Caroline Gipps

The Under-threes in the Nursery

Very few studies have looked at the experience or development of children under three years of age who receive substitute day care. The paucity of official provision for this age group reflects, at least in part, a widely held view that children under three are best cared for at home, as does the fact that the limited places available are allocated to children whose acute needs make institutional care appear the lesser of two evils.

Who Goes to Combined Centres

This chapter looks in greater detail at the different types of provision offered by the four nursery centres, at the ways in which places were allocated and the charges made for them. As well as describing these aspects of the centres’ organisation, we look also at the views and experiences of some of the parents whose children were attending the new nurseries.

The Effects of Different Types of Nursery on Children’s Social and Emotional Behaviour

The role of the nursery group in promoting the social and emotional development of pre-school age children has long been regarded as of prime importance, either as a positive contribution to subsequent adjustment to the school system or, more realistically perhaps, as an immediate source of enjoyment and well-being for the children concerned. The opportunity for co-operative play and for developing social relationships with other children and adults is seen as one of the positive features of all types of nursery provision, although for some children, especially those receiving full day care on priority grounds, the role of the nursery with regard to their social/emotional development may be more compensatory than enriching.

An Introduction to the Combined Centres

The purpose of this chapter is to present an introductory picture of the four combined nursery centres which formed the subject of the research — to describe how they came into being, the kind of areas in which they had been set up and, most importantly, the characteristic features of their organisation which distinguished them from the ‘conventional’ day nursery or nursery school.

Observed Behaviour of Nursery Staff

The previous chapter described in some detail the views expressed by the nursery staff of their own and others’ work role. This revealed differences of emphasis, especially with regard to the educational and caring aspects of pre-school provision, between the different types of nursery and between the two professions involved.

Administrative Framework of the Combined Centres

The integration of services hitherto provided separately by education and social services departments presented challenging requirements of a joint administrative framework in which combined centres could be planned, operated and supported.

Observed Behaviour of Nursery Children

The important role of play in children’s cognitive and social development has been long and widely recognised, and numerous researchers have conducted systematic observations of play behaviour in various pre-school groups (Jones, 1972). The findings of such studies not only increase our understanding of the relationship between aspects of play and children’s level of development in different areas, but also, by implication, offer insight and guidance to those directly involved in the promotion of learning in the pre-school setting.

Provision for Health Care

The final area of children’s development investigated in the evaluation study was policy and practice concerning health care, a comparatively neglected topic in studies of pre-school provision and services. The separate development of day nurseries and nursery schools, described in Chapter 1, was paralleled by an administrative division of responsibility for the children’s health care between local authority health and education departments respectively. Traditionally, greater emphasis on physical welfare has been found in day nurseries, which until 1971 were under the direct control of local health departments.

Staff in Combined Centres

The difference in the nature of provision offered by the traditional nursery school or class and day nursery is matched by variations in the number, type and working conditions of the staff employed. The typical nursery school has a head teacher in charge, with each class the responsibility of a qualified teacher assisted by one or two nursery nurses, who have normally undergone the NNEB (National Nursery Examination Board) training. All staff are employed by the local education department, and work normal school hours and terms.

The Effects of Different Types of Nursery on Children’s Cognitive Development

Perhaps the most obvious, and certainly one of the most important questions to tackle in evaluating the combined nursery centre was: what effect did this new type of provision have on the children attending? In this chapter we look at the study’s findings concerning the children’s cognitive development, while the following chapter presents the results of an assessment of their social and emotional behaviour.