The legal requirements relating to young children's welfare and well-being are brought together in one massive early years unit in the new Level 3 Diploma for the Children and Young People's Workforce.
Given the wide-ranging scope of the unit, covering areas of practice as diverse as risk assessments to sleep routines, it is not surprising that the Early Years Mandatory Pathway 3: Promote children's welfare and well-being in the early years, is the largest mandatory unit for the childcare sector. It is worth six credits, has six learning outcomes and requires 45 guided learning hours.
Gail Shenton, deputy to the partners at the Jancett Group and JACE Training, says, 'It is a very good unit, as it brings everything together so that learners can see how the legislation links in to practice and how that links in to the day-to-day care they provide in their setting.
'Previously, this was spread across several units. Now, not only is all this aspect of practice in one unit; the new qualification also goes into more depth. The outcomes are clearer.'
Ms Shenton believes this unit is absolutely fundamental to working with children. 'If you cannot get this right, then you will really struggle to work with children,' she says. 'There is an emphasis on the fundamentals of day-to-day practice as well as legal aspects, covering, for example, the risk assessment of the environment and how the environment should be kept clean and tidy. Cleaning and tidying are not always the most popular tasks in the setting, but they have to be done.'
The unit ranges across all the legal requirements, including providing a safe environment, hygiene, dietary requirements, medicines, food allergies and health and safety.
The points it covers can provide a routine checklist to ensure all aspects of children's welfare and well-being are embraced. 'It underlines the importance of team work, as different team members take the lead role in fulfilling the various aspects of care covered by the unit,' says Ms Shenton. 'For example, a learner can see that while the manager inspects the rooms on a daily basis to make sure all is well, the cook, who might not necessarily be aware of the unit, will be working to ensure that nutritious food is prepared to the highest standards according to the children's dietary needs.'
Two areas pose the biggest challenge to learners, according to Gill Mason, enterprise director for Vauxhall Neighbourhood Council, specialising in training and education for the children's workforce. She says, 'These areas are allowing children to explore and manage risk and challenge, while supervising them safely, along with food management and portion control. Parental preferences are also taken into account.
'These elements require learners to demonstrate judgement and how to take a sensitive and sensible approach.'
Ms Mason adds, 'It is essential that practitioners recognise that babies and children under the age of three have specific care requirements, and understand how they should meet them sensitively and with confidence so that babies and young children can thrive.'
MIXING THEORY AND PRACTICE
Mrs Shenton acknowledges that the scale of the unit and the fact that so much of it represents legal requirements might seem quite intimidating for younger learners. 'It is a huge amount for some of these youngsters to take on. Some of the more mature learners will have come across aspects such as undertaking risk assessment from their life experience.'
However, Laura Clark, 19, who is doing the Diploma while working at Pollyanna Day Nursery in Carshalton, Surrey, says the unit represents day-to-day routine and practice. 'I suppose if I had looked at this unit before I started working in the nursery I might have been quite daunted by all the legal aspects and legal requirements. But with handwashing, for example, this is what we do every day and I understand why it is so important.'
Ms Clark has found the unit very interesting. 'There is a lot on routines - for example, taking the children to the toilets to wash their hands before meals and brushing their teeth afterwards, and obviously washing their hands after they have been to the toilet.'
Her manager, Sharon Perry, says, 'It is a massive unit, but I don't think this is a problem. It fits together and links in nicely. If you are doing all that this covers, then you will have a good setting. My staff are promoting children's welfare and well-being all the time while working to the EYFS standards, so when they consider the unique child they are looking at aspects such as hygiene, diet and fresh air.'
Ms Perry stresses that it is a fundamental unit. 'It is also full of the underpinning knowledge you need to work in childcare,' she says. 'You are doing this every single day depending on your responsibilities and your actual role.'
Ms Shenton likes the way the new qualification mixes theory and practice. 'You cannot just learn the theory, you have to put it into practice. It is good because you cannot just sit in a classroom and learn about something - you have to be able to do it too. This unit demonstrates that balance well.
'Yes, the old NVQ was practical, but it was at times a bit tick-box. Units like EYMP 3 cover everything you would expect a practitioner to know and be able to do, so they can show they understand the legal requirements and the frameworks they are working under.
'Learners have to start somewhere, and this is a very good fundamental unit. When you are undertaking an assignment you should be thinking about practical strategies regarding areas such as diet and nutrition,and how these are applied to practice. In this way you build up real-life evidence so that the work for the qualification is not hypothetical theory but real, and practical.
'The unit encourages students to think about the children they are actually caring for and if there is a child with food allergy or intolerance, to then use that child as a case study. There are dietary requirement to consider because of allergies, but also because of religious requirements which can be a new issue for some people.'
Mrs Shenton advises candidates working their way through the unit one step at a time to see how everything integrates. 'Most people understand about anaphylactic shocks but they do not necessarily know about the other dietary considerations,' she says.
TOP TIPS
Gill Mason, enterprise director for Vauxhall Neighbourhood Council, specialising in training and education for the children's workforce, gives her top tips for EYPM 3:
- Meet children's individual needs according to the latest guidelines
- Provide opportunities for young children to become independent
- Provide a wide-ranging nutritional diet for children
- Support parents by providing information about health issues
- Provide opportunities for children to learn about cooking and choosing nutritious food
- Provide resources for parents to take home to learn more about nutrition
KEY ELEMENTS OF EYMP 3
The unit focuses on children's welfare and well being and assesses the learner's ability to provide basic care in an hygienic environment.
- Understand the welfare requirements of the relevant early years framework.
- Be able to keep early years children safe in the work setting, ranging from explaining the systems for ensuring children's safety on arriving and leaving nursery, to staff ratios and space requirements.
- Understand the importance of promoting positive health and wellbeing for early years children.
- Be able to support hygiene and prevention of cross-infection in the early years setting.
- Understand how to ensure children in the early years receive high-quality, balanced nutrition to meet their growth and development needs.
- Be able to provide physical care for children, including explaining personal care routines and the management of medicines.
Next month: EYMP 2 Promote learning and development in the early years
