Firstly, it is necessary to abandon the mindset of considering preschool teachers as “babysitters”, like the way of looking after bicycles and motorbikes. This way of calling not only lowers professionalism but also shows contempt for preschool teachers, leading to disrespectful attitudes and behaviors from parents, causing them more resentment. It is possible that these long-suppressed resentments will lead to the mechanism of “taking it out on the child”. For children who cannot speak yet, only 17-18 months old, caregivers always have to meet many skills in addition to taking care of children, from feeding, sleep training, toilet training, bathing, age-appropriate language interaction, or requiring understanding and first aid skills, handling emergency situations such as choking on foreign objects, etc.
Not only skills, the younger the child care worker, the more basic qualities must be met such as being interested in the development and truly loving children (not only loving beautiful and well-behaved children but also loving disabled, disadvantaged, and naughty children). Professional child care workers must be trustworthy. They must prove that they are able to stay calm in all stressful situations; use reason to transform negative emotions...
To become a caregiver, teachers must have enough cultural awareness to understand that children under 18 months old cannot speak, they will whine, whine, want our attention, want us to play with them or show frustration as if they are playing and do not want to leave the play area. Children's behavior is not hostile, hurtful to adults. What caregivers need to do is try to understand what they want and teach children how to express what they demand, not punish them with cold-blooded beatings.
Although preschool teachers do not require high academic qualifications (the 2019Education Law stipulates that preschool teachers must have a college degree in preschool education or higher), they require good childcare skills, knowledge, and the qualities and heart of a mother, so they should be considered a professional profession. Parents must give them the respect they deserve and be grateful for taking care of our children at the cost of ordinary labor (about 18,000-20,000 VND/hour).
Second, through the incident, we see too much irresponsibility from the parties involved that led to the irreversible consequence of a child passing away forever. The first irresponsibility comes from the local education management agency. The incident occurred at a spontaneous children's group and this facility operated illegally, the physical conditions were not safe, damp, unsanitary, and had many risks of causing illness to the children. The nanny lacked knowledge, capacity, and was not trained and was recorded twice by the Department of Education and Training of Thuong Tin district, but why did she continue to operate?
Next is the irresponsibility of parents when leaving their children in an unsafe environment, not finding out if the childcare facility is qualified and licensed. Parents are also irresponsible when they do not find out if the person taking care of their child has the knowledge and capacity to meet the conditions for practicing the profession. In addition, parents can also be held responsible for not caring and recognizing the signs of risk of child abuse even though the child has suffered abuse for a period of time.
Finally, there is the irresponsibility of local authorities. Our education has suffered a lot after the Covid-19 pandemic, especially preschool education. We have known and predicted the difficulties and shortage of preschool teachers, but what have localities done in the face of this situation? Have there been any specific solutions implemented to support workers' children in the context of returning to the new normal, having to work twice or three times harder to recover the economy ?
Is it enough to be dedicated after each incident that child protection agencies express their outrage and recommend that all preschools operating without registration or without a license be inspected and closed? Where will the children of workers be sent if they just ban and close them? What urgent and long-term solutions are there to ensure that preschool care meets standards and that such incidents do not occur have not yet become the focus of discussion.
For example, we need financial support solutions and mechanisms to attract more investors to deploy preschool education facilities. Plan and place orders with universities and colleges of education to train qualified human resources for the locality. Develop a plan to exploit and utilize the human resources of 4th year students of preschool education bachelor's degrees in the process of practicing under the supervision of university teachers to provide childcare services to the community. Develop a nanny practice certificate to train and equip those who provide childcare services with minimum knowledge.
We also need to learn from international experience to strengthen screening and prevent harmful risks from adults to child care services like this. When I studied psychology in the US , when I went to schools to practice psychological counseling for students, I was required to undergo a criminal background check and answer a number of personality questionnaires to eliminate all risks of harm to children. For example, a personality test shows that you are a person with a tendency to anxiety and difficulty controlling emotions; if you have been abused in the past or have had violent behavior with friends in high school, you will also be eliminated from the list of people allowed to meet directly with students.
As for young people who are orienting their future career to become a preschool teacher, remember that this is a profession that requires good health, the soul of an artist and the heart of a mother. If you do not really love children or only feel love for clean, fragrant, and well-behaved children, then do not choose this profession. If you think this is just a profession to earn a living that is suitable for your learning ability, then do not do it. If you feel that your personality is impatient, not meticulous, uncreative, poor in communication, and irresponsible, then do not do this profession. Because sooner or later it will lead to professional negligence that creates irreversible consequences, not only affecting the children but also cutting off your own future.
Assoc. Prof. Dr. TRAN THANH NAM, Head of Faculty of Educational Sciences , University of Education, Vietnam National University, Hanoi
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