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The Early Years Collaborative
is a national initiative bringing together Scottish community planning
partnerships
to make positive changes to the way the services work
with children and their families. Community planning partnerships
are the people who make decisions on local priorities.
It includes strategic members of health,
police, local authority and the voluntary sector.
This short animation aims to give an overview
of how this is progressing in Falkirk, to share this information with families
and those who work closely with families and children.
In 2008 Scottish Government published a paper called the Early Years Framework
They set out then aspirations to give Scottish children the best start in
life
and the steps they would take to reach this aspiration..
The Early Years Collaborative highlights the importance of in early intervention
within Early Years
investment and support to ensure better
outcomes for all. Since 2013
local professionals who either make decisions about
services or work directly with children and families
have gone along to a number of learning sessions. They have learned from research
how vital changes can be made to help improve lives for our children.
The model for improvement is a scientific process to enable
practitioners
to make small changes and measure the impact
on children and families. The basics
are you have an idea about how to improve the way you work with a child or
family
you make a small change that embraces that improvement
and then you study the results. Did it make the difference you wanted?
The results are then recorded. The important factors
are reporting whether improvement has been achieved
and learned from these tests. Those who work with children and families are aware
is important to identify
what doesn't work as much as what has been successful.
These small changes are then shared with others around Scotland so that is a
national picture
of which changes can lead to improvement.
After the learning sessions the group come back
and share what they have learned with other people in their work.
At present we have a number of people who are working with children and
families
testing out their work practices to see if it improves the work they do for that
child or family. The findings of these tests are collated centrally
in Falkirk
so we can share and learn from them. The group
also share their learning from the learning sessions and the testing that
has been going on
to a wider group of people who work with children and families
at an event called Falkirk Early Years Collaborative home team.
The more people who know about what is being learned
the more likely we are to improve our work with children and families.
One at the National aims is to reduce infant mortality.
Research tells us that the health risk to a
pregnant mother and her baby is greatly reduced
if they are attending the maternity appointments and being monitored by the
very
early stages of pregnancy. In Falkirk
midwives have been testing different methods of increasing pregnant mothers
awareness
of how to book their first appointment with the maternity services.
Being aware of how to book into these appointments
reduces any delay in getting the appropriate support.
In Falkirk they have developed posters about the booking system
put information cards in pharmacies next to pregnancy testing kits.
This has resulted in pregnant mothers booking directly
and earlier. Another aim
is that children will be meeting their expected developmental milestones
by the time they have their 27 to 30 month assessment.
This has been introduced across Scotland and in Falkirk
health visitors are working towards carrying out these reviews
for a hundred percent of the children in their practice.
One of the tests that is simple and has proved a huge success
is changing the way the appointment is made. The health visitor phones the
parents to make the appointment at a mutually convenient time
instead of the previous practice of sending out an appointment not knowing if the
parent was able to attend at that time of day.
This personal contact has led to this health visitor
having all her families attending the appointments and 100 percent of
the reviews completed.
Another aim is that children will be meeting that expected developmental
skills and abilities
when they start primary school. Nationally
every parent is given a book called every day is a learning day.
It is given out by the health visitor with the book bug package.
The book is a great aid to doing everyday activities with your child
to help them develop and learn. However we realize
that parents often find it difficult to allocate aim to read this material.
In Falkirk we have produced a short animation that explains the basics of this
book
and are testing whether it is a more productive way of getting the
message across to parents.
If you work with children and families in Falkirk look out for the dates
of those wider home team meetings
or call the Falkirk Early Years Collaborative Team
to be added to the list if people who wish to be involved.
If you are a parent ask your health visitor or Early Years Officer at
nursery
if they know about the Early Years Collaborative. Are they doing any small
tests
you could be involved in or perhaps you could share ideas with them
about what would improve things for you and your child.
You can visit the blog at the following link:
and you can also view Every Day is a Learning Day animations at the link
detailed here.