Coronavirus (COVID-19): re-opening childcare - impact assessment

Chapter 5 : Mitigating Actions

Guidance and sharing good practice

A suite of guidance has been published covering all aspects of registered childcare (ELC, school age childcare, childminders and fully outdoor settings). This was updated on 30 July, taking effect from 10 August^[73]. This aims to mitigate differential health impacts. Further updates and operational and practice guidance will be provided as required.

The guidance is based on a set of principles for all services across Scotland that recognises that safeguarding the health and wellbeing of the child, and adults who work with them, must be central to any plans to reopen and deliver services.

It is not appropriate for young children to maintain physical distancing, either practically or in terms of child development. It is important for children to feel secure and receive warmth and physical contact that is appropriate to their needs, in particular when they are receiving personal care, need comforting or reassurance. The guidance for the sector therefore puts in place age appropriate public health measures.

The Scottish Government and ADES will also gather good practice examples of successful workforce deployment and workforce support models adopted during delivery of critical childcare and share this learning widely across the sector.

The Scottish Government continues to work with experts from a range of fields, including our new Ethnicity Expert Reference Group, to develop actions to help mitigate any disproportionate effects on minority ethnic communities.

Guidance documents for the sector highlight that individual requests for additional protections should be supported wherever possible. Responding to requests for additional protections may include offering access to support from occupational health services and the provision of individual risk assessments. All minority ethnic staff from South Asian backgrounds with underlying health conditions and disabilities, who are over 55, or who are pregnant, should be individually risk assessed, and appropriate reasonable adjustments should be made following risk assessment.

Support for workforce to address children's needs – during and after lockdown

During the closure period, Education Scotland provided support for the workforce to help them to support children learning at home – including newsletters, webinars to support educators to use digital platforms, links to new and existing support materials, and events for head teachers.

Education Scotland's practice guidance for early level, 'Realising the Ambition: Being Me^[74]' has specific content to help staff to support children transition back into settings, including the recognition that they may have experienced/be experiencing trauma of varying degrees from the experience of lockdown.

The Scottish Government has also funded the Virtual Nature School to help ELC workforce to work virtually with families and support outdoor learning.

Support for workforce wellbeing and practice

The Scottish Government is working with partners from across the childcare sector to develop a directory of existing mental health, wellbeing and professional learning support for early learning and childcare, and out of school care, practitioners and childminders. This is updated and shared across the education and childcare sector at regular intervals.

In addition, Scottish Government has worked with Early Years Scotland to develop a new Team ELC Wellbeing Hub, a website which sets out vital information for the sector on maintaining their wellbeing at this difficult time, and creates opportunities for staff to connect with each other.

It is also important that professionals from across the early learning and childcare sector are provided with safe and supportive spaces to connect with colleagues from across Scotland in a virtual environment, to allow for professional dialogue and peer support to take place during this challenging period. The Scottish Government will work with Education Scotland to create such opportunities, for example via further instances of the successful #BeingMeBlethers professional learning events, which have enabled practitioners from across the ELC and childcare sector to engage in shared learning via Twitter.

Support for parents – during and after lockdown

The Scottish Government has been supporting parents and carers who were unable to access childcare through their successful 'Here for You' campaign – to help parents understand that they are not alone, and to direct them to Parent Club, which has a specific coronavirus hub of information, support and resources across a range of issues that parents, carers and children face e.g. learning at home, balancing childcare/ learning and working from home, child and adult mental health, activities and play, positive parenting, financial information and keeping children safe online. The hub also acts to keep parents informed with the latest information about the coronavirus restrictions. In addition, Education Scotland has a regular newsletter for parents to support learning at home at all levels.

Parent Club has also launched a new campaign to support parents and carers with the return to school and ELC. This will include a TV advert, social media posts, and new content on the website. As part of the campaign, there will be videos from experts about subjects such as play, learning and anxiety. Parent Club already includes information about the new guidelines as well as advice and support about settling in, managing mental health, and information about funded ELC and changes to the 1140 commitment.

Funding for free school meals

The flexibility afforded to local authorities to put in place provisions to continue free school meals, throughout the lockdown period had supported around 175,000 families at the end of June. Free school meal provision will continue for all eligible families when schools reopen.

A report by the Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) has found that^[75]:

• Families have appreciated support with food costs from their schools and local authorities in alarming and difficult times.
• Families had positive experiences of all methods of free school meal provision, but by far the highest levels of satisfaction were with direct payments to people's bank accounts. 81% of families receiving payments say this works extremely or very well.