Getting to Know Your International Contacts - Part 2

This week I received e-mail contact from Beth Warkentin from the Canadian Association for Young Children. She used to be an Early childhood teacher, instructor, and the director of the Saskatchewan division, but has since stepped down. Ms. Warkentin was able to direct me to a couple of websites that has given me lots of insight into her province in Canada.
The Canadian National Childcare Federation
www.education.gov.sk.ca/ELCC

There was so much information that it was overwhelming, but I ran across this article called, "Best Approaches to Quality Enhancement in the 'Informal' Child care Sector". The article talked about quality of care in the family childcare home, with the focus on what we call "unregulated" care. It was interesting because in Canada they see care by family members as just another viable option for parents and in Canada this is the mosts utilized care. Some of the reasons given were: parents work irregular hours, like the smaller setting, easier to obtain for rural families, and they can find more cultural/linguistically familiar settings to meet their needs. They feel that the term "unregulated" sends a negative message about the assumption that the program is of "poor" quality. For this reason they prefer the term "informal". They feel these informal settings should be treated as equals to licensed care so they have worked to come up with a support system called the "Family Support Model" which looks at these two types of care as a continuum with family childcare on one end and Childcare Centers on the other end. The closer the program is to home care, they get referred to more community development and other initiatives. The programs that fall closer to centers will get more professional development and regulation. This new strategy focuses on universal outreach to all as it looks for ways to support these programs.

Some of the support includes unconditional positive regard through home visits, toy libraries, drop in groups, neighborhood networking, newsletters, and workshops. In addition they encourage peer support, affirm lifelong learning, promoting relationships based on equality and respect for diversity. The Family Support Model also believes that the focus should be on the community capacity and strenghts instead of deficits. The article closes with this quote, "Seek first to understand then to be understood"(Covey, 1989, pp. 237).

This gives me a lot to think about, as in my state we look at things a little differently. In my county we just passed an ordinance that all childcare programs regardless of home or center need to become licensed. The way we look at it is that children deserve the best possible care regardless of where they are sent. It does not mean that homes are of less quality or unsafe, but if you look at statistics you will find that most fatalities occurr in the Family Child Care home. Regulation will not save all children however, if it can help to save just one child than it is worth it. Having been on both sides I can relate to both so this gives me another prospective to think about.