Responsive Care

Statement of Purpose

Seashells Nursery ELCC recognises that all children have a right to be safe, healthy, achieving, nurtured, active, respected, responsible and included and that it is the role of responsive adults to ensure this.

Children thrive socially and emotionally when care, interest and sensitivity to their needs is shown by staff. Research has highlighted the importance of nurture and attachment in supporting brain development and the consequences of neglect. This is supported through Getting it Right for Every Child using the wellbeing indicators.

Relationships are key in making the child feel valued, safe and secure and are at the heart of learning and development. The Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014.

The following policy outlines the setting's guidance to staff on providing an environment based on responsive care. Throughout this guidance the term parents is used to include all main caregivers.

Nurturing Relationships

Each child will be allocated a key person within Seashells who will be their prime caregiver and key link with the child's family. Our staff are trained, competent and skilled, are able to reflect on their practice and follow their professional and organisational codes. It is the responsibility of the key person to form positive relationships with the child and family that allow them to become aware of the child's preferences, needs and wider family influences that impact on the child in order to respond sensitively at all times. However, all staff should foster relationships of trust and confidence with children and families attending the setting. Appropriate adult/child ratios are observed.

Responsive interactions between adults and children encourage language development and social skills. Staff should endeavour to maximise these opportunities by talking and listening to children during care routines, meal and snack times, play etc. as well as during planned learning activities.

Staff should be aware that children are very sensitive to relationships between adults and should strive to present a good role model of positive, respectful relationships and interactions both with other members of staff and also with parents.

Rights of the Child

Staff should respect the rights of the child to influence decisions relating to them. Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) states that children have a right to express their views and have their opinions taken into account appropriate to the child's level of maturity. Very young children and babies are able to express preferences through use of gesture, smiling, crying and by their level of engagement. Staff need to be sensitive to these indicators.

Respecting Individuality

Children should be valued for their ethnic background, language, culture, faith and family circumstances and staff should respond positively to and celebrate this diversity. Staff should always demonstrate respect for children's home values and social experience. Where children have physical or learning difficulties staff should support them so that they feel included, responding sensitively to ensure fairness, equality and opportunity.

Children's needs vary as they develop and staff should be aware of how best to support them. Realising the Ambition offers practical advice for staff on responding appropriately to the developmental needs of babies, toddlers and the young child. Staff should become familiar with this guidance.

While accepting that a child's age offers a general guide to expectations of development, we recognise that all children develop at their own individual rate. Staff will use personal observations and assessments to enable them to support the child's development responsively.

Continuity of Care

Young children benefit from familiar and positive routines. The key person should discuss the child's care with their parents, taking their views and wishes into consideration. It is the key person's responsibility to ensure that other members of staff are aware of any care preferences expressed by parents, as per their personal care plan, in line with statutory requirements. This will ensure continuity of approach.

While consideration needs to be taken of the setting's daily routines, staffing availability and other practicalities, care routines such as feeding, changing and sleep should be responsive to the child's needs in the first instance.

In order to support a positive experience for the child, transitions from home to the ELC setting and movement between 'stage' related rooms within the setting should be carefully planned by the key person in conjunction with the parent, taking the child's views into consideration. The nature and speed of the transition will be in response to the individual child's needs.

Partnership Working

We view parents as partners in their child's care, learning and development and as the main caregivers we respect their unique knowledge of the child. We will involve parents in all decisions regarding their child and offer support and information where necessary to encourage a consistent approach to the child's care from all significant adults.

Where appropriate we will work closely with other agencies such as Health, Social Work and Psychological Services in the best interest of the child. We will strive to attain the best possible outcomes for them and ensure they are appropriately involved in discussions and decisions that affect them. The wellbeing of the child is paramount.

Environments

The UNCRC (Article 31) firmly asserts the child's fundamental right to play freely and make choices about their own learning. The Seashells Nursery environment will reflect opportunities for play that respond to individual children's needs.

We aim to provide an environment where all children feel welcomed and secure and which responds to their varying needs for familiarity and safety, stimulation and challenge, quiet spaces, boisterous play, indoor and outdoor experiences, reflection or participation, controlled risk taking, fun and enjoyment. All these experiences will be supported by attuned staff.

Building the Ambition (Scottish Government 2014, p53 -73) describes three principal drivers of early development and learning as:

· wellbeing

· communication

· promoting curiosity, enquiry and creativity.

It offers practical guidance to staff on their role in supporting these areas and in providing appropriate environments. Staff should become familiar with this guidance. Young children are very aware of and responsive to atmosphere and staff should be aware of any subliminal messages given through body language or tone of voice.

Monitoring of this Policy

It will be the responsibility of Miriam Lindsay, Nursery Manager to ensure that all staff, including new or temporary staff, are familiar with this policy and to monitor that it is being implemented. This will be achieved through both formal and informal observation of staff practice.

Links to national policy:

Health and Social Care Standards – My support, my life (Dignity and respect, Compassion, Being included, Responsive care and support, Wellbeing)

http://www.gov.scot/Resource/0052/00520693.pdf

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2002/114/contents/made (Scottish Statutory Instruments)

http://www.unicef.org.uk/Documents/Publication-pdfs/UNCRC_summary.pdf

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/1141/0065063.pdf (GIRFEC)

http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/earlyyears/prebirthtothree/index.asp

http://www.sssc.uk.com/about-the-sssc/codes-of-practice/what-are-the-codes-of-practice

https://education.gov.scot/improvement/learning-resources/realising-the-ambition/?dm_i=LQE,6RCQ3,MUS8SA,R0T2D,1 (Realising the Ambition)

Find out more:

http://developingchild.harvard.edu/resources/reports_and_working_papers/working_papers/wp12/

(The Science of Neglect: The persistent absence of responsive care disrupts the developing brain. Working Paper 12, Harvard University.)