THE Catholic Church can still support the family structure while providing childcare, says an early childhood specialist employed by the Catholic Education Office.
By Anthony Barich
Stephanie Jackiewicz, formerly with the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research, was appointed to the WA CEO in July 2008 shortly after the CEO completed a survey of parents and school boards gauging community interest in various programs, including out of school care.
Ms Jackiewicz, who is on the Early Childhood Australia WA Branch committee representing Catholic education, says the parent is always the first educator of the child, but the family is part of a community, and the Church needs to nurture them inside the parish dynamic.
Ms Jackiewicz said there are many commercial childcare centres with a different model, so the Church needs to help build up families by supporting them in the local Catholic community, especially as today’s parents often don’t have access to extended families that help teach them parenting skills.
In this respect, the role of the Church includes promoting play groups for parents to come to, where they can meet other parents with children the same age, in conjunction with the parish.
“We come from the ethos that the parent is always the first teacher of the child, and we want to support them to parent their child to the best of their ability,” said Ms Jackiewicz, who assists schools who want to introduce three-year-old programs, also known as pre-kindergarten programs.
Last year there were approximately 15 schools currently running pre-kindergarten programs in WA, with more on the way.
“Unfortunately we don’t all have extended family available to us like in the past, and childcare services fill that gap,” she said. “That’s not to say kids who stay at home have fantastic opportunities – in fact, if families can do that I’d strongly encourage them to take advantage of it.
One Perth mother of three who started up a playgroup in her parish for parents to interact five years ago said that ‘suburban isolation’ is a significant factor for adults to deal with.
“There’s a lot of really smart parents that aren’t working really smart jobs at the moment,” she said, but added that intellectual stimulation can still be found in such parish-based playgroups among other parents in a similar situation.
In her experience, she said such playgroups could be prone to collapsing easily as it depends on parents’ availability and willingness to commit time and energy.
She said that when the parish venue became unavailable when she organised it, they held the playgroup at the nearest Anglican church hall, and when that denominational parish also promoted it, the group became a productive ecumenical affair.
Then when that venue became unavailable, parents held it in their own houses, rotating the group between themselves week to week; but this proved a significant burden on those organising it, the parent who started it told The Record.
“It’s a real struggle, a real workload for whoever’s home it’s being held in,” she said. “Many parents like it but don’t want to make the commitment. It’s ok to fill a gap, but if something else better comes along they go to that.”
“Parents need to know that what they can teach their child at home is at least equal to what they can learn at school,” she said.
“There must be a clear distinction between day care and early childhood education so parents don’t think the child will be better off in the institution than at home.”
She also told of a system in the Eastern States of school principals of public schools in lowr socio-economic areas having special rooms for parents in schools and giving them access to the staffroom, so they have a better relationship with the teachers that area dealing with their students and don’t feel isolated from the school, especially where the children are infants in early childhood education or childcare.