Opinion: Letters

Phoebe Doyle's article ('On the other side', 3 December) about how motherhood had made her a better teacher brought back vivid memories for me.

As a newly-qualified teacher in my early twenties, I couldn't wait to have my own reception class. I enjoyed teaching children and was happy to comfort a sad or hurt child by sitting them on my knee and giving them a cuddle, despite having little experience of young children and their families outside school.

In retrospect, I realise that I was not always particularly understanding if a child didn't settle in the class routines easily or forgot their PE kit on the correct day, or a working parent hadn't had time to read with their child the previous evening.

On starting a family, my husband and I decided that I would spend several years at home with our children. When I returned to teaching reception six years later, what a different teacher I was!

Then I understood how difficult it was to get children organised and out of the house by a set time each morning and how easy it was to forget something out of the many things I had to remember for the day. Other household tasks meant that I didn't always have a sustained amount of time to spend reading with my children every evening. So, I could really empathise and tell parents it was not a hangable offence!

But perhaps, most importantly, I knew how crucial it was to tell parents about the small achievements of their child's day and to celebrate the milestones together.

Of course, not all early years practitioners have or want to have children themselves and, therefore, they do not have the complexities of life to contend with that many young families experience each day. But things do look and are different on 'the other side of the fence', and an attempt to understand goes a huge way towards building relationships with parents.

Helen Marshall, early years consultant with responsibility for Parent Partnerships, Germany

- Letter of the Week wins £30 worth of books

BACKWARDS WITH THE TORIES

'Childcare sector warms to Tory election win' (News, 7 January 2010) - what short memories people have! There is a lot wrong in the childcare sector, especially around pay, but do people not remember what it was like for us under the last Tory government?

I do not stint in my criticism of this Labour government, but they need to improve - replacing them with a Tory government will take us backwards, not forwards.

Just think of a few of the things that Labour has introduced, and try to imagine how many of them would survive under the Tories: free entitlement to nursery for all threeand four-year-olds, childcare tax credits, Sure Start, EYFS, CWDC, etc.

Charlie Owen, Institute of Education, University of London

PRE-SCHOOL PLIGHT

I am writing in response to the letter 'EYSFF sheds light on the real world' (Letter of the week, 7 January). Like the author, I too work in a charity-run pre-school and hope that school nurseries are now aware of how fortunate they are compared with voluntary organisations.

Pre-schools have to compete with Sure Start centres and private businesses offering full daycare, and so face a constant struggle to survive financially, even though our staff are generally paid less than those in schools. We are also expected to provide the same level of care and education as other early years settings, yet we tend to be overlooked and forgotten about.

The delayed Early Years Single Funding Formula could have forced the closure of small voluntary pre-schools and playgroups, and I hope the Government will take this into consideration in the coming year.

At least delaying implementation of the EYSFF in most areas of the country gives pre-schools another year in which we can try to survive. Come April 2011, it will be interesting to see what changes the Government has made so that it can support all early years providers, regardless of their status.

Claire Taylor, King's Lynn

- Send your letters to ... The Editor, Nursery World, 174 Hammersmith Road, London W6 7JP, letter.nw@haymarket.com, 020 8267 8401.