Consultation on Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care

As part of actions outlined in the Creative Youth Plan the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY) committed to the development of key principles underpinning young children’s quality engagement with the arts in early learning and care settings.

Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care were published in October 2022.

This consultation invites artists, early years educators and all early learning and care stakeholders to use and explore these draft principles and test their validity in practice.

While the working principles were conceived from an early learning and care perspective we also wish to explore their relevance and the ways in which they may be adapted to better support engagement with the arts in school-age childcare. We invite all school age childcare stakeholders also to use and test these draft principles.

Findings from this consultation will inform the finalised publication of the principles, the development of practice resource materials and accompanying CPD training.

Submissions can be made in writing via email to qualitydevelopment@equality.gov.ie

The following questions may assist you in writing your submission:

Early Learning and Care

• do you feel the Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care will be useful in guiding your work with babies and young children? If yes, why? If not, why not?
• what changes, if any, would you make to the Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care? And why? (Feedback can include, but is not limited to, suggestions regarding comprehensiveness and/or appropriateness of content, accessibility of language, and layout / presentation)
• what supports would help you to engage with and apply the principles in practice?

School-Age Childcare

• do you feel the Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care could be useful in guiding your work in school-age childcare? If yes, why? If not, why not?
• what changes, if any, would you make to the Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care in adapting them to meet your needs in school-age childcare? And why?
• what supports would help you to engage with and apply the principles in practice in school-age childcare?

The closing date for receipt of submission is Wednesday, 31 May 2023.

This is an inclusive consultation process, and alternative formats of submission will be accepted. Please contact us at qualitydevelopment@equality.gov.ie if you wish to make a submission in a format other than a document, or support someone to have their views heard.

The Working Principles are presented as individual statements with features of each statement listed beneath. They start with the child then extend outward to elements which support the facilitation of the arts in promoting play and creativity in early learning and care.

Children are creative

• they are born with unique qualities and abilities which drive creative and imaginative expression
• they reveal aspects of their unique nature, talents and prior learning through acts of creating

Children’s creative expression must be nurtured

• in a prepared emotionally-safe environment
• where they can build, and are supported to build, trusting relationships, with other children, with participating and supportive adults and with themselves
• where risk-taking and exploration are supported
• where all children have access to all art forms, and with an understanding that each form offers unique opportunities for expression and creativity

Children develop as creative thinkers

• within their body, mind, feelings and spirit
• through regular access to space indoors and out, in which to explore and imagine
• with frequency of time and opportunity to play and create in the arts
• supported by the provision of open-ended, aesthetic, found and naturally occurring materials which can be used and interpreted in multiple ways
• nurtured by playful engagement with the environment and with others

Creativity is a process

• which can achieve the highest moments of learning and understanding
• which is felt and can be experienced as a state of flow
• which offers experiences for holistic learning and development
• which is active, hands on and sensorial
• which encourages a sense of self, agency, wonder and awe
• which may see the creation of products or artefacts, but not always

Essential features of arts in early learning and care are exploring, creating, imagining and communicating

• focusing on broad development goals and an emergent approach, led by individual children’s learning pace
• supporting children’s developing sense of self and group identity
• facilitating children in making connections between their inner lives and their outer worlds
• inviting symbolic play and the use of symbols in expression and representation
• enabling individual artistic expression through a variety of media
• including individual, collaborative and collective sharing and making

The Creative Ireland Programme is a whole of government initiative, which places creativity at the centre of public policy, with the underlying proposition that participation in cultural and creative activity promotes individual, community and national wellbeing. The Creative Ireland Programme is built around five pillars including Creative Youth, which aims to enhance children and young people’s access to creative activities in early learning and care and school-age childcare services, in schools and in communities. The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY), as a key partner in the implementation of Creative Youth, is responsible for a number of actions contained within the Creative Youth Plan.

The DCEDIY committed to the development of key principles underpinning young children’s quality engagement with the arts in early learning and care settings. In 2019 research was commissioned to develop a report that would include an overview of how creativity, play and the arts feature in early learning and care policy and provision; a glossary of key terms; and an articulation of key principles underpinning this area of practice. This work was to be informed by Síolta, the National Quality Framework for Early Childhood Education, and Aistear, the Early Childhood Curriculum Framework. Following a successful tender, Dr Triona Stokes of Maynooth University was selected to carry out this research. A steering group was established with representatives of the DCEDIY, the Department of Education, the Arts Council, the Creative Ireland Programme team in the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, and the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, to oversee the work.

In November 2019 a consultation event was held at the DCEDIY to discuss draft principles with artists, early years educators and school-age childcare practitioners. Following this consultation, the draft principles were further developed. While the COVID-19 pandemic caused some disruption to original timelines the Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care were published in October 2022 with the intention that they would remain in draft form while artists and early years educators had an opportunity to use and explore the validity of the principles in practice.

In addition to this consultation, the DCEDIY are partnering with The Arts Council to pilot an Arts in Early learning and Care and School-Age Childcare scheme. The pilot aims to support professional artists and arts organisations to work with early learning and care and school-age childcare settings, and will incorporate the exploration and development of the Working Principles for Engaging with the Arts in Early Learning and Care. The pilot aims to include children aged Birth-3, 4-6 and 7+ across a variety of settings in different parts of the country. It is anticipated that a total of eight settings, and up to four artists/arts organisations will participate in the pilot. Both the consultation and the pilot will inform the finalisation of the Principles.

Further information.

qualitydevelopment@equality.gov.ie

This Consultation is now closed