Children Should Not Be Silenced

Abstract

Early Years services in Romania have, until recently, lacked any form of national financial support. Early childhood practitioners are very low paid and the investments in training programs are insufficient. The impact on children should be considered and policy decisions should be taken, in order to grow the opportunities for training. In a world affected by financial crises, attitudes about children’s needs are very important. This research evaluates if the voices of children in Romanian preschools are heard and proposes new educational policy in order to train practitioners for preschools. The purpose of the study is to involve practitioners and parents in the Early Years in an experimental training program called: “Voices of Children in Romania”. We discovered that according to the traditional attitudes of Romanian parents and practitioners, children’s voices are rarely taken into consideration. After the new training program was put into practice in preschools and homes, teachers and parents started to give more attention to children’s voices and children’s wellbeing was improved. The study is relevant in order to increase public attention to the professional development of the early childhood workforce as a factor that can contribute to a healthy childhood.