ECE Services that Swallowed up Most Funding and the Groups that Got a Smaller Portion of the Pie

ANALYSIS/OPINION – June 26, 2025.

The Government spent 13% more on funding early childhood education last year than in 2023, but three out of the top four not-for-profit provider groups got a smaller portion of the pie.

The two largest privately-operated provider groups – BestStart and Busy Bees – received slightly more funding (proportionately) year-on-year.

New Shoots Children’s Centres had the highest amount of funding per individual service in the group ($31.26M for 16 services, or just under $2M per service).

Whānau Manaaki (Wellington) Kindergarten Association, Auckland Kindergarten Association and Central Kids Kindergarten Trust (Waikato/Bay of Plenty) all got smaller proportions of funding than they did over the previous 12 months.

(See charts and tables below for more details.)

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Setting up, managing and teaching in a small private preschool has many challenges, however it is very rewarding when you see the enormous benefits that a small owner-operated centre brings to children.

This is my story.

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NZIRECE Journal early childhood education research

Huritao: Critical Reflection on Pedagogy through Assessments

FULL REFERENCE: Werry, S., Cown, P. and Skeoch, R. (2021). Huritao: Critical reflection on pedagogy through assessment. NZ International Research in Early Childhood Education Journal, 23(1), 1 – 13.

Log-in to read the full research paper below. Or order a pdf copy of the article from the main NZIRECE Journal page.

ABSTRACT: Te Whāriki, Aotearoa New Zealand’s early childhood education curriculum states assessments need to make learning ‘visible’. This paper discusses how a particular form of narrative assessment, called trissessment, challenged kaiako (teachers) to reflect critically on their pedagogy. Trissessment uses the indigenous whaikōrero tikanga of tau utuutu (a speech making protocol) as a way of amplifying tamariki (children) and whānau (family) voices in the assessment process. Our project was a collaboration between researchers and kaiako-researchers of four-year-olds in an early childhood centre. Thematic analysis of trissessments and interview data obtained from kaiako and whānau revealed kaiako were paying much closer attention to tamariki through observation and listening; becoming more curious about what intrigued tamariki, thus deepening kaiako insights into children’s learning. As kaiako reflected critically on the learning that comes from the tau utuutu process, there was a profound shift in their pedagogy.

Key words: Assessment, pedagogy, reflection, practitioner research.

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She is worried that with the relaxing of health and safety requirements from the regulation overhaul to support service operators to have less compliance, child injury rates will continue to increase annually.

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