BBC NEWS | Politics | Poor ‘may start learning at two’
Children from poor families could begin pre-school learning at age two to help give them more stability and stimulation, MPs have heard.
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The government is piloting this type of provision for 12,000 two-year-olds in some of the poorest areas of the country.
Ms Hughes ruled out giving grants to grandparents who look after children whose parents are too busy.
So this is about removing them from home and family environments and getting them into institutions nice and early. Don’t get me wrong – there are some nurseries that are lovely, and I really do believe that Big was better off in a nursery than she would have been at home with me full time. By the time I’d had Small I was a very different person, and home was a good place for them both.
But to assume that because a family is poor that the best thing to do is shove the children into a ‘a good quality pre-school learning environment’ is precisely the wrong thing to do. Children need to be in families. If the families aren’t stable environments (though I’d question what right anyone has to judge an entire section of society merely on the basis of their income) and we’re going to throw tax payers money at the children anyway, throw it at the home lives. Grants to grandparents to look after grandchildren would be only fair tbh, you can get grants for all sorts of other childcare, why not assist the families direct?
Gill has another take on this as well.
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