Irish pre-school education

egreta

Hello, We are moving to Adamstown/Lucan co. Dublin from Holland with our 2 year old daughter. I know nothing about the Irish system. When do children start school here and how to choose a school? I see a lot of adds for montessory schools, they say it's for 2,5 - 6 year olds, but I thought primary schools start fom 4. Maybe somebody can explain to me how it works in Ireland. Thanks in advance.

E.T.

Hi, once your child turns 4 it's your decision whether or not to send them to primary school. I'm a primary teacher, and I've taught junior and senior infants for years (4-7 year olds). From my experience, the older your child is starting school, the better. Children starting at a young 4 seem to be at a big disadvantage socially, and often educationally - no matter how bright they are, they are often unable to cope well with the school routine. If a parent asks me about their child coming into my own class, this is the advice I give them. The school year starts in September here, so if your child is only going to turn 4 in the summer or late spring, I really think they'd be better off with an extra year of playschool or montessori.

Gurgle

egreta wrote: »

Hello, We are moving to Adamstown/Lucan co. Dublin from Holland with our 2 year old daughter. I know nothing about the Irish system. When do children start school here and how to choose a school? I see a lot of adds for montessory schools, they say it's for 2,5 - 6 year olds, but I thought primary schools start fom 4. Maybe somebody can explain to me how it works in Ireland. Thanks in advance.

Just be aware that the whole pre-school sector is about to be incomprehensibly fcuked around, with the forthcoming introduction of a "free pre-school year" for all children.

Currently, most pre-schools are one of 3 types:
1) A play room attached to a creche. There will be somebody in the building who is qualified but not necessarily in the room.
2) A small pre-school run privately, generally in a converted garage or shed. AFAIK, theres no regulation of these so the teacher may or may not be qualified.
3) A pre-school run publicly, attached to a primary school. Operated by professionally qualified teachers and pre-school teachers, complete with curriculum, objectives and cognitive development programs.

Version 1) (The corporate money cow model) will pretty much replace the others next year.

Also, 'Montessori' doesn't necessarily mean that the teachers are Montessori qualified teachers or that the children follow a Montessori curriculum.

The word is used because it sounds fancy.

alex22

Hi Egreta,

Here are a few resources, in case people's comments are not sufficient:

http://www.educationireland.ie/
http://www.education.ie/home/home.jsp?pcategory=10856&ecategory=30941&language=EN

Have a look in this last one at "A Brief Description of the Irish Education System"

Alex

dogbert27

Gurgle: I have to disagree with your interpretation of your type 2 scenario as per the 2006 Childcare (Pre-School Services) Regulations:

PART III

NOTICE TO BE GIVEN BY PERSON PROPOSING TO CARRYING ON A PRE-SCHOOL SERVICE
10.(1) Where a person proposes to carry on a pre-school service that person shall, at least 28 days before the commencement of the service, give notice in writing to the Health Service Executive

This is irrespective of whether they are private or publically funded. You may be referring to private childminders who just look after kids without providing an educational aspect to the service.

As for you say the next year will be the cash cow model of scenario A. I assume that you are referring to the ECCE scheme where pre-schools will get €64.5 a week per child. Most private pre-schools are complaining because this amount is restricting them and will significantly reduce their income so I can't see how the ECCE scheme will provide a cash cow model of pre-school.

As for the third and seemingly perfect scanrio can you tell me what level of qualification these professionally qualified teachers and pre-school teachers are at?

Gurgle

dogbert27 wrote: »

Gurgle: I have to disagree with your interpretation of your type 2 scenario as per the 2006 Childcare (Pre-School Services) Regulations:

PART III

NOTICE TO BE GIVEN BY PERSON PROPOSING TO CARRYING ON A PRE-SCHOOL SERVICE
10.(1) Where a person proposes to carry on a pre-school service that person shall, at least 28 days before the commencement of the service, give notice in writing to the Health Service Executive

But is there any regulation of teacher qualifications, objectives or curriculum?

dogbert27 wrote: »

I assume that you are referring to the ECCE scheme where pre-schools will get €64.5 a week per child. Most private pre-schools are complaining because this amount is restricting them and will significantly reduce their income so I can't see how the ECCE scheme will provide a cash cow model of pre-school.

Becuase their complaints are bare-faced lies.
Private pre-schools cost ~€50 to €60 per week, and its fairly consistent between the small ones and the corporate ones.

dogbert27 wrote: »

As for the third and seemingly perfect scanrio can you tell me what level of qualification these professionally qualified teachers and pre-school teachers are at?

A qualified primary teacher and an 'assistant' who has generally got a 3rd level qualification in pre-school education or a related field.

(Who said 'perfect' by the way?)


Relevant reading: http://www.education.ie/servlet/blobservlet/oecd_thematic_reivew_early_childhood_rpt1.pdf

dogbert27

Gurgle wrote: »

But is there any regulation of teacher qualifications, objectives or curriculum?

I take it you accept my answer then in that pre-schools, whether public or private are regulated.
In answer to your question reqgarding teachers qualifications my answer is no but the department will probably tell you there is with the following wishy washy regluation:

Qualification and training
It is acknowledged that many childcare staff have a qualification or are working towards achieveing one. In centre-based services, it is considered that the person in charge should aim to have at least fifty percent of childcare staff with a qualification appropriate to the care and development of children. The qualified staff should rotate between age groupings.

This in my opinion is complete horse manure. As for objectives and curriculum they are also not regulated and left to the individual pre-school to come up with. Although as far as I know this is being addressed by Siolta. In the terms and conditions for the ECCE scheme it does say that to qualify services must agree to provide an appropriate educational program for school children in their pre-school year, which adheres to the principles of Siolta, the national framework for early years care and education.

Gurgle wrote: »

Becuase their complaints are bare-faced lies.
Private pre-schools cost ~€50 to €60 per week, and its fairly consistent between the small ones and the corporate ones.

The terms and conditions for the ECCE scheme state that to qualify a playschool sessional service will be requried to provide the service for 3 hours a day for five days for 38 weeks to receive the maximum €64.50. They must have a minimum of 8 children. So taking the minimum of 8 children mulitplied by 64.50 by 38 weeks you get an income of €19608. From that you are to cover your overheads, (light and heat, food), insurance, wages, possibly rent, etc. It's not such a cash cow as the more children you take in the more staff you require to cover the ratios.

Gurgle wrote: »

A qualified primary teacher and an 'assistant' who has generally got a 3rd level qualification in pre-school education or a related field.
(Who said 'perfect' by the way?)
Relevant reading: http://www.education.ie/servlet/blobservlet/oecd_thematic_reivew_early_childhood_rpt1.pdf

Apologies, to me it would be perfect to have pre-school children given care and education by NFQ Level 7 and 8 qualified people.
The largest percentage of the sector at the moment are at level 5 or unqualified. I don't neccesarily agree that the teacher has to be a qualified primary school teacher either as there are NFQ level 7 and 8 graduates in early childhood education who know what is required to develop and implement a curriculum for this age.
Thanks for the link. I only had time to read the summary and I agree with most of it.

Gurgle

I've got nothing to argue with right up to here:

dogbert27 wrote: »

The terms and conditions for the ECCE scheme state that to qualify a playschool sessional service will be requried to provide the service for 3 hours a day for five days for 38 weeks to receive the maximum €64.50. They must have a minimum of 8 children. So taking the minimum of 8 children mulitplied by 64.50 by 38 weeks you get an income of €19608. From that you are to cover your overheads, (light and heat, food), insurance, wages, possibly rent, etc. It's not such a cash cow as the more children you take in the more staff you require to cover the ratios.

AFAIK, the maximum ratio is 15:1 for pre-school aged kids, with no required qualifications for the 1.

Now you've got €36.7k to cover the cost of the premises, light, heat and a near minimum-wage level assistant.

There is a fair whack of profit to be made there, especially in a large corporation-type creche.

dogbert27 wrote: »

Apologies, to me it would be perfect to have pre-school children given care and education by NFQ Level 7 and 8 qualified people.
The largest percentage of the sector at the moment are at level 5 or unqualified. I don't neccesarily agree that the teacher has to be a qualified primary school teacher either as there are NFQ level 7 and 8 graduates in early childhood education who know what is required to develop and implement a curriculum for this age.

Thats exactly my issue with the unregulated privatisation of pre-school education. All the profit is to be made by barely meeting the regulations, i.e. if you can get away with an 18yo school leaver on minimum wage then all business sense says do so.

Many of the small, converted garage type pre-schools are run by well qualified and experienced people - but they're going to find themselves hard pressed to compete with the corporate ones as the sector expands with the 'free' year of preschool. Once cost is taken out of the equation, parents are likely to choose based on appearances - and who's going to send their child to a converted garage when theres a super-creche around the corner?

dogbert27

Hi Gurgle - As per regulations the ratios are as follows:
Part time and Full time Pre-School
0-1 years Ratio 3:1
1-2 years Ratio 5:1
2-3 years Ratio 6:1
3-6 years Ratio 8:1

Sessional Pre-School
0-1 years Ratio 3:1
1-2.5 years Ratio 5:1
2.5-6 years Ratio 10:1

The maximum number of children to be catered for in one room in a sessional group is 20 subject to area/space required.

When you register your pre-school the HSE inspects your premises and tells you how many children you are allowed to enroll.

The regulations say that at least 50% of staff should be qualified therefore if you only hire one person then they have to be qualified although they can still only be paid minimum wage!

As for your issue with the privatisation I have exactly the same issue. As far as I can see nobody in government really wants to tackle the early years care and education sector because it is such a mess. The negative reaction from the sector to having to upgrade to level 6 alone for the ECCE scheme should have set off alarm bells for the government. Why would so many people object to getting a higher qualification?

Because they've set up their own creche/pre-school with minimum requirements of FETAC level 5 and are happy out.

They don't really care about such things as curriculums. They've been giving a way of making a lot of money from minimal qualifications.

I've seen FETAC level 7 graduates leave college to work BELOW FETAC level 5 qualified people and be told how to do something that they knew to be obviously wrong but got ignored or treated with disdain with the usual "don't think you're better than me cos you went to college" attitude. (I've seen this attitude in the engineering sector too between qualified electricians and graduate engineers)
To most of the people working in this sector they just see it as a job and not a profession. They are not aware of what the implications are to the children in their care if they do not perform.

The flip side to this though is that there are parents out there who don't care either if their child is being educated or not they just want to drop the children off somewhere for a few hours to give themselves a break.
Like many issues in this country, solving the problem of early years care and education requires a change in society before real change can be made to the sector.

reggae

childcare workers in ireland are very poorly paid. in community based pre schools staff often have to sign on dole during holiday periods. speaking from many years experience of working in childcare facilities and educated to hetac level 9 level, it is high time pre school were regulated by dept of education and science and that salaries and conditions were in line with other personel.

Gurgle

reggae wrote: »

it is high time pre school were regulated by dept of education and science and that salaries and conditions were in line with other personel.

Along with the curriculum of the preschool and qualification requirements for the staff.