Profile 1 - Day Nursery
Nursery Manager
My main tasks are to take care of the children and the staff, in terms of Health & Safety and to provide a stimulating, safe environment for them to thrive in. I think one of the main qualities for a Nursery Manager is empathy with staff and children and to gain an insight into their needs and understanding. Be prepared to look at new ways of doing things and to grow and develop within the profession. It’s important to be patient, to be able to multi-task and to retain a sense of humour and to keep staff motivated, training being an important one. I think that also as a Manager you have to make absolutely sure that your customer service is of very high quality and that means building firm, solid relationships with parents and carers.
Profile 2 - Day Nursery
SENCO Nursery Practitioner
I’m called Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator. My first job is to make a very good relationship with parents; they still need maybe coming to terms that their child has a disability. Some children may just need input from what’s called a specialist teacher, who will come into the setting, see the child and the parents. Some children may have one professional; other children could have up to 20 different professional agencies dealing with them. When we’re working with children with special needs everything is always positive, but I also have to relay back any information not just to any other support workers that we may have to use but all the staff that are working in that class with the child, so that every member of staff is aware of what we’re doing, why we’re doing it and how to do it.
Profile 3 - Day Nursery
Nursery Practitioner
I look after all the children’s needs, I’m a key person within my class, I have a set number of children to look after and make sure that the parents of these key children know exactly where their children are with their development and make sure that their emotional needs are met and that all the activities that are out in the room. You’re developing their creativeness and you’re working on their emotional needs, their language.
I’m quite an outgoing sort of person, really friendly, really helps cause you need to be able to build a relationship with the people you work with. You need to be really interesting so that the children are interested in you, I absolutely adore my job and I couldn’t see myself doing anything else, I love everything about it. I really like coming to work.
Profile 4 – Pre-School
Pre-school Manager/Owner
I enjoy working with the children and when I employ staff that’s ultimately what I want them to want to do, is to work with the children. We try and keep paperwork and anything like that in the classroom to a minimum, so that they’re giving all their time and energy when they’re in the room with the kids and that’s what I want to do. So whenever I’m getting a bit bogged down and I feel like I’ve been in the office too much or things, I get back on the floor with those kids because you know what you get with them is black and white, there’s no complications and life is as they see it and its just brilliant, to watch it through their eyes and then it makes you take stock of your own life and make you realise as well so you know its definitely why I’m here. It took me a while to discover it but when I found it, I’m not going to let it go.
Profile 5 - Children’s Centre
Children’s Centre Manager
One of my main roles is do develop the vision for the Centre, which is meeting the Sure Start principles, see parents, try to meet with parents well before they’re actually bringing their children into the Nursery. I like to make sure they feel comfortable about it particularly for the parents of children with special needs. Maintaining the vision for a Children’s Centre amongst a very diverse and large staff is a big part of my job as well.
Profile 6 – Children’s Centre
Children’s Centre Nursery Manager
I’m the acting Manager here at the Carousel Day Nursery. My day to day, you know sort of business is the running of the Nursery, so I obviously make sure that all the children are safe and happy and of course the staff are also. I’m also in charge of the daily running of the Nursery, so things like invoices, staff rota’s, making sure the ratios are correct in each room as well. The qualities needed I think, to be a Nursery Manager is dedication, patience is another one of them and flexibility I believe as well.
Profile 7 – Children’s Centre
Children’s Centre Qualified Teacher
Within the Centre I work on inviting groups of parents into the Centre, hard to reach families and at the moment I’m working on the Messy Club with them. I’m also working with the DU, which is the Development Unit and I support and share ideas related to individual children and work in the community with the DU. Part of what I do is work on Transition stage, getting to know the parents and then getting to know the Early Years Teachers in school, who are still working within the Foundation stage and helping the children get to know their new routines and ways in which they’ll work within their school.
Profile 8 – Out of School Clubs
Male playworker
My job role is a play worker, I generally oversee the children playing, making sure that they’re safe in what they do, not interfering with their play, allowing the children to develop with/learn through play. A lot of the children like to play on their own, a lot of the children come up to us and say “oh can you just help us, can you do this for us” and we will join in if asked. I mean we’re blessed here at after school club at Highfield that we actually have 4 male play workers working here, which I think is absolutely brilliant and the kids absolutely love it and the parents they thinks its wonderful as well.
Profile 9 – Out of School Clubs
Breakfast Club Supervisor
This Breakfast Club opens at 7.30 in the morning; we’re here maybe 15 minutes to half an hour earlier to set up. Then the parents can drop their children off on their way to work and know that they can get to work on time. After the cereals and toast and when they’ve eaten, they’re offered fruit, which we encourage and then they go out to play or into the next room to play games. At 08.30 they’ll come back in to do their teeth before they go in, after which they’re only offered water to drink and then the Juniors go off about 08.40 and the infants are taken up to their playground about 08.45. Then we come back, make sure everything’s tidied up and put away and leave about 09.05.
Profile 10 – Out of School Clubs
After School Club Supervisor
My name is Maddie and I’m Supervisor of the Doddinghurst After School Club. I’m basically in charge of supervising children, staff and its very much hands on. It’s certainly not a removed Management position. We provide the children with a home from home environment after school until they’re picked up; provide activities for them and just a safe, caring environment. You have to enjoy the children, even when they’re driving you mad. You do have days when you don’t have a good day but you can always see a good quality and get fun from them as much as hopefully you give to them.
Profile 11- Training Roles
0-3 Development Officer
There has never been a stronger time really in terms of the Government’s agenda now to really look at why birth to 3 does really matter and we have a framework that we are currently working with, which is a very, very strong framework, it focuses on stages of development rather than ages and it’s a framework not a curriculum, so its about understanding individual children’s needs. And I think in terms of our practitioners and early years settings within Essex we have been very pro-active in trying to support their professional development in understanding the really specific needs of very young children and tuning into, not necessarily their verbal communication, but their body language and the way that they display their needs and wants really and how we can meet their individual needs. I think for me as a professional working with 0’s to 3’s and supporting people who are caring for that age group, its really important that we get right the children’s emotional well being, it’s very clear from research that the biggest impact you can have on children’s development in terms of their personality, their brain development and their emotional well being is before their 3rd year. So I think its really very important that we support our early years practitioners to understand about the attachment issues, the triangle of trust between a carer, a parent and a child is really important. If we don’t have a child of a very young age who is emotionally attached, its very difficult for that child to then begin to learn and progress through their stages of development.
Profile 12 – Training Roles
Organisational Development Consultant
I’m an Organisational Development Consultant. My job is to manage the recruitment and training team, who deliver a training program for people who work with children within the Borough. My role within the Borough is to manage a small team, who are responsible for organising a continued professional development training program, which is available to people who work with children either in a paid or voluntary capacity. I find my job really enjoyable because it gives me an opportunity to speak with lots of people, I speak with staff who work in a setting, Manager’s and also the general public, who live within the Borough who are interested in working in childcare. I have the opportunity also to teach those people who are interested in working in childcare, which is really nice because we can then look at where they are, what they need to do and perhaps any training they already have and progress them on so they can actually apply for jobs within our local childcare and be successful in actually progressing a career which is what we would like people to do in childcare.
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