Personal, Social and Emotional Development and 30 hours

I would like to express my thoughts on Personal, Social and Emotional Development (PSED) and how this 30 hours free childcare will contribute greatly to children who are able to access it. It is my belief, that children learn best when they are happy, feel safe and engaged in the environment they are within. This is extremely important of course, when children attend a childcare provision. It is reasonable to assume children usually have strong attachments to their parents from a young age and changing this routine can cause distress. However, this is often soon forgotten and children usually soon adapt to new routines and begin to enjoy their new experiences. When children only attend a setting for 15 hours per week, this routine can sometimes take longer to achieve but still this short time at a childcare setting can be beneficial.

One advantage of the 30 Hours childcare will that it should be more in line with a school day, ie 9am – 3pm and thus naturally making the transition process for both children and parents easier, when the time comes. Having these additional 15 hours at a childcare setting will also speed up the time in that a child makes relationships, for example. They will hopefully form attachments with both staff and other children in less time and their routines will be more robust in a shorter time. This will hopefully also make children feel more welcomed, more secure and therefor happier whilst at their new childcare setting. With these children attending for 30 hours per week they should soon develop routines and be more prepared for school life when it arises due to the similar hours of attendance.

The 30 hours free childcare, or additional 15 hours to be exact, was not solely for the child’s educational benefit but it is for parents to get either given the opportunity to get into work or increase their hours. This should help to improve the family finances and get some families out of “poverty” and really help relieve some pressures from family life that is unhelpful. It is fair to say that financial stress, just like other stresses in life, can lead to negative behaviour within the family. Negative behaviour such as, parents arguing with each other or with their children over issues to do with money. Children may be neglected to dangerous levels and even also parent’s struggling to feed themselves and their children! Many do rely on food banks here in the UK! This is unacceptable in a nation as advanced has the UK. Even though it shouldn’t be acceptable in any part of world, we come to expect it in some 3^rd world countries.

Of course it won’t just be a child’s Personal, Social and Emotional Development that will benefit but the foundations that this area of learning will help to improve many other areas. With a child settling into a childcare provider in a shorter time and becoming secure in their environment sooner, all other areas of learning will be much more effectively gained naturally. With this extra time in a childcare environment, it allows much more exploration of child initiated play and finding new friendships within this playtime. It also allows more time for Early Years Professionals to engage with children during group times and adult led activities. This should all increase the overall effectiveness of children’s development, whilst at a childcare provision. If these new skills that children develop whilst at a childcare setting transfer to home life, then this will hopefully be another way to reduce family pressures and stresses that might have been a problem previously.

To summerise, these additional 15 hours will hopefully help many parents back into work, or working more hours and be financially more secure. Hopefully this can be achieved and maybe in the near future many families will benefit from this increase in government funding and in turn many children will therefor benefit both, at home and in a childcare setting. This new Government plan might just actually pay off and some positive decisions made to win the election campaign for the Tories, will actually be a benefit to many people! Let’s just wait and see what the next 12 months brings?