Safeguarding Policies in Schools for Effective Childcare Practice

How do national and local guidelines, policies and procedures affect your day to day work in school

The safeguarding policy in the school to ensure effective childcare practice is maintained include recruiting staffs & teachers with proper background analysis, monitoring the working nature of staffs & teachers and providing training regarding childcare practice to the staffs and teachers. The effective background analysis of the staffs and teachers before recruitment leads the school authorities to determine if the individuals to be recruited have effective knowledge in accomplishing childcare practices at the school or are included in any malpractices regarding childcare (Abujarad et al. 2018; Schröder et al. 2019). This is required so that the school authorities can provide proper training to the individual and avoid people with malpractice background to be eliminated from recruitment to ensure effective childcare practices are performed in a safe manner where no children are harmed. The monitoring the work helps in the safeguarding of children and ensure effective childcare practices are performed because the authorities can identify if the person is acting according to rules for childcare or not (Ahmad and Yaacob, 2019). Thus, the mentioned safeguarding policies are effective for the school authorities to ensure proper childcare practice through the safeguarding of the children as no malpractices and people who are intended to execute any harm are avoided to be involved in teaching the children.

The Every Child Matters Act 2004 informs that effective safeguarding to the children is to be provided within the society to ensure their good health and well-being (gov.uk, 2004). The Act is followed in the school settings to protect children from harm. This has led to ensure child protection at the settings as the school authorities have developed the responsibility to ensure taking actions to avoid any harm or abuse to the children. The section 16 of Children Act 1989 indicates that risk assessment is to be made for children who are suspected to be vulnerable or at harm (egislation.gov.uk, 1989). The Act is followed in the school settings which has lead the authorities to make the teachers report any suspected risk regarding the student so that risk assessment can be performed to understand the steps to be taken in protecting the child from any further harm.

In order to ensure, the voice of the children is heard the school authorities have ensured teachers listen effectively to the children demands and needs (Richards, 2018). This has affected the day-to-day work of the teachers in the setting to pay keen attention to the voices of the children to understand as well as identify which student needs help or protection to avoid them from harm. The supporting of children who show concern in the school settings are done by providing them with proper assistance and reporting childcare authorities to intervene (Peckover and Trotter, 2015). This has affected the day-to-day work to remain concern regarding which child requires help as well as helping them to meet authorities who can help them to ensure their safety.

Explain how your settings policies for confidentiality comply with data protection and information handling and sharing.

The Data Protection Act 2018 mentions that no personal details of the individuals are to be made public without informing them. Moreover, the use of information is to be made transparently, fairly and lawfully as well as handled in such a way so that security is maintained (legislation.gov.uk, 2018). The Act is followed in the settings and to comply with its guidance the personal details of the children and young people are protected through password within the computer. The password is known to only limited person within the settings who are in direct contact with the children. In case any personal information of the children is to be shared, prior permission from the students as well as their parents are taken by mentioning them in details regarding the need of sharing the information as well as the way information asked to be shared is to be used. Further, the personal information of the children while sharing is handled in such a way so that the concerned person is able to know the data. This is to ensure security and protection of the information for safeguarding of the child.

How do you support children and young people's self-confidence and self-esteem

The self-confidence and self-esteem of the children can be developed in the school settings by encouraging them and providing them scope to show innovative and practical skills along with criticism for failure is to be avoided (Mulyadi et al. 2016). This is required so that the children can feel inspired to showcase their abilities rather than avoiding them to be showcased because of fear of criticism. The self-esteem of the children is ensured by praising them for accomplishing goals and the student who fails is provided support in accomplishing objectives rather than criticising them (Augestad, 2017). This is because praise helps the children feel valued and dignified whereas support to accomplish gaols by the students who have failed helps them develop the confidence to achieve goals. For example, in my settings, while I asked students of 1st grade to draw scenery few students failed to draw it properly. I personally guided them regarding the way they can draw scenery from their imagination. In the next class, it was seen that those students presented me a beautiful piece of work without facing any hesitation that they have previously failed to accomplish it. Thus, the support provided them confidence in them to be able to achieve study goals like others did at the first attempt.

Provide an analysis of the importance of supporting resilience in children and young people

Resilience is referred to the process in which people try to adapt to the trauma, adversity, threat or tragedy (Jenson and Fraser, 2015). The resilience in the setting is supported by developing positive relationship with the students by the teachers. This is because positive relationships help the students feel sense of security in traumatic situations making them share their emotions with the teachers to help them adapt to the situation (Masten, 2018). The resilience of the children is supported in the setting by helping them develop proper morals and values so that they have the ability to understand the way to act by identifying what is right or wrong (Dubowitz et al. 2016). The benefit of supporting resilience in children is that it helps them to develop protection mechanisms against experiences that could bring damage to them. Moreover, it is beneficial as it helps the children maintain balance in life and develop the ability to cope with stressful periods (Jenson and Fraser, 2015). The resilience in children is going to help them avoid getting panicked and anxious in the troublesome situation as well as assist them to avoid suicidal attempts in stressful periods.

Why is it important to work with children and young people to ensure they have strategies to protect themselves and make decisions about safety

The children are to be equipped with strategies for protecting themselves so that they can avoid abuse and harm towards them (Ang, 2015). This is because children who are unable to protect themselves from harm at times develop fatal injury as well as mental health issues which ruins their future to lead a normal life. The children are to be made aware regarding protection strategies and develop decision regarding safety so that they can fight with anxiety and fear to develop strong psychological condition in leading a proper life (Brocklehurst, 2017). For example, in case the children are unable to understand the way they are to protect themselves from bully at Scholl they develop distress to attend school which would eventually lead them to drop out. Thus, students are to be made equipped with protection and safety strategies so that they are able to have a better physical and mental health as well as avoid death due to injury or negative mental state due to bully made at school.

The ways in which children and young people in the settings are empowered to make positive as well as informed choices to ensure their safety is as follows:

The children are taught to understand the brutal situations they are going to come across and the way to cope with them to empower them to ensure their well-being (Mitchell, 2015). For example, the children are taught karate to develop skills they are to use when they are to be fatally or brutally attacked to save themselves.

The children are made to understand regarding the boundaries they are to manage and maintain in life (Grealish et al. 2017). For instance, children are taught in the settings that few people may take time to accomplish certain tasks and they require being calm and avoid criticising them. The children are taught regarding the way they are to interact in positive manner with disabled people so that they are able to ensure the rights and dignity of the disabled individuals are not harmed.

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References

Abujarad, F., Desloge, A., Carlson, K. and Swierenga, S.J., 2018. The Importance of User-Centered Design in Performing Background Checks in Child Care. In International Conference of Design, User Experience, and Usability. New York: Springer, Cham.

Ahmad, Z. and Yaacob, S., 2019. The Childcare Center at Workplace: Observing (Monitoring) and Evaluation System to Support the Social Protection Program among Poor Children. Open International Journal of Informatics (OIJI), 7(1), pp.60-70.

Augestad, L.B., 2017. Self-concept and self-esteem among children and young adults with visual impairment: A systematic review. Cogent Psychology, 4(1), p.1319652.

Brocklehurst, H., 2017. Who's afraid of children?: Children, conflict and international relations. London: Routledge.

Dubowitz, H., Thompson, R., Proctor, L., Metzger, R., Black, M.M., English, D., Poole, G. and Magder, L., 2016. Adversity, maltreatment, and resilience in young children. Academic pediatrics, 16(3),pp.233-239.

Ang, R.P., 2015. Adolescent cyberbullying: A review of characteristics, prevention and intervention strategies. Aggression and violent behavior, 25, pp.35-42.

Grealish, A., Tai, S., Hunter, A., Emsley, R., Murrells, T. and Morrison, A.P., 2017. Does empowerment mediate the effects of psychological factors on mental health, well‐being, and recovery in young people?. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, 90(3), pp.314-335.

Jenson, J.M. and Fraser, M.W. eds., 2015. Social policy for children and families: A risk and resilience perspective. Sage Publications.

Masten, A.S., 2018. Resilience theory and research on children and families: Past, present, and promise. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 10(1), pp.12-31.

Mitchell, F., 2015. Facilitators and barriers to informed choice in self‐directed support for young people with disability in transition. Health & social care in the community, 23(2), pp.190-199.

Mulyadi, S., Rahardjo, W. and Basuki, A.H., 2016. The role of parent-child relationship, self-esteem, academic self-efficacy to academic stress. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 217, pp.603-608.

Peckover, S. and Trotter, F., 2015. Keeping the focus on children: the challenges of safeguarding children affected by domestic abuse. Health & social care in the community, 23(4), pp.399-407.

Richards, C., 2018. ‘It’sa big ask when your job is to teach children to read, write and to count’: the experiences of school staff in early help and child protection. Pastoral Care in Education, 36(1), pp.44-56.

Schröder, L., Dintsioudi, A., List, M.K. and Keller, H., 2019. Teachers’ Conversational Style and Children’s Language Development in German Childcare Centers: A Culture-Sensitive Intervention. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 50(2), pp.164-184.