How can practitioners across childrens services develop their skills, knowledge and values to improve their practice with children, families and with each other?

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KE312 Working together for Children.

How can practitioners across children’s services develop their skills, knowledge and values to improve their practice with children, families and with each other?

In this assignment I will look at how practitioners across children’s services can develop their skills, knowledge and values to improve their practice with children, families and with each other. I will briefly look at the history of changes within children’s services, identifying some of the research that has brought about changes to the way in which professionals are expected to work to fulfil their professional remit. I will then go on to critically analyse the conditions and processes that have lead to effective professional, inter-professional and interagency working with children. The main focus of the assignment will centre on the importance of reflective practice and the theories underpinning the principles of adopting a participation approach to working within early year’s. I will identify different models of learning and discuss how Continual Professional Development is instrumental in enabling practitioners to develop the tools needed to improve their practice. I will draw on examples from my own practice and research to support my writing as well as from wider sources. The importance of lifelong learning and the ways in which it can support professionals, children and families will form the conclusion.  

Children’s services are very high on the government’s agenda. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) was ratified by the United Kingdom in 1991. This commitment by the UK government to addressing the problems faced by children meant that they needed to be proactive, adopting new policies and procedures to ensure something was done about the way some children were treated.  The Children Act 1989 was already in place, it set out in detail what local authorities and the courts should do to protect the welfare of children.  After the publication of the Laming Report (2003) on the death of Victoria Climbié it was recognised that the Children Act 1989 did not protect children fully.  The reports show that ‘the legislative framework for safeguarding children set out in the Children Act 1989 is basically sound. However, there are serious weaknesses in the way in which it is interpreted, resourced and implemented’. (DfES pg. 2) It also highlighted the lack of training and support given to staff, to enable them to deal with situations that could arise, stating that ‘the system failed comprehensively, because of ill-trained and overworked staff, who were unsupported by their managers’. (DfES pg 2) In 2004 the Children Act 1989 was updated, requiring partnership working as stated on page 104 (Stone, B. et al).

To address the shortfalls in services the Government devised a ten year strategy to improve children’s services by addressing the underlying problems identified in the Laming report. It also set out to ensure that the people working with children are valued, rewarded and trained.

The Green Paper, Every child Matters sets out the core outcomes that all services for children are expected to meet, they must also provide evidence to demonstrate how they are met. These five outcomes are:

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Being Healthy,

Staying Safe,

Enjoying and achieving,

Making a positive contribution,

Economic well-being.   (Jones, C et al pg. 127)

To enable the ten year strategy to take effect Local Authorities worked with existing providers and services reflecting on what was already being provided and what could be done to improve services. OfSTED also changed the way in which it inspected settings to encompass the five outcomes.

Practitioners were expected to embrace the new way of working as it would bring about better services for children and families. As stated by Andy Rixon ‘practitioners with established ...

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