ChildIN kicks off in Paris
On November 14 and 15 2018, 12 professionals and autism associations fromPortugal, france, Poland and Belgium met to launch ChildIN, a new Erasmus+ project aiming at developing a training for childminders to support inclusion of children on the autism spectrum.
In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the availability and the quality of early education and care (ECEC) in the European Union. Currently available competence frameworks for childminders do not include specific and stand alone learning modules to train to care for children with special needs. The only training available is provided in more general training schemes.
In the framework of this project, running from November 2018 to December 2020, partners will:
-develop a competence framework for childminders working with autistic children;
-develop an online database of resources to care for autistic children;
-test and validate a set of blended training materials implementing the learning architecture;
-create guidelines on how to use tools and materials provided by the project, in order to support the use of results by other VET players in Europe;
-draft policy recommendations to provide useful insights for policy planning, in turn contributing to the improvement of the learning offer for childminders, and to the improvement of the quality of care offered to children.
The ChildIN kick-off meeting, hosted by the project coordinator, IPERIA Institut, aimed to share understanding of the purpose of the project as well as to ensure the project’s viability and success in the long-run.
Different issues such as the initiative’s main objectives, the modalities of the programme development, dissemination and coordination aspects were addressed during this two-day meeting. At this initial stage, partners are undertaking a literature review to identify best practices in relation to training on autism and transversal competences.
ChildIN partners will meet again in May 2019 in Olsztyn, Poland. The project foresees five transnational meetings over its two-year lifespan.
