Florence Pirard

Accompaniment and quality in childcare services: the emergence of a culture of professionalization

This article addresses various educational cultures observed today in a variety of training and professional development contexts in the field of early childhood education. The paper also analyses methods of developing and implementing training or professional ‘accompaniment’. This notion of ‘accompaniment’ has been developed in the context of French-speaking countries, especially in relation to the development of childcare services and the search for quality. From a case study using ‘accompaniment’ as a professional development initiative to consider freedom of movement for children aged birth to three years as a quality criterion in daily educational practice, the article illustrates the importance of considering innovation in the professional development of early years educators, not only as a new initiative in this specific context, but also as a signifier of the wider emergence of a new culture of professionalization where actions, actors and environment undergo change simultaneously.

From the curriculum framework to its dissemination: the accompaniment of educational practices in care facilities for children under three years

This article addresses the accompaniment of early childhood professionals in the French Community of Belgium, during the implementation of new curricular frameworks for children under three years of age. It provides a critical analysis of the risks of standardisation arising from the development of quality tools, when such tools are not accompanied by long-term, professional coaching participatory processes and democratic debates between all stakeholders. It shows the importance, especially in countries where the system of care and education is divided, of designing procedures and approaches that strengthen inclusive professionalism.

New developments in Belgian childcare policy and practice

In this article recent evolutions in the French and Flemish communty of Belgium are critically analysed. In the French Community of Belgium the importance of the pedagogical function of childcare has increased, while the policy of the Flemish Community focused on the social function. In both parts the was also a diffrent evolution concerning the professionalisation process. While the situation in the French Community did not changed, in the flemish Community a process of deprofessionalisation has been going on since the beginning of the new millenium.

Men in childcare services: From enrolment in training programs to job retention

This article presents a study conducted in Federation Wallonia-Brussels (FWB) to identify factors that motivate men to enrol in training programmes and work in a field where women are the majority, in a context in which few proactive measures are taken to overcome gender stereotypes. Comprehensive interviews conducted with male childcare ‘informants’ who had been working with children under the age of three for at least a year in subsidised childcare centres helped us to identify factors which seemed to influence their decision to enrol in and continue an initial training programme with a curriculum that is not gender-neutral, and then work in a profession that is almost exclusively female.

Professional Development in a Competent System: An Emergent Culture of Professionalization

Workforce quality and professionalization in the field of early childhood education are widely considered to be a powerful lever in improving the quality of childcare services. This emphasis demonstrates the necessity of increasing the level of practitioner qualification across the sector and to revise both professional profiles and training curriculum in response to the complex demands of professional activity. Nowadays workspace is recognized as a potential learning space where individual, institutional, inter-institutional and political actions interact. This approach to professionalization is grounded in a theoretical and systemic view that recognizes different levels of responsibility in the development of professional and quality services. This paper presents different educational cultures observed today in the variety of training and professional actions in the Western World. It shows that changes in early childhood education could be understood as a signifier of the emergence of a new culture of professionalization where actions, actors, and environment undergo change simultaneously.

Le vécu de parents en situation de précarité à l'entrée à l'école maternelle en Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles

In the changing political context of early learning and childcare in Scotland it is important to gather knowledge in order to understand the work of childminders and to make it more visible. The small scale scoping study presented here seeks to explore the role played, in Scotland, by childminders as they welcome and care for young children. In Scotland there are currently 6,102 people registered as childminders to provide day care in their own homes: they provide for 34,600 children (Care Inspectorate, 2015). Many of these childminders (about 80%) are members of the Scottish Childminding Association (SCMA). Their work is equivalent to that of day-carers and home-based carers in other countries. Typically, the children who benefit from their services have working parents who often choose this form of home-based care as the next-best choice to having their children at home.