The Status of Holistic Integrated Service Delivery Early Childhood Development and Education Centers Ref.No.SSTCRC2606
1. Introduction
The first years of a child’s life are undeniably important and crucial for early future learning, health, social development, and productivity. This is the period when the brain undergoes its most dramatic growth and the ability to think, speak, learn and reason. It is the period in the life a child of great mental elasticity and environmental adaptation. This is also a time when mental stimulation, nutrition, and emotional attachment all work together to shape a child’s identity, coping skills, intelligence and problem solving abilities needed for healthy, intelligent and positive adjusted adolescents and adults. The extent to which these processes lead to healthy development depends upon the qualities of stimulation and support, in the social environments. Consequently, this is the stage in human development when the most care and support is required. Nurturing care and early learning opportunities are important for children who already lag behind due to poverty, disability and marginalization. In many rural communities in Africa, children face increasing challenges due to global inequality, climate change, and crises due to displacements. Scaling up access to ECD services offers an opportunity to address these inequalities, break the cycle of poverty, and improve outcomes later in life. These factors are cornerstones for both society’s growth and the child’s well-being.
Early childhood development (ECD) programs aim to meet the cognitive, physical, and emotional health and developmental needs of children aged 0-8 years. Quality ECD programs integrate health, nutrition, education, and child protection. ECD programs build on community strengths; capacity education for caregivers; equitable access; support diversity, gender sensitive, multiple generational and ongoing quality assurance. ECD programs operate either as:
-Community-based ECD centers - established at the community level for the holistic development of young children
-Family-based - care provided in the child’s home
-Center-based ECD programs – includes crèches, nursery schools, daycares, preschools, children’s centers, and kindergartens.
Holistic integrated ECD Center suggests an approach that integrates the three approaches listed above. An ECD center despite being led by formal curriculum in formally build structures can also operate in the community in a designated school building, community building, religious structure (church, mosque, pagoda etc.) or under a tree shade or playgrounds. An integrated ECD approach can be expanded to include family-based ECD programs in which ECD caregivers/teachers can initiate outreach services to provide parents or caregivers with basic skills and knowledge in child development. Community ECD outreach program can ensure evidence-based approaches and age-appropriate activities are incorporated into traditional childrearing and cultural practices and beliefs of parenting. In addition, outreach workers or mentors would help parents or caregivers access services like immunization, health care, caregiver support groups, and involvement in income-generating activities as well as identifying issues and locally appropriate solutions.
A holistic integrated ECD program should be rooted on sustainability values drawing ownership, financing, and management from the government, community, nonprofit organizations, private businesses, or religious institutions. Sustainability ensures a multi-sectoral approach to ensure holistic ECD and Care is adapting a structured curriculum in line with national standards closely sustained and monitored in close collaboration with communities and linked to existing community structures. At the ECD Center, children (3-6 years) interact with their peers as they benefit from nutrition, health care, education, stimulation, and play based learning in an integrated manner.
Important goals of ECE centers are; i) Children aged 3-6 years access quality early childhood education and care (ECEC); ii) Mobilization of local resources for children development; iii) Connecting ECEC to local communities needs and iv) Multi-sectoral approach to ensure holistic Early Childhood Development and care (ECDC) in line with national standards. Some of the strategies and activities for ensuring a sustainable ECD include:
-Community mobilization, assessing communities’ needs and start parenting education.
-Strengthen links with local government and stakeholders in education, child protection, nutrition, and health.
-Building or upgrading an ECD center in line with national standards.
-Establishment of ECD management committees responsible for continuation of the ECD. Key interventions
-Communities generate revenues to enhance ECD services.
-Capacity building of ECD teachers through training and linkage to model ECD centers.
2. Challenges
-Quality community-based ECD centers require sufficient resources. Limited resources can result in services being uneven from one site to another, being overcrowded, having too few or inadequately trained staff, and being incapable of providing the care needed by the children, and instead just a place where they will be passively watched for much of the day.
-Fees for ECD centers can be prohibitive for vulnerable families struggling with issues such as HIV, poverty, orphans etc. Depending on the particular context, there are some ways to address the burden of fees.
-Teacher salaries and staff turnover can be an issue for ECD centers. If the government employs ECD staff, may not have opportunities for refresher training, may face human resources constraints, and may be rotated in and out of the center, affecting the quality of the childcare provided.
3. Purpose
The purpose of this study is to establish the status of the holistic integrated service delivery at the ECDE centers in selected counties in Kenya.
4. Objectives
-Establish the status of the holistic integration of service provision in ECDE in the counties
-Evaluate the extent of multi-sectoral approach of the relevant stakeholders in service delivery in the ECDEs
-Assess the quality of the implementation of ECDEs curriculum in the selected Counties
-Establish the Status of ECD workforce landscape in the target Counties
5. Theoretical Framework
Theoretical framework anchored on the World Bank’s (2014) Systems Approach for Better Education Results (SABER)-ECD policy rubric that describes three ECD policy goals as establishing an enabling environment; implementing widely; and monitoring and assuring quality. The Total Environment Assessment Model for Early Childhood Development (TEAM-ECD) is a framework that builds on the bio-ecological model to understand the environments and interactions that play significant roles in providing nurturing conditions to children in the earliest years of life. This framework describes four elements that are important for quality in ECD programs namely; Structural variables (the physical environment, the teacher-child ratio, the availability of equipment and materials), Caregiver variables (the level of education, training, mentoring, supervision, compensation of caregivers), Program variables (the curriculum, daily routine, the intensity of the program, parent involvement, health and nutrition provision) and process variables (caregiver-child and child-child interactions, staff, space and materials, involvement of families and the wider community). The TEAM-ECD framework is organized by interacting and interdependent spheres of influence which include the individual sphere, the family and home sphere, the neighborhood or residential community sphere, the relational community sphere, the ECD services sphere, the regional environmental sphere, the national environmental sphere, and the global environmental sphere.
6.Research Design and Methodology
The study will employ convergent design approach to enable investigators conceptually and analytically to integrate qualitative and qualitative data. The research will be mixed methods research. Quantitative and qualitative data will be collected simultaneously but analyzed separately. The results are combined to draw recommendations. Mixed qualitative and quantitative research methods designs validate each other. The research methods are complimentary and allow triangulation to enable the data corroborate, expand and develop the results for to holistic answer for the research question.