The specific needs of part-time students are catered for through flexible approaches to learning that encourage core reading to be examined and questioned in the students' workplace. Students choose a work-based mentor to guide them with their practice and have a Personal Academic Tutor who supports them during both levels of the degree. Each level of the programme involves a strand of practice-based enquiry that enables and promotes learning from and through practice.
The programme recognises the needs of part-time, mature students engaged in full-time employment in the following key ways:
- Current and relevant content enabling work related reflection
- Varied and practice-related assessment
- One attendance on campus each week
- Delivery pattern to fit in with the school term
- Active encouragement to analyse and reflect on students' own practice
- Online resources to support distance learning between sessions.
Why study Managing Services for Children and Young People?
This course may be for you if you are working in a managerial or support role for children's workforce professionals and would like to raise your level of qualification to foundation degree graduate, either as an end in itself or as a route to honours graduate and postgraduate qualifications. If you want to develop your professional knowledge and understanding while still working, or you wish to progress further with your career, then the FdA in Managing Services for Children and Young People is a valuable next step.
Features:
The Common Core of Skills and Knowledge for the Children's Workforce is embedded within the programme and professional standards audits have been undertaken to assure students who wish to pursue Early Years Professional Status that this is open to them. This programme covers the knowledge required for the Early Years Foundation Stage (2008) and takes appropriate account of current government policy, e.g. an Every Child Matters audit has been conducted and links are made to current practice in each module. For parts of your course you will work alongside other Children's Services professionals to help develop the kinds of integrated planning and multi-disciplinary working advocated by the Children Act 2004.
Programme Structure:
Level 4 Modules
ED4501 Practice-based Enquiry 1
This module aims to help students develop a clear understanding of their role in supporting children's learning and development in their setting. Their role within the context of the assessment and planning cycle will be explored and students will be expected to identify developmental targets to improve their personal performance. Meeting the needs of individual children whilst working within the policies and practices of the setting and their role in the professional team will be explored. The module introduces participants to basic enquiry methods and observation techniques and examines the strengths and weaknesses of a variety of approaches to child observation, assessment and planning.
ED4502 Personal and Collaborative Learning
This module aims to provide the opportunity to audit learning skills and to help students establish development targets that can be achieved in subsequent modules. The theoretical perspectives explored in this module will enable students to reflect upon and share their own experience as learners and to relate this to current thinking. The taught sessions and assignments also aim to provide opportunities for professional collaborative and cooperative working.
ED4503 Promoting Positive Relationships
This module aims to focus attention on the central role of effective communication in the development of positive relationships within a setting, with the community and with other professionals. Through critical reflection on practice, and analysis of the modes and methods of communication, the module aims to develop participants' understanding of the features of positive relationships and to promote the ECM agenda.
ED4504 Safeguarding Children
This module will explore ways in which child protection is an essential and complex area of inter-professional practice. Students will be prepared by this module to appreciate the importance and mechanism of child protection for children at risk and the support system for children and their families within a legal framework and society. It aims to enable students to recognise risks and hazards to children's safety and understand the roles and responsibilities of professionals in reducing them.
NM4008 Effective Communication Skills
At the heart of inter-professional working is effective communication and this module focuses on questioning techniques, non-verbal communication, and effective writing and reporting skills, and examines barriers to communication. Methods of effective listening and responding are explored and the module helps students to plan and deliver effective presentations and to develop an awareness of the structure, process and organisation of meetings. An appreciation of strategies for marketing and influencing key personnel within organisations is also explored.
ED4536 Social Policy and Legislation
The main focus of this module is the understanding of the context within which people at both individual and group levels experience life within our society. It helps professionals to examine how social policy and legislation impact on the lives of people and the implications of this in the context of human growth and development. In particular it provides students with the opportunity to examine government policy initiatives in relation to their impact on children and young people.
Level 5 Modules
ED5501 Inclusive Practice
This module aims to support the role of the professional in meeting the needs of all children, by examining the broader issue of inclusion, whilst having regard for current legislation. Meeting the needs of all children is a fundamental principle and the content of this module reflects the complexities surrounding a modern, diverse and inclusive Britain.
ED5532 Introduction to Business Skills for Integrated Services
The aim of this module is to stimulate debate and promote critical thinking through identification and analysis of key contemporary issues in integrated services. Students will develop those business skills relevant to effective service provision through investigating a chosen area of significance in their sector of Integrated Services. Theories of business management relevant to the provision of services for children and young people are discussed and analysed.
ED5533 Changing Needs of Children and Young People
This module aims to provide students with an opportunity to explore issues and analyse factors affecting the child, childhood and the family. Students consider contemporary British society in the global context of childhood. Globalisation as a concept is explored and students investigate the impact of mobility, immigration, work and career moves, and asylum seeking on childhood and the family. Government policy and practice in a contemporary context and the UN Conventions on the Rights of the Child underpin this module of study.
ED5504 Practice-based Enquiry 2
This module will build further on the work undertaken so far in this programme by focusing on the application of theory and principles in a workplace context. Although there are no prerequisites, the module aims to build on the Level 4 Practice Based Enquiry module through a negotiated workplace action research project which will enable students to further their understanding of their role in shaping practice and identify areas of expertise. Action research has been selected as a starting point for professional practice-based research for Foundation Degree students. The module aims to help students to critically review policies and practices in their setting and to identify targets for future developments both personally and in relation to workplace practice. They will develop relationships with colleagues in their setting and also with other professionals.
ED5535 Supporting and Managing People
This module examines a range of management themes and activities. Theories underpinning organisational behaviour are introduced and examined in the light of professional practice and experience. The key roles and functions of managers are explored and students examine the significance of ethical and social responsibility in a range of sectors and contexts.
ED5536 Managing Change
The aim of this module is to stimulate debate and promote critical thinking through identification and analysis of key contemporary issues in integrated services. The module examines the process of change and the application of theories of change management to service provision. With support, students investigate a chosen area of significance in Integrated Services.
Assessment is designed to help students demonstrate their understanding and knowledge of the course content and identify the next steps in their learning. Learning, teaching and assessment are inter-related and all are planned to help support and develop highly effective early years practitioners. The programme adopts the following principles:
- A range of assessments including case studies, portfolios, evaluative reports, reflective essays and presentations are used to enable opportunities for all students to display their strengths
- All assessments are used formatively to help students develop action plans to support their learning
- Assessments allow students to utilise their professional settings as a context for assignment tasks.
Many students gain promotion or secure new jobs while they are undertaking part-time study. It is not just the additional qualification but also the act of studying for further professional development that is attractive to employers.
In addition to the obvious endorsement that the FdA Managing Services for Children and Young People gives to those seeking employment in the sector, the course also serves as a bridge for those wishing to progress via a Level 6 qualification (the BA Integrated Working with Children, Young People and Families, for example) to become full honours graduates.
With an honours degree, professional postgraduate programmes for many sectors of the Children's Workforce become accessible, like the professional development pathway leading to EYPS, or the Postgraduate Certificate in Early Years Practice with EYPS or, PGCE Early Years for those wishing to enter the teaching profession.
We will consider applications from candidates who hold one of the following qualifications:
- An NQF/QCF level 3 qualification in a related subject.
- English and (ideally) Mathematics at GCSE (or equivalent), grade C or above.
- Approximately 2 years experience of working in a relevant setting either voluntarily or employed.
- Support of their employer to undertake the programme with a satisfactory reference
- A recent CRB check.
Accreditation for prior learning (APL)
If you already have a relevant Level 4 qualification then you may be able to apply for advanced credit on this programme.
