There are lessons to be learned on nursery schools | Education

I broadly welcome plans by Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, to improve education for the under-fours (Labour wants graduate-led nurseries to fight equality, p1, 3 July). However, I feel that the emphasis she places on graduate teachers in the early years is misplaced. We also need a well-trained and educated workforce to provide the holistic care and education promise.

Having worked in nursery care and education for many years, and co-written textbooks for students, I believe that those entering the sector already receive a firm grounding in all aspects of early years education. The main emphasis in all these programmes is children learning through play.

Reintroducing the Sure Start scheme would be a better way to commit money and resources, rather than trying to attract graduate teachers. Sure Start, launched by Labour in 1998, went a long way to ensuring that the most disadvantaged children were given opportunities to thrive. The scheme aimed to improve social development by supporting the early relationships between parents and children, and – crucially – offered the early identification and support of children with emotional, learning or behavioural difficulties.
Carolyn Meggitt
Hampton Hill, London

Oh dear. Nurseries, the last bastions of whole-child education, are to be given over to teachers trained under the unimaginative, inflexible, Ofsted-type tick-box system of education. Abandon hope, humanity. Why do people not in nurseries imagine that there is no expertise within the nursery already?

As a primary school teacher, I was constantly amazed at the opportunities lost for language development by other teachers who focused on national curriculum lesson planning that would satisfy Ofsted and Sats. They wasted the real-life opportunities offered by drama, making things, foreign language learning and play (there is an almost complete lack of understanding of the value of well-enabled play by those with influence in education).

Of course, my fellow teachers were exhausted (or managing their energies and efforts in order not to burn out) and dancing to the tune of Ofsted, Sats and frequent observations by senior staff lacking the experience and expertise to understand the value of quality play. This is so wrong an approach for so many reasons.
Lise Bosher
Oxford

Planning for early years care and nursery education is complex. Yes, the overall aim is to have happy, competent children who have equal opportunities. Children also need the warmth and love that can build confidence in the outside world. Sometimes that is best achieved by home-teaching, with the support of playgroups and other activities. Sometimes by full-time nursery education. The parents have needs too. Many models of childcare can achieve this.

As someone who used wonderful childminders, I’m not sure a university degree could have enhanced the day-to-day experience. Scotland was an early provider of school-linked nursery education, but the short-term, limited hours were of little use to parents working full-time.

The recent experience of our granddaughter in England, whose primary school-run, all-year nursery closed with just three weeks’ notice, suggested that proper levels of pay for staff and flexibility in their working hours might be more important than who has a degree.

Has recruitment and retention of NHS nurses improved by making them all get degrees? Closer to home, we know of senior nursery staff who would leave rather than meet the expensive, time‑consuming and daunting prospect of having to acquire a degree after decades in their job.

Let’s hope that Labour looks at what already works well, and builds on this.
Sally Cheseldine
Balerno, Edinburgh