Undergraduate Major Project Report Writing Assignment Sample

Introduction

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ABC Day Nursery is a kindergarten school that takes the responsibility to provide basic education to children and look after their development. The schools have been reported to have several regulatory aspects that are being followed for carrying out daily activities. Disciplinary activities are well maintained in the schools ensuring the proper development of the child. Though it has made many regulations, nursery schools are noted to face several strategic issues and challenges. In this report, the issues and challenges have been mentioned. Mitigation strategies aiming to solve the problem are also being mentioned. Implementation of such strategies is necessary to improve the framework of the institution. 

1. Report on ABC Day Nursery

1.1 Strategic Issues

Educational institutions face several strategic issues. Nursery schools are among the educational institutions that are involved in providing basic education to the students. They comprise an important section of society. Issues are an inevitable part of every educational institute. In the situation of a pandemic, the issues have considerably increased. The prime issue that should be considered is the pandemic plunge. The pandemic situation has created an additional burden on the institute. This is because nursery school forms the base of success in later times of the academic period. The issues that have been highlighted in recent times are the standard of education and have been the ability to meet up to the expectations. Institutions are failing to meet early reading goals, which will further affect the reading and writing skills of children (Reimers, 2020). The same issues have been observed in the case of numbering and spatial sense. Therefore it can be assessed from the above-mentioned problem that teachers will face the issue of whether children can learn the things being taught to them. 

The Second issue of these institutions is long teaching houses with no sick days. Schools are considered the second home for children. Thereby teacher associates in preschool carry the responsibility of handling children like their parents during the schooling time (synonym.com, 2022 ) These proved to be challenging for the teachers in these institutions. Not only do they have to handle the little ones but also have to carry out paperwork, assigning tasks to them. Another issue is that the government has mentioned a mandatory student-teacher ratio. This ratio is dependent on the number of students present. It will be difficult for a single teacher to handle many students. Thereby class is being segregated between two more teachers for efficiency (Lyzwa, 2018). This situation can be compelling for teachers, as they have to attend school irrespective of any bad situation. 

The declining situation of mental health has been another issue that teachers and institutions are facing. It is obvious that teachers should be in their best mental condition while teaching little ones. It is important to note that children are at a critical stage of their development and that inappropriate attitudes of teachers can affect them. It is evident from children's behaviour of not willing to go to school or is not attentive in the class. Teachers feeling depressed or overwhelmed will affect their teaching standards as well as their ability to manage a class. It has been evident from several cases that healthy brain development of children will depend on the creation of positive relationships or getting involved in encouraging and positive activities. The effect on mental health of teachers has been evident during the phase of a pandemic (Solvason, 2022). It has been reported in a study that most teachers associated with preschools have been engulfed in depression. Thereby initiatives should be taken in relaxing this situation

The next issue to be considered also associated with the situation of a pandemic is the online classes. The pandemic has affected the educational system the most. In preschool cases, the effect can be highlighted greatly. The school remains closed for a long period of time until the provision of online classes started. As per preschool students resolutions of online classes are not effective. It does not provide a clear image of what has been taught. The curriculum of activities that are being followed in school is disrupted. It is not possible on online platforms to interact with students as that in offline classes. Moreover, students have to be guided by their parents from time to time on what has to be done (Hoskins, 2021). In many cases, parents are failing to do so amid their other work responsibilities. It has been hampering the education system of children. 

Low pay and insufficient funding for the institution is other major issue. It can be directly related to competitive marketing. Several preschools are there that are functioning and hence it has a bly competitive market. Considering the fact that in a single preschool of ABC Day Nursery the number of students is limited. This can be true for other institutions as well. In order to have a competitive advantage, the provision provided by the institution matters. As there have been a limited number of students, the revenue collected also gets limited. As per the situation, the pay scale of employees remains low. Covid has increased the intensity of the problem. Students are not allowed to attend school during the situation of lockdown. Thereby fees structure has to be arranged accordingly (Pollard, 2021). In these situations, the fee scale is reduced. Thereby the pay scale of employees has to be reduced to run the organisation. It can lead to the feeling of under appreciation.

1.2. Challenges

The biggest challenge that preschools face is an operational challenge. The prime operational challenge it faces is lack of qualified teachers. Teaching little children is a difficult task and educators need to be trained accordingly. Children at times are not able to express their feelings, thereby a trained teacher is necessary to handle them and understand their condition. Educators need to effectively apply several techniques for the responsibility of developing young minds. It has been seen in many cases that educators fail to deliver efficient teaching materials to the students. It is also a matter of fact that teaching training is quite expensive. Another issue that contributes to this challenge is the low pay scale. Therefore quality teachers do not agree to be in the field. In case of homegrown schools, the biggest challenge is the lack of an effective curriculum. In many institutes research-based curriculums are not followed therefore substantial learning is not gained by the student (Bradbury, 2021). While considering a business perspective, an effective curriculum should be integrated into the institute such that it can provide profitability and new admissions.

A major limiting factor of preschool institutes is the high cost of marketing and sales. The institute has been cutting costs because of limited sources but this has been affecting the institution's brand as well. It has been failing to attract enough potential leads and hence viability has been another issue. On the account of increased leads, franchisees of the institute benefit. The profitability of the business is impacted in the long run. The sizable brand advantage helps in gaining a competitive edge for the franchisee and shows the bottom line. One of the biggest challenges in expenditure is the rentals. As real estate prices are increasing, rent of estate is increasing and is posing a major challenge to the institution. The institution is getting bound to charge high from parents (Pollard, 2021). In such cases, parents are bound to rethink the investment being made. Therefore, preschool businesses are facing several challenges that are of higher priority to get solved. 

Although ABC nursery supports the uniqueness of the children and strives to blend the innocuous souls into the modern reality so that they could grow up protecting their uniqueness but fail to accomplish the contentious demand of the parents. This creates a challenging environment for both the ABC group and the children (Lyzwa, 2018). These demands of the parents to raise their child with the knowledge required to deal with modern social requirements hampers the unique approach of the children, which is oblivious to modernity. Individuality fostering approaches of the ABC nursery is excellent for the same. In the approach, individuality imbibes by encouraging the pupils to various individual tasks. This way, they learn to respect themselves. This approach to motivate the children to be self-conscious sometimes creates challenges of rudeness, egoistic and ignoring behaviours among the children. This indeed hampers the overall objective of the nursery to build an empowered generation. 

The approach of this nursery to protect and preserve the creative nature of the children sometimes reduces the score and understanding of the subject matter of other disciplines. As an example, math, English and civics studies have been negatively impacted by the general interest of the children in painting and drawings (Sharp et al. 2020). The Montessori process of making children independent and building confidence among them empowered them to deal with the requirements of the higher classes on the one hand but on the other hand, reduced their sociability and integration with their family members. Along with this, the behaviour of living in isolation is also observed in the children. This hampers the prospects of the children as self-isolation from society indirectly reduces their emotions toward a society in general and social and family members in particular. 

Other than that, anxiety due to separation from the parents also negatively impacts the children of nursery school and sometimes can create long term challenges for children. Making friends in the new environment also creates challenges for the children in coping with the nursery school. Almost all the children face the same situation. Some children readily approach the friendship with other pupils but some are hesitant to do so and remain watchful of others (Lu et al. 2020). Children also sometimes face challenges in relating themselves with the teacher and learning. Therefore, a sense of isolation and fear play to the detriment of the normal behaviour of children. Children also face the challenges of communication with teachers and other children due to a lack of similarities in their speaking attitudes. Some children speak their mother tongue fluently and aggressively, but some are shivering to communicate in their mother tongue even with the children beside their home. Therefore, all these challenges have to be monitored, evaluated and mitigated efficiently so that a conducive learning environment can be created.

1.3. Mitigation strategy

Problems associated with nursery school must be mitigated promptly so that adequate responses can be adopted to improve the learning outcome of the curriculum. Therefore, an integrated measure has been observed in the mitigation strategies. In the following, problems and their mitigation strategies have been explained. Nursery schools must maintain the balance between uniqueness of the children and the modern needs of society and parents. It is a common concern of the parents that what, when and how their children get an education so that they could live with ease. Nursery schools, in this sense, can adopt integrated mitigation measures by reshuffling the school curriculum so that both uniqueness of the children and the modern need of the same is maintained (Garstang et al. 2020). Therefore, parents will be happy to send their children to schools where they can ensure the future of their children. In the following, this integration has depicted how the parents-teacher coordination can improve the learning outcome of the children. 

Individuality is pertinent for the individual growth of the children but it must be integrated by fostering morality and ethical consideration. This way, individuality improves the self-consciousness of the children on the one hand and ethical empowerment on the other hand will help the children to get both the taste of individuality and morality (Cova et al. 2020). This way, deviation of the children from the society can be ensured. Other than that, the covid- 19 pandemic also hampers the integration of the children with mainstream society due to frequent lockdowns. Therefore, integrating ethical learning with maintaining individuality can help children be honest themselves with and engendering respect for the society. 

Integration of creativity of the children with other subjects can also be considered as the mitigation strategy for the challenge of low performance in an essential academic discipline (Britton et al. 2020). In this sense, the painting or drawing skills of the children must be assimilated with the learning of the other disciplines. As an example, themes of social sciences and natural sciences can be tasked to draw by the children. Therefore, integration of the drawing skill of the children with other academic disciplines can be ensured (Briggs, 2020). With this, creative aspects of the children can also be used in consolidating the other subjects such as creative writing of the children can be tasked to write on social science themes based on the real-life experience of the children both at home and in the school.

Problems associated with the individuality and confidence of the children such as egoistic, anger, rude and ignoring behaviour can be mitigated by integrating them with different and multiple social events (Wells et al. 2021). This includes family gatherings, school festivals and annual academic events such as sports, essay writing, recitation, singing competition and others which help in more social integration among the children. Other than that, the malice of anger and other obnoxious behaviour of the children can also be mitigated using the social empowerment of the children. This can be done by organising cultural events such as dance, plays and fancy dress competitions. Separation from the parents, as a problem, can be mitigated by adopting some emotional strategies such as meeting with the children over video phone calls. 

Along with this, regular counselling of the children at home by the parents can also reduce the anxiety due to separation from the parents. It will integrate the feeling of children with the experience of the parents by a strategy of convincing the students to go for nursery schooling in a storytelling style. Making friends is another issue that is faced by nursery children. As has been evaluated above, due to introvert and extrovert behavioural features some children easily cope with the other children but some are unable to do the same (Lyzwa, 2018). Therefore, an interacting session can be introduced in the nursery school to consolidate the relational aspect of the children with that of others. In this way, introverts will feel the environment conducive and that will allow them to behave normally. Consequently, their overall mental and physical growth can be ensured. 

The problem of biting is frequently observed in preschoolers due to their inability to express anger and frustration. This also has been considered by Firestone. According to Firestone, in that case, children must be taught that biting is not acceptable. To mitigate the situation, a nursery child must be oriented to play with someone else in the classroom. If nobody wants to play with the child who bites then the child will realise that biting is not acceptable and the child will stop biting the next time. Children also feel lacking in relating themselves to the teacher. This negatively impacts their understanding of the explanation from a person who is alienated to them. This hampers the overall growth of children. The problem of communication gap in the nursery school can be mitigated by subscribing to the smaller classrooms and regular presentation of the ideas and learning of the children in front of the whole class (Wells et al. 2021). Initially, they will hesitate to do so, but eventually, accept the same and proceed with the presentation. Technological applications can also be used to mitigate problems such as the freedom of children to watch TV. Educational cartoon content has two aspects. On one side it entertains the children and on the other hand enhances their knowledge based on the inculcation of the mathematical, science and civic contents through audiovisual representation using TV or projectors. 

1.4. Implementation of the strategy

A strategy for maintaining a balance between uniqueness and modern needs can be implemented by changes in the curriculum of the school. Subjects such as social science should be taught artistically. With this, integration of various disciplines in the curriculum should be based on the interest of the children and also based on the performance of the subjects. This will stabilise the expected outcome which has been assumed before the implementation of the changing the school curriculum. Mitigation strategy to maintain individuality with morality and ethical integration can be implemented using the regular practice of the ethical approach. These practices include ethics in the playground, classroom and examination (Briggs, 2020). This fosters a sense of responsibility among the children so that their toil for individuality does not harm ethical empowerment. Therefore, nursery students do not obligate modernity ignoring the importance of tradition. This can also be implemented by organising an annual parent’s fair where all the parents and their children compulsorily attend the same. Here, children feel integrated with society, school and teachers and also feel relatable to them. In this way, a sense of self-confidence along with social integration can be possible to foster among the pupils. 

Implementation of the mitigation strategy of integrating the creativity of children with other subjects is also important. This can be done by adopting suggestions from the parents so that conformity from the parents could also ensure the effectiveness of the mitigation plan. Conducting drawing, singing, drama and recitation competitions among the children regularly can help them integrate their creativity with academic performance (Cova et al. 2020). Along with this, they feel secure while confronting any challenges such as annual exams, parent-teacher meets and others. Implementation of the mitigating strategies to reduce the anxiety incurred from the separation from the parents and siblings can be done by convincing them in the house by telling them the importance of schooling in a storytelling style. This will help them understand the importance of nursery school in their life. With this, the importance and excitement to meet new friends in the school can also be adopted to lure them to go to school. Making friends is cumbersome for introverts but exciting for extrovert students. Therefore, implementation to mitigate the problem of hesitancy for making friends can be accomplished using separate storytelling for both introverts and extroverts. 

Implementation strategy for mitigating the problem of relating themselves with the teacher can also be done by adopting the regular and frequent interaction with the teachers so that a scene of security can be ensured by the children from the teacher as it has been felt by the parents. Implementation to mitigate the problem of the communication gap between children with other children and teachers can be done by conducting game plans among the children. In the game plan, each child has to present their chosen topic or theme in their mother tongue (Hackett et al. 2020). This way, they feel confident while interacting with other children or teachers. Therefore, confident behaviour is observed in the children. The technological application can be used to implement the mitigating strategies rationally so that adequate and timely reformative strategies can be adopted. In the following, various applications of the technology that can be used for the implementation of the mitigation strategies have been depicted. 

The primary objective of the implementing strategies has been to construct a consolidated vision for the mitigation strategies. Here, the future expectation of the mitigation strategies has been adopted (Visser and Upton, 2018). Next is the strategic process where the technology can be used to form appropriate strategies to mitigate the problem associated with the nursery school. After that, technology also helps in implementing the plan of strategy. Here the role of parents becomes important to appropriate planning for the implementation of the mitigation strategies. In the next section, three important elements have been adopted to implement the mitigation strategies. This includes ownership, deadline, and accountability. At the last comes the role of a monitoring system. Here, the outcome and mitigation strategies have been thoroughly evaluated and appropriate reforms in the implementation strategies have been adopted (Reimers, 2020). This process of monitoring the implementation program is important for the overall benefit of the nursery school as late reforms in the ill-performing mitigation strategies can impact the reputation of the ABC nursery school. If any mitigating strategies are found incapable to mitigate the problem in the nursery school and the children therein, immediate reforms or deliberation of the new strategies for their implementation can be adopted. Therefore, the role of technology in implementing mitigating strategies is both essential and desirable. 

Conclusion

In this report, various challenges have been described which are generally observed in pre-schooling such as ABC nursery. These challenges include rudeness, egoistic and ignoring behaviours, and the demand of the parents to teach their children modern academic disciplines. In this, expectations of the school and parents have clashed and some mitigating strategies such as integration of vision of the nursery school and aspiration of the parents. Concerned preschools help the students become more independent and confident, but fail to imbibe the ethical norms among the students (parentcircle.com, 2022). Therefore, ethical and moral empowerment has been suggested as the mitigation strategy. Separation from the parents and alienation feeling of the children from the teachers hamper the mental growth of the children in the long run. Consequently, timely interaction with the parents and counselling of the children for the school by the parents has been suggested. Mitigation strategies for communication with teachers and other children have also been suggested. Montessori has been the earliest model of pre-schooling which requires some sort of modernity in its teaching. Encouraging the behaviour of the staff enhances the learning of the children and gives them confidence. Various playful outdoor activities conducted by the ABC nursery make the children happier both in-home and at school.

Recommendation

After a thorough evaluation of the ABC nursery along with explaining some mitigation strategies with their implementation approach, this study can suggest some recommendations. First recommendation for the concerned nursery school would be to allow the parents at the off time of the day to meet their children so that their children feel surprised and stay in the expectation of the same for the whole day and on the next day too. It has also been recommended to the school adopt various technological applications so that the communication gap can be mitigated. With this, it is also recommended to empower the children with ethical conduct in behaviour with appropriate respect to desired personalities (Solvason and Watson, 2022). Implementation of the mitigation strategies must be gradual as drastic changes can hamper the children to adopt new practices. This can negatively impact the adaptation of the children. With this, the Montessori model can be reformed to the extent to assimilate the modern need.

Reference

Books 

Briggs, F., 2020. Child protection: A guide for teachers and child care professionals. Routledge.

Hackett, A., Holmes, R. and MacRae, C. eds., 2020. Working with young children in museums: weaving theory and practice. Routledge.

Reimers, F.M., 2020. Educating students to improve the world (p. 131). Springer Nature.

Visser, J. and Upton, G. eds., 2018. Special education in Britain after Warnock (Vol. 57). Routledge.

Journal 

Britton, J., Farquharson, C., Sibieta, L., Tahir, I. and Waltmann, B., 2020. 2020 annual report on education spending in England (No. R183). IFS Report.

Cova, F., Rincón, P., Bustos, C., Streiner, D., King, M., Saldivia, S., Inostroza, C., Grandón, P. and Novoa, C., 2020. Randomized cluster trial of a parenting program in Chile: Key mediators in the decrease in behavior problems in preschool children. Clinical child psychology and psychiatry, 25(2), pp.320-332.

Garstang, J., Debelle, G., Anand, I., Armb, J., Botcher, E., Chaplin, H., Hallett, N., Morgans, C., Price, M., Tan, E.E.H. and Tudor, E., 2020. Effect of COVID-19 lockdown on child protection medical assessments: a retrospective observational study in Birmingham, UK. BMJ open, 10(9), p.e042867.

Lu, D.Y., Chen, Y.Z. and Lu, D.F., 2020. Nursery education, narrow-range or wide-range. Nurs Care Open Access J, 7, pp.87-9.

Lyzwa, J., 2018. Evacuation analysis in nursery schools–Challenges of parameterizing the behaviour of children. In In: Fire and Evacuation Modeling Technical Conference.

Sharp, C., Nelson, J., Lucas, M., Julius, J., McCrone, T. and Sims, D., 2020. Schools' Responses to COVID-19: The Challenges Facing Schools and Pupils in September 2020. National Foundation for Educational Research.

Solvason, C. and Watson, N., 2022. Insights into Positive Approaches to Parent Partnership Working in UK Nursery Schools. Journal of Social Psychology Research, pp.18-30.

Wells, A.E., Hunnikin, L.M., Ash, D.P. and Van Goozen, S.H., 2021. Improving emotion recognition is associated with subsequent mental health and well-being in children with severe behavioural problems. European child & adolescent psychiatry, 30(11), pp.1769-1777.

Hoskins, K., Bradbury, A. and Fogarty, L., 2021. A frontline service? Nursery Schools as local community hubs in an era of austerity. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 19(3), pp.355-368. 

Pollard, A., 2021. Introduction: New perspectives on children. In Children and their Primary Schools (pp. 1-11). Routledge.

Bradbury, A., Hoskins, K. and Fogarty, L., 2021. Policy actors in a hostile environment: the views of staff in maintained nursery schools in England. Education 3-13, pp.1-15.

Website

parentcircle.com, 2022 Common Problems Preschoolers Face In Schoolhttps://www.parentcircle.com

synonym.com, 2022 Problems in Teaching Preschool - Classroomhttps://classroom.synonym.com