As I tried to explain to Chris afterward, most people can cook, but when they try to cook nutritionally great, tasty meals, for large numbers of strangers, in a restricted time frame, catering to special dietary requirements, fussy eaters and more without training disasters happen.
Then there is evaluating what and how you did as you plan for your future meals.
Teachers are ordinary everyday people, but they have specialist training.
Parents and families know their own kids and are an important part of their health care and education, but you need training to cater to large numbers and specialist needs, to detect subtle problems, and act on them.
Yes I know when my child has chicken pox but I still take them to the doctor.
Chris argued that some aren't getting anything, better they get something than nothing. While I agree we should aim for 100% participation, I don't agree cuts are the way to achieve that goal, regardless of how you manipulate the statistics and argue cuts are increases.
Yes Chris gruel will keep you alive but please sir we want some more.
Chris said it is about choices, well time and again the national government has found money for pet projects like national standards (even though it is widely regarded as faulty and redundant as duplicating existing assessments.) I know my children's school assessments have always been clear , picked up what has needed to be done, and as a parent I've always worked closely with my children's teachers to develop support programs for my children at parent teacher interviews. If it's choices I would rather have no cuts to ECE than money wasted on implementing the dubious National standards.
Anyway part 2, remember to watch part 1
The views expressed in all three of these posts are mine and do not necessarily reflect those of our association.
