Traveller’s Pre-School Service
The Traveller’s Pre-School service currently provides a pre-school provision for Traveller children from the greater Belfast area. Transport to and from the pre-school is provided and is a key factor in the projects success. The bus collects and returns the children daily and is driven by service staff who are all MIDAS (Minibus Driver Awareness Scheme) certified.
In fact, the pre-school is only the third service within Barnardo's’s UK and the tenth service in the whole of Ireland to gain this prestigious accreditation. This is a testament to our extremely hard-working staff and the children with whom we work. The High/Scope approach enables all children to participate in their learning and helps them to see themselves as responsible, capable and confident learners. Long term research shows that High/Scope fosters the betterment of young children’s lives and consequently life chances through a high quality education programme.
Over the years many relationships have been formed and maintained with local primary schools and other key professionals include:
- psychologists
- speech therapists
- educational psychologists
- and health visitors.
Networks have been established with key Traveller agencies. In April 2006 we developed a partnership with Colin Neighbourhood Sure Start and have a Traveller Sure Start worker who provides one to one support to the children and their families based at the Pre-school Service.
We have developed a pilot programme in September 2011 which included Traveller parents in the daily routine of the service and this will be rolled out again in Spring 2012. The service is currently undergoing a review and as of 2012, will not offer a dedicated pre-school service. It will instead target two year old children and plans to include parents in this new pilot. Details will be confirmed in June 2012.
