THE ROLE OF THE

7 FACES OF THE EYE

The early childhood teacher as a communicator. ...

The teacher as a facilitator. ...

The teacher as a coach. ...

The teacher as a model. ...

The teacher as a storyteller. ...

The teacher as a keeper of time. ...

The teacher as a researcher.

Quality Regulatory Framework 

It is the duty of every person carrying on a preschool service to take all reasonable measures to safeguard the Health, Safety and Welfare of the children attending the service and to comply with the Child Care Act 1991 (Early Years Services) Regulations 2016 and the Child Care Regulations (The Child Care Act 1991 (Early Years Services)( Amendments) Regulations 2016.

Siolta
Standard 11 Professional Practice

Skills

Knowledge

Values
Attitudes appropriate to their role and responsibility within the setting

Reflective practice

CPD

The role of the adult is of central importance in achieving quality in both provision of the service and in the experiences of young children.

1. Staff must be appropriately QUALIFIED for the level of responsibility and practice expected of them in the setting.
2. An early childhood education setting should be recognised and developed as a learning environment, not only for the children but also for the adults staffing it (CPD).

3. Processes should be in place to ensure that all staff operate to an agreed set of core principles that promote the creation of a respectful, democratic community of practice conducive to encouraging (CODE OF Principles)



4. REFLECTIVE PRACTICE, ongoing RESEARCH and CPD.

5. As adults, we are ROLE MODELS FOR CHILDREN in all aspects of our behaviour and must provide ethical leadership and guidance through our everyday actions (p.8).

Practising in a professional manner requires that individuals have skills, knowledge, values and attitudes appropriate to their role and responsibility within the setting. In addition, it requires regular reflection upon practice and engagement in supported, ongoing professional development.

A. Qualifications

B. Values and principles

C. Reflective practice

D. Dispositions

A. Qualifications - The EYE continues training and CPD
A strong commitment to qualifications has been made in practice as research (Sylva et al., 2004) has made it clear that there is a strong correlation between qualifications levels of adults working in services and the quality of the service (p.3).

Commitment to training that addresses the core knowledge, skills and competence for professional practice

B. Values and principles - The EYE works with a code of ethics

Professional practice in ECCE needs to be guided and informed by a set of core values and principles (Rodd, 2006). These can be expressed as a code of ethics, which are usually developed by the membership of the ECCE sector. They are important because working with young children and their families is often challenging and regularly requires practitioners to make quick decisions

C. Reflective practice - The role of the EYE involves engaging in reflective processes that make her/him aware, in a critical way, of her/his everyday activities with a view to continuously improving and refining practice.

D. Dispositions - The role of the EYE is to develop sensitivity and empathy with the ability to be objective and practical



Have a genuine commitment to working positively with children and families.

AISTEAR SIOLTA

The Aistear Síolta practice Guide - Element 4 Professional Practice

Encourages reflection across all seven pillars and reflection is mentioned no less than 80 times across the entire website. The guide provides many opportunities to reflect and has a plethora of resources to assist practitioners to do this on a daily basis.

Code of Professional Responsibility and Code of Ethics for Early Years (DCYA, 2020).

Joint publication of the Code of Ethics and Code of Professional Responsibilities, which outlines the values and standards expected of the sector’s workforce

Code of Ethics (January 20 , 2020).

A guide the values and ethics which should underpin the duties and responsibilities of those working in the early years sector, regardless of role.
Built on Síolta and Aistear, the codes are a reference point for our sector to guide best practice in decision-making.
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ROLE OF EYE
Place the rights of the child at the heart of practice but also extend to the rights of parents/guardians and into the wider community.
Use the Code of Ethics as a foundation on which to develop policies, procedures and practice within their settings

WHY AN AUDIT = YOUR VOICE

The codes are an important point on the road to professionalisation for our sector in that they equip early years practitioners with a framework to exercise their own judgements in the professional setting.

This is a fundamental aspect of early years pedagogy that is sometimes overlooked in the Irish context – A “top down” approach to quality assurance in early years (ECI, 2020).

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• 1. To make professional decisions based on A Code of Professional Responsibility and Code of Ethics for Early Years (DCYA, 2020).
• 2. Place rights of the child , parent, community AND STAFF at the heart of practice

Competence Requirements in Early Childhood Education and Care (CoRE report)

Competent Systems in early childhood has been developed by the CoRe project – an international study that investigated Competence Requirements in Early Childhood Education and Care on behalf of the European Commission (Urban, Vandenbroeck, Van Laere, Lazzari, & Peeters, 2011).

Competence Requirements in Early Childhood Education and Care (CoRE report) (Urban et al., 2011)

PRACTICE
KNOWLEDGE
VALUES

PRACTICE to be able to critically reflect on their practice.




KNOWLEDGE (THEORY) of Working with children, families, other professionals. Early childhood in the wider local, national and international context

VALUES
A. Children’s and human rights practices with all children, families and communities
B. Democracy as the basis for meaningful participation of all children, families and communities
C. Respect for diversity as the basis for working towards social justice and more equitable outcomes for all children
D. Empathy Early childhood as a public good and public responsibility

WHAT IS THE ROLE OF THE EYE?

No single ‘right’ answer

Getting it right from the start: how early years practitioners work with babies and toddlers (Ofsted, 2025).

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