Curriculum
Knollcrest Nursery's curriculum has been tailored to specifically meet your children's needs. It incorporates old and new schemes to meet national standards, giving your child their best start in life.
ECCE (Early Childhood Care and Education)
Knollcrest Nursery is a participating providers of ECCE Government scheme which is funded by DCYA (Department of Children and Youth Affairs).
This scheme provides a free year of early childcare and education for children of pre-school age.
The scheme is run over 38 weeks for 3 hours per day 5 days per week according to the ECCE Calendar and is in keeping with the Academic School Calendar (i.e excluding Halloween, Christmas and Easter)
The National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) developed Aistear: the Early Childhood Curriculum Framework in partnership with the early childhood sector.
Aistear is the early childhood curriculum framework for all children from birth to six years.
The word Aistear is Irish for journey and was chosen because early childhood marks the beginning of children’s lifelong learning journeys.
The framework can be used as a guide in planning learning experiences in sessional, full and part-time day care settings, infant classes in primary schools and childminding services. It can also be used by parents in children’s own homes.
Community Childcare Subvention (CCS) Programme
The Community Childcare Subvention (CCS) Programme is a support scheme for community and private Early Childhood Services to provide quality childcare at reduced rates to parents on low income or in receipt of social welfare payments.
The CCS Programme operates as part of the National Childcare Investment Programme, which is administered by the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA).
Síolta, the National Quality Framework for Early Childhood Education, was developed by the Centre for Early Childhood Development and Education on behalf of the Department of Education and Skills. It was published in 2006.
Síolta is designed to define, assess and support the improvement of quality across all aspects of practice in early childhood care and education (ECCE) settings where children aged birth to six years are present.
These settings include:
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Full and Part-time Daycare
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Childminding
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Sessional services
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Infant classes in primary schools
Knollcrest Nursery incorporates the Siolta and Aistear Frameworks in daily practice.
The National Childcare Scheme
The Affordable Childcare Scheme will take effect from October 2019. It is a targeted subsidy to assist with childcare costs, for children from 6 months old up to 15 years of age.
The level of subsidy will depend on:
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The family’s net after tax income
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The number of children in a family
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The ages of the children.
It is intended that the National Childcare Scheme will also be available to children in addition to the ECCE preschool scheme (above), where a family requires additional hours of childcare during the day.
This scheme will replace the above CCS Schemes when it comes into effect in October 2019. It is intended that parents will be able to apply for the National Childcare Scheme online, and obtain information on what level of subsidy is available to them, based on the family net income, the number of children, and the ages of the children.
We have participated on the Better Start Programme which is a national initiative established by the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA) to bring an integrated national approach to developing quality in Early Years Education and Care (ECEC) for children aged from birth to six years in Ireland.
It will coordinate and extend the wide-ranging choice of supports and services already provided through City and County Childcare Committees and Voluntary Childcare Organisations. This new initiative will provide a specialist on-site mentoring service.