Childcare Inclusion Programme

In April 2005 DESSA organised ‘Let’s ALL Play’ an Inclusive Play Seminar, in the National College of Ireland. The aim of the conference was to encourage childcare service providers to identify the issues they perceived as barriers to including more disabled children in their settings. The idea for a Childcare Inclusion Programme (CIP) originated from this seminar, as an initiative which would seek to address these issues and concerns, through the provision of targeted training and supports.

DESSA's Childcare Inclusion Programme was funded from May 2006 to December 2007. The project had a number of key objectives, which aimed to promote and facilitate the active inclusion of disabled children in mainstream play and childcare settings.

Research was undertaken to inform a Profile of Inclusion , which documents the level of inclusion of disabled children in services and practitioners' attitudes towards the provision of inclusive settings. 

CIP hosted a consultation day 'Valuing Your Voice', inviting childcare providers and families to come along to The ARK, in Temple Bar, to discuss their experiences of disability and inclusion, with our inclusive play trainers - Playworks.uk and Alison John and Associates Limited.

The outcomes from this consultation helped to build the Profile of Inclusion and also to inform the content and structure of our inclusive play training, policy seminars and workshops for parents. A number of inclusive play courses, one-day policy seminars  and parent workshops were subsequently delivered throughout  2006 and 2007.

The Profile of Inclusion, Reports on work with Practitioners and Parents and our Manual of Best Practice are available from the DESSA office.

The core philosophy behind the Childcare Inclusion Programme is summed up in the following quote:

"Inclusive Play is not about meeting ‘special needs’; It is about meeting all children’s needs in the same place and in a variety of different ways."

It Doesn’t Just Happen: Inclusive Management for Inclusive Play, Philip Douch, KIDSactive 2002.

The Childcare Inclusion Programme was a pilot initiative funded to 31st December 2007 by the Enhancing Disability Services Programme of the Department of Justice Equality and Law Reform, through Pobal.