General News
11 September, 2025
Researchers visit Gulf communities as part of study into childcare in remote areas
University of Queensland researchers connected with the 10,000 Hours Project recently visited Normanton, Karumba, and Croydon.
A Normanton woman undertaking a PhD into early childhood challenges and opportunities in the Gulf town recently welcomed University of Queensland researchers connected with the 10,000 Hours Project.
Normanton resident Anne Maree Taney met with project chief investigator Professor Karen Thorpe and Dr Bonnie Searle when they visited Karumba, Normanton, and Croydon in August to speak with families and educators to learn how environments, routines and relationships shape rural and remote kids’ learning before they enter school.
“The 10,000 Hours Project is a longitudinal study that is trying to understand how children’s experiences an early childhood education and care can set them up for success in future life,” Dr Searle said.
“We’re particularly interested in remote areas, because they do have barriers and challenges that are different to other areas of Australia.
“It’s longitudinal, so we’ll go back each year and track the children’s progress into school.”
She said children can spend up to 10,000 hours in childcare over the course of their early childhood before they start school.
“This is a really important opportunity to influence their brain development, especially considering that 95% of brain development happens before the age of five,” Dr Searle said.
“What we’re looking for is trying to work out and find the evidence for the practices that are producing those really good outcomes, and that will feed into policy to inform how money is best spent in ECEC.”
Ms Taney said it was an honour to have the researchers in Normanton to get a better understanding of a topic that’s often overlooked.
“I think the people in Croydon, Karumba and Normanton really valued that they took the time to come and spend time in their community, talk to them, and observe their kids,” Ms Taney said.
“People really do feel that most research happens in the south-east corner. The fact that people actually came here and asked their thoughts and ideas and found out what works for them and what doesn’t work for them, I think was really appreciated by the educators and the parents.
“It was also really good because it provides a good introduction to my research.”
Ms Taney’s PhD work will focus on early-childhood care in Normanton, but will be integrated into the 10,000 Hours Project.
“Whereas their research is about kids within the daycare setting, my research is going to be broader – so the different ways that kids get provided with education and care, and seeing whether what is provided meets their needs, or whether people have ideas about what would suit what they need better,” she said.
She said while data released earlier this year about childcare in Normanton may not seem positive, they didn’t tell the whole story of what happens in the town.
“Lots of our kids grow up strong. So I’m looking at what helps kids grow up strong, what the parents do, what the community does,” Ms Taney said.
“I’m a social worker by trade, and one of the ways we work is highlighting the strengths of the families and looking for local solutions to local issues.”
As part of the project, Dr Searle interviewed educators and young children about their experiences with food, mealtimes and food insecurity in a remote community.
“If a child’s hungry, it’s so much harder to actually learn all those vital social emotional skills that children should be learning,” Dr Searle said.
“So even if you’ve got very high-quality early-education care, if a child is experiencing hunger or doesn’t have enough food in the day, it’s really going to impact their ability to access that education and care.”