Nursery World - NCMA takes Ofsted to task over claims childminders 'not up to the job'

The National Childminding Association has written to Ofsted hitting back at suggestions that childminders should primarily deliver 'care' not education in the EYFS.

The NCMA accuses Ofsted of being more interested in cutting costs than improving quality.

Sue Gregory, national director of education at Ofsted, chose the inspectorate’s first annual early years lecture last night to echo comments made in Ofsted’s annual report, published last week, which proposed that childminders should only be required to deliver some aspects of the EYFS and not all of the learning and development requirements.

In her speech to an audience at the Foundling Museum in London, Ms Gregory said, ‘There’s a question about whether all those who work with the very youngest children, especially childminders, should be required to deliver more than the prime areas. Do we ask them to do too much?’

The way that childminders will be inspected will change ‘in the longer term,’ Ms Gregory added, signalling a move away from individual inspection to a network model.

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