When the country's pre-schools stopped for the summer holidays it provided a welcome break for the dedicated staff who have been juggling with work and study for the new certificate and diploma in pre-school practice.
The qualifications, which have been launched as a joint initiative between the Pre-school Learning Alliance and CACHE, the Council for Awards in Children's Care and Education, both involve four units covering a total of 240 hours tuition and learning plus a total of at least 150 hours work in a pre-school setting.
PLA training manager Pat Barber explains the rationale behind the decision made last year to link up with CACHE. 'This has allowed the PLA to concentrate on developing their programme as a national training provider, but ensured that there are still Level 2 and 3 QCA qualification framework awards that take into account the special features of community pre-school provision involving parents in their children's education.' Course content
The joint venture covers three qualifications: the Introduction to Pre-school Practice (IPP) and the Certificate in Pre-school Practice (CPP), which are both graded as CACHE Level 2 qualifications, and Diploma in Pre-school Practice (DPP), which is a Level 3 award. Like other CACHE qualifications the awards have been designed progressively as career stepping stones to take pre-school staff from an introductory phase up to working at supervisory level.
The CPP provides the underpinning knowledge for units within the Early Years Care and Education NVQ Level 2 and is aimed at staff working at a supervised level. The DPP provides a similar bedrock of knowledge for units in the EYCE Level 3 and is geared to people working unsupervised on in a supervisory role.
The IPP involves 60 hours of learning and just one unit while the two further awards each offer the opportunity for candidates to achieve freestanding units or one qualification made up of four units. The CPP and DPP each cover three core units and also allow students to choose an option unit and explore a specialism in greater depth.
For the CPP the core units are the 'Introduction to pre-school practice', 'The needs of young children' and 'Providing a safe, stimulating and secure environment'. The choice for option units is between 'Working in partnership with parents in early years settings' and 'Supporting the care and education of toddlers'.
The core units for the DPP are 'Promoting children's development', 'Early learning' and 'Best practice in pre-school settings'. The three options for the final unit are 'Working with children with special educational needs', 'The first year of life' and 'Community development'.
A pioneer student
With the backing of a supportive family and a switch in bedside reading from novels to child psychology texts, Yolanda Cawdeary has enjoyed the first three terms of the DPP course.
'It has been extremely useful. We study all aspects of work in a pre-school, from psychology to curriculum planning and management. I always enjoyed my job as an assistant, but it has become much easier now that I know why we do things the way we do.' She can now contribute to planning meetings and at staff meetings she can share information gleaned from her weekly day at college.
Mrs Cawdeary, who lives and works in Cowplain near Waterloo-ville, Hampshire, will complete the course this autumn term. 'It is a long course of four terms and there is a lot of studying to do. It is not just a case of observing the children in pre-school and making some notes.' 'My advice to new students would be: before you take it, you must consider your home life and decide if you can find the time to do it. You need a very patient family who will take over things like the washing up at times. You have to be very strict with yourself. My son was taking his A levels this summer so we were fighting over the computer.' She cannot quantify how many hours of home study the DPP has involved, but says as the deadline approaches for finishing an assignment the work rate increases.
'It helps going to college because we can support each other when the going gets tough. There are about 15 of us on the course and we can share the ideas from our different pre-schools. Our tutor is very supportive, although we must have driven her mad at times with our insecurity.' One drawback has been that, as the first students on the course, they have no previous work to refer to in order to find out in how much detail to cover an assignment. 'If you're taking a course like a GCSE they have old papers for you to look at, but there are no old papers for us. It is not that we want to copy, but we don't know what they are looking for in a question. It is new for the tutor too. People on the course next year will have our examples so it will be easier.'
Another snag has been the length of time it has taken to process assignments. The students were working on the third assignment and had handed in the second before the marked work from the first assignment was returned.
'The DPP is a lot harder than the IPP. I think some have been a little daunted by it. It depends upon how long it is since you were last studying. If you've not done any studying since you were 16 it can be difficult, but I have done all sorts of courses.' Mrs Cawdeary adds that she is the student representative on a support group which feeds information back to CACHE, so their concerns will be passed on.
Further information
* For more information about the CACHE pre-school qualifications, telephone 01727 847 636 or visit the website at www.cache.org.uk
* For details about how to claim help with fees through the system of Individual Learning Accounts, contact the helpline on 0800 100 900 or visit the website at www.dfee.gov.uk/ila