OSHC programming - observations

[Ashwee94]

I am a Coordinator at a Before and After School Care service owned by a large company.

Upon meeting with my Regional Manager, we spoke about updates to the NQS, and I mentioned to her that we no longer are required to keep documentation on children’s development - as in individual observations on children. She was unaware of this, and said she would contact our Operations Manager - her supervisor to check to see if it was still required in our program.

A couple of weeks later, she said that we are still required to do them.

According to the regulation, we are required to only keep documentation on the development of the program itself.


I personally do not feel it is appropriate to do observations on children in the OSHC environment, and we should base our program on the children’s interests.

My main concern is that I am due for reassessment and rating, and I want to know if Authorised Officers are still looking for observations in an OSHC program? I would rather myself and my staff focus on the program as a whole, rather than putting more work on ourselves - which we don’t get paid for as we have to do it while the children are off site.

Does anyone have any advice or is the Coordinator of an OSHC and has recently been assessed under the new NQF?

[Lorina]

What state are you in?

In regards to completing observation for children in OOSH, it depends on your state/territory. Under the new NQF - Services that educate and care for children over preschool age in the Northern Territory, Queensland and NSW will no longer be required to keep documentation about individual children’s development. Instead, these services must keep documentation about the development of the educational program. There is no change to existing requirements for services that educate and care for children over preschool age in the ACT, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia.

If you are from a state that mentions you do not need to observations on individual children's development, the authorised officers will not ask for observations, however, if you are from a state that requires them, you will need to show them.

,
Lorina

[Ashwee94]

Are you able to provide an example of how a service would keep documentation on the development of the program? Is this done via critical reflection on the program as a whole weekly? There is no guidelines on this and it’s so confusing.

I am in NSW also.

I am currently doing group learning stories on individual activities to show that we are still doing some kind of observation and includes follow ups.

[Lorina]

You could do daily dairies - or daily reflections - which evaluates the activities/experiences that are on offer for the day and you can also include follow-up activities to link to the following week's program.

You can download the following sample templates to look at:

Daily Diary
Weekly Diary

I am also including a Daily Evaluation for children. The best source when working in OOSH is the kids themselves so you could ask them the following questions to help evaluate the program.

Daily Evaluation For Children

Hope this helps!

Let me know if you need any further help!

,
Lorina

[amurphy71]

Hi. Late to this feed but I am a little confused.

The Regs state in Part 4.1 Regulation 74 that the "approved provider of the education and care service must ensure that, for the purposes of the educational program, the following are documented— for a child over preschool age, evaluations of the child’s wellbeing, development and learning.


The development is still included. Am I missing something? Where does it specifically say that we do not have to do individual observations on children in OSHC. My thinking is that depending on service size, number of children that this would remain a key point for planning while also doing daily, weekly reflections on the progam itself. I'm QLD based. I also checked the QLD Regs. Says the same as the National Regs.

Angela

[amurphy71]

Hi. I am a little late to this post. Only recently joined.

I am also a little confused by this.

Under the Regs it states that the "The approved provider of the education and care service must ensure that, for the purposes of the educational program, the following are documented— for a child over preschool age, evaluations of the child’s wellbeing, development and learning.

The development of the child is still in place. Am I missing something? Where does it say that we don't have to do individual observations on children in Outside School Hours Care? I am from QLD so I checked those Regs as well. Same wording as the National Regulations.

My thinking would be to continue doing individual obs based on wellbeing, development and learning while reflecting daily, weekly on the educational program.

Any thoughts?

Angela

[Lorina]

Hi Angela.

In 2017, the following decision was made:

"OOSH Services that educate and care for children over preschool age in the Northern Territory, Queensland and NSW will no longer be required to keep documentation about individual children’s development. Instead, these services must keep documentation about the development of the educational program".

In the Regulations it states the following:

289A Programs for children over preschool age

(1) This regulation applies in place of regulation 74(1)(b).
(2) The approved provider of the education and care service must ensure that, for the purposes of the educational program for a child over preschool age, evidence about the development of the program is documented.

So this means that you only need to show evidence on the development of the program, not individual observations per child. So this could mean getting child input, writing a daily diary, through reflections, learning stories etc. The easiest would be to write a daily diary and follow up activities and add these to your program.. also, ask the children what they would like to do as well!

Hope this helps!

,
Lorina

[Rpeter]

hi


I am educator of Oshc in Western Australia , I have a same question ? Do we have to make an observation on individual child or we can do in group ob as well follow up ? Thankyou

[Rpeter]

Please help me do we have to make an individual obs in Oshc Western Australia ?

[Lorina]

See if the following helps:

Program and Planning In OSHC Services

,
Lorina