Challenges to the infant care profession: Practitioners' perspectives

Challenges to the infant care profession: Practitioners' perspectives

• Chan, Wai Ling The Education University of Hong Kong

Early Child Development and Care, 189(12), 2043-2055, 2019

Routledge

2019

• M Teachers & Education for Teachers
  • MA Professional Education for Teachers
• Q Philosophy of Education, Educational System & School At Different Levels
  • QB Pre-school Education, Child Caring Facilities, Maternal & Infantile Health Facilities

Crèche Childcare Worker Infant Care Practitioners Staff-Child Ratio

• Hong Kong

• 1997.7 onwards

• Pre-Primary Education

This paper explored the challenges to the infant care profession in Hong Kong creches, with an aim to contribute to the existing early childhood care literature for reference and comparison elsewhere. A questionnaire survey was conducted with 55 childcare workers and 12 supervisors, followed by interviews with some selected participants to examine the education, experience, training, working conditions and staff-child ratios of the practitioners in creches, and their perceptions towards the profession. The findings identified the areas for enhancing the education level and training of the practitioners to improve the quality of infant care. The results also indicated the problems of low salaries, unpleasant working conditions and inadequate staff-child ratio in the profession, discouraging high-calibre candidates from entering the field. This paper discussed the implications of the findings and offered some recommendations to raise the status of the infant care profession and the attractiveness of the job for prospective practitioners.
[Copyright of Early Child Development and Care is the property of Routledge.]

• English

Journal Articles

• 03004430

• 10.1080/03004430.2018.1432606

https://bibliography.lib.eduhk.hk/en/bibs/180712a8

2020-08-26