Introduction

This project was aimed at all children and families that use the setting with the aim to seek the views on the opportunities provided within the nursery to support singing in early years.
With Froebel placing such emphasis on the importance of singing to develop literacy skills and strengthen relationships between children and adults I wanted to find out what musical opportunities the children experienced at nursery, home and within the wider community. I looked at what impact our role as practitioners has and how I can add depth to our provision, whilst supporting our Froebelian values of unity and connectedness and by placing children and families at the centre of all we do.

Context

As a setting we provide musical experiences daily with all staff singing with the children throughout the session to support and enhance their learning. The setting provided access to musical experiences through outside professionals such as Gaelic tutors and YMI, however this is done sporadically throughout the year in the 3-5 room and not available to all age groups or to families. As part of my role and the ethos of our settings inclusive approach I was keen to develop the experiences we provide, making singing accessible to all and part of our continuous provision.
As a Froebelian setting I felt it was extremely important that families are part of our journey and as family engagement is part of our improvement plan. We needed to provide opportunities to work with our families and share our knowledge and skills in a creative way that does not
provide barriers to learning whilst providing children with access to knowledgeable, nurturing educators. This also gave me the opportunity to investigate what musical experiences children shared with their families at home and in the wider community

As I embarked on this project, I was aware that this needed to reflect the views of all that used the service, with this in mind I felt that using questionnaires provided children, parents and staff a medium to express their views in an unobtrusive way with the option of non-participation if
expressed.
To support participants, I engaged in conversations to explain my reasons for seeking this information and to answer any questions they may have and to explain alternate approaches to completing the questionnaire such as support to fill it in or translation if necessary.
With regards to gaining the views of the children I felt that using a mind map in small group situations allowed the children to engage in conversations with both adults and peers creating a more natural, relaxed approach to express their views before transferring this to a questionnaire
format that I could later seek the appropriate permissions for.

Ethics

As my project was based on a questionnaire format, I felt that I could easily gain consent from all participants by attaching the appropriate permissions. In the case of children, I explained to the child that they were helping me to learn more about what they liked and then any information
given was then transferred to a questionnaire and shown to the parent or guardian for overall consent.
I did not feel that I would encounter any issues as I explained to every participant that this was a voluntary exercise, and they could withdraw consent at any time or choose not to complete the questionnaire and that the information that they provided would only be used to support the
development of this project.
In the case of child protection issues all parents, carers and staff are aware of the protocol that we follow as part of Falkirk Council’s Child Protection Procedures