in the outdoor area for the future sessions planning.

[Guest]

Hi, I also am required to plan for these sessions in a childrens centre, I currently set up the room in the area's I do for a playgroup sessions (ie areas that link with the eyfs) but will adapt each so it is more widely suitable but that run alongside my long tem planning for example i would have a creative activity such as corn flour along side a table covered in paper for free painting, i turn the "quiet / book area" into an enclosed area with baby toys and cusions etc, the home corner is theme based role play linking with the topic, IDK if that helps? I dont have a weeks plan to hand to upload ATM but could get hold of one.

With regard to the next steps we evaluate each session and as part of this we look at what activities were popular we then identify development of this activity as next steps IE we had the toy library in and the beebot proved popular so the the identified next steps was to provide a range of IT toys in the outdoor area for the future sessions planning.

 

[Guest]

Hi, have just started as a family support worker and need to plan for stay & play sessions amongst others. Does anyone have any examples of planning. Do you have to do weekly, medium term etc. OFSTED are due to visit and I want to ensure that the planning is up to standard. Thanks

 

 

Thanks for your reply. Would appreciate a template for focus planning if you have one!!

Still getting used to this forum and how you reply etc thats why its taken so long to reply. Sorry.

[Guest]

i've never uploaded before so hope it works LOL also hope it helps, its a pretty standard template that seems to be used in one form of another throughout the CC's in my local authority

s_pweek1.doc

[Guest]

i've never uploaded before so hope it works LOL also hope it helps, its a pretty standard template that seems to be used in one form of another throughout the CC's in my local authority

Thanks just downloaded your stay and play planning. How do you record childrens development. Do you use learning journeys?

[Guest countrygirl]

Hi Lula, I work as a Stay and Play Coordinator and as such are responsible for planning and charting the children's progress. I have had major trouble with regards to not knowing who is attending when and the implications this has on Learning Journeys and observations. We are at present creating a group learning journey with links made to the 6 areas of learning. Our planning also covers those "individual children" who we know will be regular attenders and observations of these along with next steps are noted down. It is very difficult planning and observing in this context, I had a meeting with our development officer and she was pleased with what we are providing. If I can help in any way please ask.

[Guest]

I am not currently doing learning journeys for those in stay and play session although I evaluate the planning and identify the next steps. This is also something I am struggling with as we have 2 sessions and roughly 30 children through each but different children each time.

Country Girl I would apreciate any tips pleeease :-)

[Guest]

We use learning journeys for groups like Stay and Play and Messy Play and in these we place photographs and written observations that capture what the children are learning from attending the group. For creches where children attend without parents, while parents are on a course, we make learning journeys for individuals. These include observations that are shared with parents and celebrate childrens achievements. Hope this helps.

[Guest]

We use learning journeys for groups like Stay and Play and Messy Play and in these we place photographs and written observations that capture what the children are learning from attending the group. For creches where children attend without parents, while parents are on a course, we make learning journeys for individuals. These include observations that are shared with parents and celebrate childrens achievements. Hope this helps.

 

Thanks it does, I may give the learning journey thing a go and i'm thinking if they are in photo form they would provide a good display for ofsted also :-). Its a very hard session to track and we had our inspection 2 weeks ago and they questioned it alot

[Guest]

We use learning journeys for groups like Stay and Play and Messy Play and in these we place photographs and written observations that capture what the children are learning from attending the group. For creches where children attend without parents, while parents are on a course, we make learning journeys for individuals. These include observations that are shared with parents and celebrate childrens achievements. Hope this helps.

 

 

Hi Liverpool 1983

I am currently trying to do some work around learning journeys with stay and play sessions in childrens centres. your post really helped spark some ideas and I was wondering if there was any way you could share a bit more information ie; the format you use to record the observations is there a sheet that you put it on ?

also do you have a space for parents to comment on it ? and then how do you store the information ?

would greatly appreciate any advice given and look forward to hearing from you.

[fudgecat]

Hi

 

we use learning journals in all of our sessions. We encourage parents to contribute to them and they help select the photos, smaples of the children's work and annotations. We use large scrap books as these can hold a larger variety of samples. The parents take ownership of them and really value them. If children also attend local childcare, we encourage a practitioner to visit the sessions occassionally (this really supports transitions) and to look at the learning journals with the parents and children. The parents can also take them to a childcare setting to share with their child's key person. Ofsted commented on the quality of the learning journals and how they were used to support tracking children's progress.

[Guest]

"OFSTED are due to visit and I want to ensure that the planning is up to standard."

 

When Ofsted came to our centre last year the inspector didn't want to see any of our paperwork, she just wanted to talk to the parents and children in the Stay and Play sessions as she said that she could find out much more about our work from them. However, one of our outreach workers who had spent ages making sure the planning, assessments, learning journeys etc were up to date and looking good said 'She is going to look at them!' and made the inspector sit down and look at some of the files.

[Guest]

I am a little concerned these children being tracked. You would have to get written consent from each parent for this just like you would for a case study. I thought if any observations are noted they would have to be anonymous so collecting wow moments would be rather difficult. I do group journals with no names but description of learning steps as a celebration of the group and for evidence. Do OFSTED ask for children to be tracked in development in Children Centres? Surely as the parents are there, they are the experts of their children and we are supporting them in developing play experiences.

[surfer]

You do need to be able to demonstrate the impact that your work is having on the children's learning- to my knowledge there is a national indicator which expects children's centres to impact on the children's EYFSP scores at the end of reception and narrow the gap between children from the target groups in the CC ofsted format and the rest of the children. So you do need to be able to show the progress that children are making- especially if you are going to be part of the payment by results system. My feeling is otherwise why do it? ( stay and play etc?)

Edited July 27, 2012 by surfer

[Guest countrygirl]

Hi, I read your topic with interest.

I work as a Stay and Play Coordinator in a CC and constantly battle with this issue of being able to justify what a child is learning from attending sessions. I find it difficult to say that the child is progressing in all areas of their learning solely because of attending Stay and Play. This does not take into account learning that is happening in the home, environment, socially. There is an indicator which places emphasis on the baseline assessment which is undertaken when children start school but unless the child only accessed Stay and Play sessions the impact the sessions have had on a child's learning are hard to prove.

I completed my dissertation on the impact of Stay and Play and this has made me realise that unless you compare two groups of children, those that have attended sessions to those that have not, only then can cautious generalisations be made. Even then can we hand on heart say this learning happened because of us. It is fair to say that the activities on offer during sessions may aid a child's learning but is the impact enough to justify the sessions? Could this level of learning happen in a Mothers and Toddlers sessions?

I don't mean to be negative but I feel that unless there are clear aims and objectives for Stay and Play and a justifiable way of measuring outcomes we will continue to struggle on.