This blog is based on the presentation given by Jackie Musgrave at the recent BECERA conference
The BECERA conference on 22nd February was a great opportunity to share the latest instalment of the research that Jane Payler and I started back in 2018. We were motivated to look at what practitioners do, and can do, to promote children’s health. Many children experience poor levels of health, especially those who live in poverty, The state of children’s health was of concern before the pandemic, and the restrictions imposed to limit the spread of the virus have made a bad situation worse.
Stage 1, the pilot, was conducted in an early childhood pre-school setting with 106 babies and children on roll in an area of high deprivation. The work of Bryk, Gomez and Grunow (2011) on networked improvement communities and of Arbour et al. 2015 on continuous quality improvement guided our thinking and action for a participatory approach to promoting child health.
The pilot of the research included the use of an original tool devised by us, Child Health Promotion: A Toolkit for Early Childhood Education and Care Practitioners, we developed a 5 Step Programme as a model to guide practitioners in identifying and implementing a health promotion activity. The findings from the pilot (Musgrave and Payler 2021) helped to refine the Toolkit, which is now available electronically free of charge, and develop an onward agenda to extend the use of the 5 Steps.
Phase 2 of the research started in Spring of 2022, with the aim of using the Toolkit and 5 Steps in other settings. The area of health promotion that was identified by co-researchers as needing attention by the Phase 2 participants was physical development. The need for interventions to support and promote physical development and encourage physical activity reflects reports that many children’s physical development has been affected by greater levels of inactivity during lockdown.
The findings foreground the valuable role that ECEC can contribute to promoting health of babies and young children. Health can be improved and promoted through implementation of many of the aims of the Early Years Foundation Stage (2021), such as the requirement to provide healthy eating options and access to outdoor play. Key to successful health promotion work is the need for respectful and positive relationships with parents and carers.
And in the post-pandemic recovery, the concerns about the health of babies and children are not going away. But the message to Government about the importance of high quality ECEC that is provided by practitioners who are rewarded appropriately for their work with young children, and in this case, for their contribution to their health outcomes, remains unheard. This situation must be addressed, our children are precious, and they deserve adult support to promote their health so that they can live the best life that is possible – they deserve no less.
If you would like to receive a copy of the Toolkit, please email me jackie.musgrave@open.ac.uk
References
Bryk, A. S., Gomez, L. M. and Gomez, A. (2010) Getting ideas into action: building networked improvement communities in education. Reorganising Educational Research and Development. Carnegie Perspectives. Stanford: Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
Department for Education (2021) Statutory framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage: setting the standards for learning, development and care for children from birth to five.
Musgrave. J. and Payler, J. (2021) Proposing a model for promoting Children’s Health in Early Childhood Education and Care Settings. Children and Society – https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/chso.12449
Ofsted (October 2020) COVID-19 series: briefing on early years, October 2020 Evidence from research interviews with 208 registered early years providers and maintained nursery schools between 5 and 16 October. Available from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/943492/COVID-19_series_briefing_on_early_years_November_2020.pdf accessed 9 February 2023
Free resources
Supporting Physical Development in Early Childhood – 18 hours course. Developed in partnership with Public Health England and ActiveMatters https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/supporting-physical-development-early-childhood – funded by Health Education England