What is PAFT?
PAFT, Parents as First Teachers, is a New Zealand home based early childhood education programme that has been run in New Zealand since 1991 aimed at supporting parents and families with young children. PAFT provides free, practical support and guidelines to encourage and support parents as their child’s first and most important teacher.
What is PAFT? : What does PAFT do? : How does it work? : What exactly will I get from the parent educator? : What qualifications does a parent educator need to have? : Who can enrol to be a part of the PAFT programme?
The core elements of this ECE program include:
- home visits providing individualised support and information on child developments and how to foster early learning
- monitoring of health screening and
- links into other existing community services
The support of PAFT is given to parent’s prior to the birth of their child through to when that child reaches three years old. The programme is funded by the Government and is administered by the Ministry of Social Development. (As of 1 July 2008, the PAFT National Centre was transferred from the Ministry of Education to "Family and Community Services", the part of the Ministry of Social Development that focuses on early intervention and prevention services, to better align early intervention and positive parenting services for families.)
The programme is popular and often full which means you may have to be placed on a waiting list. You may also need to enrol for the programme and criteria may apply.
The aim of the PAFT programme is to assist parents, to participate more effectively in their child’s early development and learning.
PAFT can help families to:
- Understand how their child grows and develops
- Encourage their child’s growth and development
- Ensure their child’s safety and wellbeing
- Gain confidence in their parents skills
- Get the support and professional assistance they may need for their child’s health and development.
PAFT can help a child to:
- Develop good language skills
- Increase his or her ability to problem solve
- Develop social skills
- Have any potential health and learning problems detected
Sourced from Parents as First Teachers – Ministry of Education
The philosophy of PAFT is that parents are supported in being the most important teacher to their child as they go through all the milestones of development in their first three years.
The support of PAFT is given through home visits, group meetings and an individualised programme for the parent and child.
Personal visits
A family is assigned a parent educator who makes regular home visits in order to share information, practical ideas, and to give families guidance as their child grows and develops. The parent educator develops an individualised programme for the family that is based on a set curriculum but ‘tweaked’ to suit the family in question. It may be that the educator picks up on particular interests of issues apparent in the family and models the programme around this.
There are two curriculums accessed by the PAFT Parent Educators: "Ahuru Mōwai" and "Born to Learn".
“Ahuru Mowai is a package to support Maori parent educators in the delivery of the programme within a Maori context. Ahuru Mowai refers to a "warm and sheltered haven", used to describe the nurturing aspects advocated by the PAFT programme. It captures and formalises the practice of Maori parent educators, who have played a major role in the development of the package. It links traditional Maori philosophy with Te Whaariki and provides explicit, practical support for Maori parent educators working with Maori families.”
Lorraine Tarrant, Coordinator for the PAFT programme
Ahuru Mowai recognises and expands on the principles and strands of Te Whaariki, the national early childhood curriculum for centres and home based care services.
During home visits parents are help to understand what to expect of their child at each stage of development and how to plan activities based on this.
A parent educator will also remind the family of the importance of continuing to make Well Child or Plunket checks for their child and continuing an immunisation programme also.
Group Meetings
Families who are a part of the programme are given the opportunity to attend regular meetings with other families enrolled with PAFT. These sessions are sometimes structured and cover a particular topic or issue, or are less formal and are more of a get together.
Examples of some of the more structured sessions and the topics that may be covered are -
- Preventing falls
- Toolbox Parenting groups
- Attachment and positive parenting
- CPR and choking
- Stress Relief through yoga
- Socialisation
- Brain Development and Attachment
- First Aid from the Kitchen cupboard
- Scrap-booking albums
- Meningococcal B
- Immunisation Programme
Developmental Observation and Recording
During the home visits the educator does, he or she will observe the development of the child and record what they witness. These observations give the family an indication of how their child is developing according to age milestones and also helps identify any potential problems early on. The family is encouraged to observe their child along the way also.
Links into community services
PAFT educators maintain links with existing community services and networks so they can then link families they work with to those services. These are community services that are able to support families and provide information and advice to them that PAFT is unable to offer.
These are the types of referals that may be made
- Correspondence School
- Probation Service
- WINZ
- Community Mental Health
- Plunket
- Midwives
- Hospital Social Worker
- School for Young Parents
- Optometrist
- GSE - Speech Language Therapist
Families receive all sorts of information and support from the parent educator who will have knowledge, ideas, activities and handouts for them on:
- What to look for and expect as a child grows and develops
- Ways families can provide exciting, educational and inexpensive experiences for their children,
- Using everyday experiences as learning opportunities for children
- How to help a child develop a love of books and stories
- Practical ideas on creating a safe environment that is exciting and fun
- Setting realistic limits for a child’s behaviour and what to do about problems
- Ways to help each child grow to his or her full potential
A person is required to have a Diploma of Teaching in Early Childhood Education
or equivalent in order to become a parent educator.
Parent educators come from a range of related disciplines. Some qualifications other than the Early Childhood Diploma held by parent educators include:
- Diploma of Educational Studies – Auckland University
- Degree in Sports Science in EC Training
- Diploma of Social and Community Work
- BA (Social Science)
- Diploma in Māori Health
- NZ Certificate Social Service
- Te Kōhanga Reo – Whakapakari
- National Certificate in Mental Health
First time educators attend an initial five day training session which gives them the knowledge of the two curriculums they need to begin working with families. Follow-up training is then provided by the PAFT National Centre.
There is no short answer to this question and no defining characteristic that states who can and can’t enrol with PAFT.
PAFT is located in 64 areas of New Zealand from Kaitaia to Invercargill (both rural and urban).
Funding is available for between 6,000 - 6,500 families only and most programmes are operating at full capacity. Vacancies come available as families complete their three years or exit from the programme for other reasons. Some areas operate enrolment criteria. Get in touch with the programme coordinator in your area for more info.
Who do I contact about enrolling or becoming a parent educator?
To find out whether there is a PAFT programme in your area, and to ask about joining, phone Lorraine Tarrant on 04 978 4122 or email Lorraine on Lorraine.Tarrant001@msd.govt.nz
For all of you who may be interested in some ideas about how you can be a great first teacher to your child click here
Books on Child Development
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Article PAFT written by Kylie Valentine, qualified NZ secondary school teacher.