Child Safety
Lesson overview
In this chapter you will learn the following:
- Overview of child safety in childcare environment
- Tips to keep the children in your care safe
- Teaching safety rules to children
Activity
Discuss in your groups how and what you can do as a caregiver to ensure the safety of the children in your care.
One of the most important tasks for you as a child caregiver, is to ensure the safety of the children in your care.
The definition of a safe secure environment for children can be distinguished in 2 groups:
- Safety: The extent to which a child is free from fear and secure from physical or psychological harm within their social and physical environment
- Stability: The degree of predictability and consistency in a child’s social, emotional and physical environment
When we talk about child safety, we refer to various levels of ensuring the safety of the child.
- Create a child care environment that supports children’s exploration
Encouraging safe exploration is an important aspect for child care providers. Children are natural explorers and risk takers. They move quickly, put things in their mouths, drop and throw things, climb and hide. Keeping children safe is crucial and you want to set up an environment that is safe for them to get a chance to explore freely in a well-organised and child safe space.
- Health and safety in child care
Health and safety are major concerns for child care givers. The environment should be prepared and ready to prevent injuries, handle emergencies and ensure the health of the children in your care. You want to ensure that the following are in place:
- Cleaning, sanitising and disinfecting the childcare environment
- Ensure health and safety in diapering and toileting
- Food safety
- First Aid
- Handwashing
- Prevention of injuries
- Sunscreen
- Toy and equipment safety
Your top priority is to keep the children safe whilst they are in your care.
Here are some tips to help you make this happen:
- Installing effective access control system: Your childcare facility should have a control system that screens visitors before entering the premises. The premises should also not be easily accessible for visitors from the outside
- Training staff: Staff that work at the facility should be well trained, ideally, in terms of safety and emergency protocol
- Fencing and burglar bars: Sturdy and secure access is very important to protect the children from outside harm
- Keep your eyes open: Always be on the lookout for strangers loitering and know where each and every child is at all times.
- Know who to call: Always have contact numbers at hand, contact numbers of parents, emergency response, ambulance, fire brigade, police etc.
- Practice emergency plans: Develop an emergency plan and make sure the children know the drill. Walk them through the experience, roleplay an event. This will put children at ease and they won’t be alarmed in case of an emergency
It is important to also teach children some safety rules, so that they are aware of dangers out there and how to protect themselves. Teach them from a young age, then it will be second nature for them to know what to do in a potentially dangerous situation.
Parents teach children safety rules at home, but it is important to enforce these rules and elaborate on them. Make it part of your curriculum and planning so that it is a formal lesson in your facility.
Here are some basic rules that you can teach the children in your care:
- Contact information: Teach children basic contact information. They must be able to share their full name, parents’ name, address and contact number with older children. Practice makes perfect. Ensure that children practice this regularly
- Never go anywhere with a stranger: Children should NEVER go anywhere with a stranger, even if the stranger claims to know their parents, it is an emergency or any other excuse the stranger may have
- Road safety: Teach children the rules of the road, eg. Look right, left and right again before crossing the road, traffic signs and wearing a helmet when on a bike, scooter etc.
- If you are lost, stay where you are: Teach children what to do when they are lost. For example, stay where you are, ask a parent or another child for help etc.
- Your body is yours only: Teach children about good touch and bad touch. This will help them determine when someone has behaved inappropriately with them. They should also know who to report to immediately and shout for help
- Don’t keep secrets: Kids are often told to keep something secret but they should know that their parents and teachers are their safe place and there is nothing that they cannot share with you or their parents
The following video gives you some extra information on the safety tips you can teach the children in your care.
In this lesson you have learnt the following:
- One of the most important tasks for you as a child caregiver, is to ensure the safety of the children in your care
- Your top priority is to keep the children safe whilst they are in your care
- There are various things you can implement to ensure the safety of the children in your care i.e access control, safe equipment, emergency drills and emergency numbers
- It is important to also teach children some safety rules, so that they are aware of dangers out there and how to protect themselves. Teach them from a young age, then it will be second nature for them to know what to do in a potentially dangerous situation