Category: Early Years

Getting early years active

by Lizzy Jones

Try our top 3 Early Years exercise activities in your setting

A child’s early years are a critical time for establishing healthy lifestyles and promoting exercise, that’s why it’s important to provide children with the right tools to do this. Providing good resources, relevant activities and positive attitudes is essential in laying the foundations for healthy lifestyles. We’ve compiled our top 3 early years exercise ideas for you to try in your school or nursery:

1. Playing catch

Children of all ages love to catch, roll and throw a ball. Make sure you have a variety of balls available in your setting; these can be soft, small or larger balls, like a football. From rolling a ball for babies to throwing a ball though a hoop for pre-schoolers, this is a perfect way to exercise and a really social activity too.

2. Building with blocks

Babies and ‘pre-walkers’ can use various sized blocks to help with grasping and improve their fine motor skills. As they get a little older they can start making smaller towers, build a den or a bridge with soft blocks that can be used during roleplay.

3. Counting games

Counting is a great activity to promote exercise and incorporate into children’s daily routines. For example, counting their steps to different destinations or counting the number of carrots on their plate at lunch time. Children can also throw a number of bean bags at a cone or in a hoop; a fun activity to use at sports day and play with parents!

Discover more way to promote Early Years exercise activities in your setting and at home for all ages with our free eGuide, here.

Why not incorporate exercise and healthy eating in your day? Our healthy eating blog is a perfect way to not only encourage early years children to exercise and build those little muscles, but to also learn about the food their eating.

Check out further information about early years exercising and physical activities:

 

Get children interested in food and healthy eating

by Lizzy Jones

Introducing EYFS Healthy Eating and Food Activities

In early years it’s important to encourage children to learn more about food as well as expand their tastes. Embracing healthy living and eating in your early years setting can be lots of fun as well as important for growth and development in the vital early years. Involve everyone – all staff or assistants as well as parents and children. This will give you a pot of new ideas as well as a feeling of teamwork.

Here are a few EYFS healthy eating activties to help encourage children to talk about, try and understand the food they eat.

1.Make bread

Help children of all ages weigh, mix and knead their ingredients. Allow them to see how the dough has risen and doubled in size!

Bonus: This not only helps to grow children’s interest in their food, kneading helps develop their small muscles (PD). In additio, it gived them an opportunity to talk about what the think healthy food means (PSED).

2.Plant seeds

By planting seeds in window boxes or outside you can help children understand where their foods come from and how they grow in different ways. Why not try tomatoes, cress or herbs?

Bonus: Take children to a farm to pick fruit, like strawberries. This will help children see a wider variety and will keep them engaged.

3.Try foods from around the world

Have an around the world or festival theme with lots of pick ‘n’ mix bowls. For example, try mangos (from India) or hummus (from Egypt) etc. This will help children try different foods and expand their tastes.

Bonus: Invite families to join in and bring food from different countries, this will help children see all of their role models together promoting and encouraging healthy eating and new foods.

Discover more way to create EYFS healthy eating activities in your setting, and boose parental paticipation at home with our free eGuide, here.

Bonfire Night

by Lizzy Jones

Bonfire Night is a great time to celebrate a tradition in the UK and enjoy a firework and bonfire display in your local area. It is something that is celebrated by all ages and by lots of families at the beginning of November. Bonfire Night, or Guy Fawkes Night as it’s also known, is a perfect opportunity to create exciting activities in your early years setting and get children expressing themselves through bright colours and fun activities. It’s also a great time to teach children how to keep themselves safe if they attend an event.

There are lots of activities on the internet but to give you a helping hand we’ve created this blog of our top Bonfire Night EYFS activities to get your children in the mood for Guy Fawkes Night, as well as some helpful tips from firework and bonfire safety websites.

Bonfire Night – EYFS Activities

1. Simple Mark Making

Mark making activities can be adapted for all age groups from babies to preschool.

You can ask children to use different material to make bright fireworks and bonfires. Younger children could use cotton buds or their little finger on chalk boards and copy firework style shapes and patterns. Or children can use their imaginations to make their own shapes and swirls with pencils, felt-tips, glitter pens or paint!

[Physical Development – Moving & Handling; Mathematics – Shape, space and measure; Expressive Arts and Design – Exploring and using media and materials & Being imaginative]

2. Fireworks in a Jar

This activity combines bonfire night, fireworks and science. Fill jars with water and set them out on an activity table. Mix together each food colouring colour with oil and use pipettes or pour the mixtures into the jar and watch the fireworks come to life!

Make sure you don’t miss the step where you mix oil to food colouring as this will make sure most of the colouring floats.

[Understanding the World- The World; Expressive Arts & Design – Exploring and using media & materials, Being imaginative]

3. Painting with Straws

Another great way to create fireworks in your setting is painting with straws!

Gather together some straws, at least one per child, as well as black card or paper and some bright coloured paint. Add some water to the paint so they become a little runnier and drop enough paint on the paper to create a small puddle. Then get your children to take their straw and blow through it to spread the puddle you made.

This may take a little practice, so you could always let the children have a few practice goes on scrap paper or newspaper.

Don’t forget to use lots of different colours to brighten up your night sky! This activity is perfect for toddlers and older children too.

[Physical Development – Moving & Handling; Expressive Arts & Design – Exploring and using media & materials, Being imaginative]

4. Bonfire Night Sky

A great way to get all children involved and celebrate their beautiful artwork is to create a bonfire night sky display board with a fun and messy twist.

Tape together lots of black card or paper, or use individual pieces, and pour the paints into trays and give the children paint brushes. Dip the brush into the paint and flick the paint onto the black paper. This is the messy bit so make sure you put some newspaper or covering down! Flick a range of colours onto the paper to create a bright picture.

You can add painting and other activities you’ve done to the board too!

[Physical Development – Moving & Handling; Expressive Arts & Design – Exploring and using media & materials, Being imaginative]

Safety

Of course Bonfire Night EYFS Activities are a great way for ealry years children to get involved in the festivities. However, wn important part of any firework celebrations, such as bonfire night, is the prevention of accidents. Fireworks and bonfires can be great fun but it is important to remember and pass on safety tips to parents, families and begin teaching children how to stay safe from an early age.

Here are a number of important tips to remember:

  • Make sure you plan your firework display to make it safe and enjoyable;
  • Read and follow the instructions on each firework packaging prior to the evening or use a torch if necessary;
  • Light the fireworks at arm’s length and have others stand well back;
  • Never return to a firework once it has been lit even if it fails to go off;
  • Direct fireworks away from spectators;
  • It is recommended that sparklers are not given to children under-5 years of age;
  • Make sure everyone handling sparklers wears gloves;
  • Never hold a baby in your arms while you are holding a sparkler;
  • When using sparklers avoid wearing loose clothing and tie back long hair.

Check out these websites for more information:

Royal Society of the Prevention of Accidents 

Fire Service

BBC Newsround 

Halloween EYFS Activites

by Lizzy Jones

Halloween is a great opportunity to celebrate the arrival of Autumn and gives you the opportunity to involve lots of Halloween EYFS activities in your setting throughout the week building up to children trick or treating.

There are lots of activities out there on the internet but to give you a helping hand our team at LearningBook have compiled our favourite Halloween EYFS activities to get your children in the mood for Halloween, whilst also incorporating meaningful areas of the curriculum of course.

1. Halloween Sensory Bin

Instead of the usual Halloween craft, why not try a sensory bin?

This is great sensory activity and keeps children engaged. Simply fill a tub or tray with your favourite materials, this can be water beads (to give that slightly slimey addition) or even black dried beans or dyed rice. Then on top of this include some creepy crawlies and other Halloween themed smaller pieces. To add additional elements to the activity, ask the children to describe what they’re feeling to encourage them to explore their senses.

You can also ask the children to name the different pieced they find from the bin and even group them based on colour or size.

[Expressive Arts and Design – Exploring and using media and materials; Mathematics – Shape, space and measure and Numbers]

2. Monster/Pumpkin Slime

This activity is perfect for encouraging young children and babies to experience new senses; an added bonus is that it’s edible!

Using melted marshmallows, cornflower, water and food colouring (we recommend green, orange, purple and black) to make the slime, ask children to pull and push the slime to work those little muscles.

[Physical Development – Moving and Handling; Expressive Arts and Design – Exploring and using media and materials]

3. Ice Cube Play

This one takes some pre-prep! Fill ice cube trays with water and pop in a spider, bugs or other Halloween themed pieced. Be aware that this activity is suitable for children over two years as the bugs can be very small!

Once the ice cubes are frozen place them on tray or onto the table for the children to play with. As the cubes melt the children can play with the bugs hidden inside.

Encourage the children to talk about what appears once the ice has melted or, if the children are capable, ask them to sort the small pieces in to different types, colours or count them.

[Expressive Arts and Design – Exploring and using media and materials; Mathematics – Shape, space and measure and Numbers; Communication and Language – Speaking]

4. Spooky Stories

A simple but effective activity is reading. There’s plenty of Halloween themed books that you can read to your children or ask them to try and read.

A classic, and no doubt somewhere on your book shelf, is “Room on a Broom” by Julia Donaldson. The story of a witch, a group of animals who help her, good manners, friendship and cooperation is fun to read aloud because of its rhythm and rhyme.

[Literacy – Reading; Communication and Language – Listening, Speaking]

5. Spider Hand Prints

Spider hand prints are great start to begin decorating your room ready for Halloween. It’s quite simple, requires few resources and can be done with children of any age.

Firstly, help paint the children’s hands with the black paint and press onto the paper. Once the handprints have dried cut them out and have the children glue on two googly eyes in the centre. You can use these on display boards or attach them to some string and hang from the ceiling.

[Expressive Arts and Design – Exploring and using media and materials & Begin imaginative]

6. Visit to a Pumpkin Patch

At Halloween nothing can beat visiting a pumpkin patch or going out to buy your pumpkins ready to decorate the setting.

Gather the children together and visit your local farm who you know grow pumpkins and pick some out. This visit will allow the children to experience a day out of the nursery or preschool and gives them some independence in choosing their favourite pumpkin to take away.

Don’t worry if you don’t have a pumpkin patch near by just pop down to your local supermarket to pick out a pumpkin or two!

[Understanding the World – The world & People and communities]

Don’t forget to search for more Halloween EYFS activities on the internet and on social media, including:

Impressing prospective nursery parents

by Lizzy Jones

As you know the first aim for a nursery is to encourage parents to entrust you with their children. It’s important to consider the impression you give parents online, in the community, during a visit and beyond. For most parents looking for childcare, this is the first time they will have to leave their child. They may be feeling guilty and nervous, and maybe experiencing separation anxiety.

As a childcare provider it is important to not only give a good impression in regards to looking after their child but also that you have the capbailities and the willingness to offer support to families as a whole. This will further assure parents they are making the right decision.

No doubt parents will consider more than one nursery visit so it’s important that you make a strong first impression.

Here’s out top 5 tips on how to impress your prospective nursery parents:

1. Online Presence

In today’s society a first impression is normally made online; this can be through your website, social media, or recommendation sites. Parents are likely to search for nurseries in their local area through a search engine or other childcare directories and forums. Therefore, it’s important to get this bit right. You can get inspiration from other nurseries in your area or even nurseries who have won awards for their online presence (Try looking at NMT Awards or Nursery World Awards). This may be how they’ve built their website, what they post on Facebook or Twitter or even what imagery they share online. When creating content in these places makes sure the values you have in your early years setting are reflected widely.

It’s also important to make the route they take through your website as simple as possible. Make sure they are directed to online forms, email addresses and telephone numbers encouraging them to call, book a visit or simply to find out more information about your childcare setting. When parents do call or email in, make sure they are responded to in a timely and polite manner, and their questions are answered.

2. Timing is everything

As you know certain times in the nursery are better at showing of the different activities and resources that are available to children to help them grow and develop.

Try to encourage parents to visit during times where planned activities or free flow play is occurring. Avoid nap times or drop-off and pick-up times where either nothing is happening or it’s a little chaotic. At these time, staff have other priorities and can’t engage with the visitors.

3. Staff should be engaged with the prospective parents and children 

Well before the visit it’s important to hire staff that share the nurseries values and are passionate about childcare. Parents will feel more relaxed and will feel more positive about leaving their child at your nursery when they can trust those who are taking care of their children.

Encourage your staff to have smart and correct uniform, smile, say hello and ask questions. Staff should speak with the parents about their child’s health and wellbeing, as well as their likes and dislikes. They can ask things about the child and family’s routine and how they can help your child settle into their new environment. This may take some practice but the more staff do this the more comfortable they will become with talking to visitors.

It’s important to remember that staff should also show engagement with the child or children not just with the parents.

4. Show off your strengths

Show off the things you’re proud of! Have you been graded Good or Outstanding by Ofsted? If so, mention this any chance you get. Parents will also want to know what makes you different, so make sure you play to your strengths during your visit. These strengths may be your staff, the outdoor area, the resources, the additional activities such as Spanish, French, yoga and so on.

5. There’s always room for improvement

Even after the visit is over it is important to ensure that you have a process in place to gather feedback from parents and families who have visited your setting. Both those who have taken a place and those who haven’t.

Sometimes this can be a phone call from the manager or administrative staff, or even an email with a survey to help you gather information.

Its one thing collecting feedback but it’s another using it to make improvements and learn from mistakes or suggested improvements. Ensure that the feedback and/or survey results are collated and feedback to the necessary people.

30 hours free childcare

by Lizzy Jones

In order to enable parents, where they wish, to return to work or to work additional hours the government is rolling out funding to support 30 hours free childcare.

In addition to the universal offer of 15 hours free early education entitlement most working parents of three and four year old children may be eligible for an additional 15 hours per week – totalling 30 hours free childcare.

Both entitlements can be delivered over 38 weeks (i.e. school term time) or the equivalent number of hours can be stretched across more weeks of the year.

Any childcare provider who is registered with Ofsted on the Early Years Register, including nurseries, pre-schools, playgroups, and some children’s centres may provide the places. It also means that Ofsted registered breakfast clubs; out of school; holiday clubs and childminders may be partners in providing free childcare places for working parents.

Am I eligible for 30 hours free childcare?

Not all parents are eligible for the extra 15 hours. However, everyone will still receive the 15 hours free childcare that is currently available.

To be eligible for 30 hours free childcare:

  • You  must live in England;
  • Your child is  3 or 4 years old;
  • Both parents must be working – or the sole parent is working in a single parent family;
  • Each parent earns, on average, a weekly minimum equivalent to 16 hours at National Minimum Wage or National Living Wage. The minimum amount will always reflect the lowest hourly rate that a person of your age can legally be paid. This information can be found online;
  • Each parent must have an annual income of less than £100,000.

Furthermore, parents can check their eligibility via the Childcare Choices website using its useful childcare calculator.

When does it start?

The scheme began nationwide in September 2017.

How do I apply?

You can now apply for 30-hour free childcare online via the Childcare Service.

When you apply, you’ll be asked to enter your name, address and National Insurance number, whether you expect to meet the income requirements over the next three months and whether you are in receipt of any benefits. Your partner will also need to fill in this information if necessary. This will enable HMRC to let you know whether your child is eligible for the 30 hours free childcare.

If you’re eligible, you’ll receive a code to take to your childcare provider and arrange your childcare place ahead of September 2017. You will also need your National Insurance Number and child’s date of birth. Your childcare provider or council will check the code is real and allocate your child a free childcare place.

Furthermore, if successful you will have to reconfirm their details quarterly – to ensure all information held is up to date.

Please be aware not all settings will offer the flexible 30 hours free childcare, it’s important to check with your local childcare providers. Also, some settings may charge for ‘extras’.

Useful Websites

Department of Education: Guidance

Childcare Choices

Pre-school Learning Alliance: 30 hours free childcare

Top 3 safeguarding challenges around technology in early years settings

by Lizzy Jones

Safeguarding Early Years – Technology

Never before has a generation grown up with such instant access to technology. Only time will tell if this will bring negative side effects. A Guardian article revealed that some leading Silicon Valley entrepreneurs restrict their children’s access to technology. In fact, some 25% of Early Years Practitioners don’t believe technology has a place in their pre-school educational environment.

Increased use of ICT brings concerns around issues. Here we offer some tips on safeguarding early years children when it comes to technology, such as:

1. Lack of practitioner knowledge

Not all practitioners are confident in using ICT, and many lack access to (and information about) which technology is best suited to the EYFS curriculum.

Only 55% of practitioners feel confident sharing a story on a touch screen. According to this report, not all staff are asking questions about the ICT children use outside school; meaning they are missing a big opportunity to learn more about children’s learning preferences and to engage with parents.

With increased training and support these issues can be overcome . IT champions in each setting can help. For small scale childminders in particular, a system for borrowing hardware and software has been recommended.

2. Security

Early years settings struggle to provide the same technology access children enjoy at home due to security issues. When safeguarding early years settings, policy makers don’t have to ban mobile devices. However, many nursery managers choose this policy as sites such as Facebook and Twitter make it so easy to share images of children.

Unlike ‘use your own tablet’ Digital Learning Journey solutions, LearningBook cannot be used for unauthorised distribution. All information is protected from data loss or cybercrime due to strict policies and secure logins.

Of course, it’s also important that children’s access to the internet is supervised. According to this report, many parents understand the importance of locking phones and using technology in a social, shared living space.

3. Health issues

Issues around sedentary, unsociable lifestyles caused by over-reliance on technology are perhaps the main cause for concern among practitioners. Analysis of 1,600 five-year-olds in Western Australia carried out in 2006 discovered a 28% reduction in children’s vigorous activity at weekends. Practitioners must ensure that technology is added to other activities, rather than replacing them, and that it encourages socialising.

What all this means for Digital Learning Journeys…

Of course, at LearningBook, we see the increased opportunity to create Digital Learning Journeys as a key advantage of classroom technology. Videos and pictures have been proven to be much more engaging for parents, much easier for practitioners to create and much easier for nursery managers and headteachers to store (information about each child and their achievements against learning goals is saved digitally, rather than lost or damaged in paper books).

LearningBook overcomes Learning Journey challenges competitors may not have considered:

  • Parents can only access information about their child via secure login;
  • All information is secured against data loss and cybercrime;
  • Other apps cannot be downloaded on LearningBook tablets;
  • Information cannot be shared on social networks, like Facebook.

If you’re looking into Digital Learning Journeys, make sure to ask about these security issues before choosing a system.

Conclusion
In conclusion, many practitioners need greater support in terms of training and managing the risks technology presents. However, the advantages of technology in early years settings cannot be underestimated; when it comes to teaching, engaging parents and improving observations and learning journeys.

Children must be able to enjoy the technology they use in their everyday lives in early years settings, ensuring that all learning styles are catered to. Digital Learning Journey systems, such as LearningBook, are an important step toward that goal.

EYFS for parents

by Lizzy Jones

In order to fully support their child’s early years learning, parents need to be familiar with the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) framework. This blog gives basic information on the EYFS for parents.

Education can be full of jargon, and keeping up with the frameworks, acronyms and governing bodies can be a struggle even for the most engaged parent. However, parents need to understand that the activities they do at home should be supporting their child in every way possible, and for that it’s vital for parents to have a good knowledge of the framework that schools and nurseries are working to in order to help and not hinder development.

An introduction to the EYFS for Parents

The EYFS is the time in your child’s life between birth and age 5. The EYFS Framework supports all professionals working in reception classes, pre-schools, nursery classes, day nurseries and childminding settings. It sets out:

  • The legal welfare requirements to keep your child safe.
  • The seven areas of learning and development.
  • Assessments that will tell you about your child’s progress through the EYFS.
  • Expected levels (Early Learning Goals) that your child should reach at age 5, usually the end of the reception year.

The welfare standards have been designed to make sure that your child is as safe as possible. These include the number of staff required in a nursery, how many children a childminder can look after, and things like administering medicines and carrying out risk assessments.

Areas of learning and development

The seven areas of learning and development are split into three prime areas and four specific areas. Firstly, children mostly develop the three prime areas first. These are:

  • Communication and language
  • Physical development
  • Personal, social and emotional development

Secondly, as children grow the prime areas will help them to develop skills in four specific areas. These are:

  • Literacy
  • Mathematics
  • Understanding the world
  • Expressive arts and design

Children’s activities are planned based on the areas of learning and development. To suit your child’s unique need, Early Years professionals teaching and supporting your child will make sure that the activities engage your child.

Traditionally completed on paper, Learning Journeys used printed pictures and sticky notes. Alternatively, digital learning journey providers like LearningBook are used to save time, as well as provide more accurate reporting and parental engagement. Schools, preschool, nurseries and other ealry years providers use LearningBook to record and track children’s development in line with the EYFS framework.

Compiled by early years practioners to document achievements through observations, above all learning journeys are used to monitor children’s progression. The learning journeys are key to share information with parents and complete assessments.

LearningBook provides a Parent Portal and Parent App to keep families informed of their child’s wellbeing, day-to-day activities and progression.

Find out more about the EYFS and how you can support your child with our free eGuide, here. In addition, check out these widely used resources on EYFS for parents:

Learning through play

by Lizzy Jones

Learning through play is a great way to encourage independence and exploration as part of early years learning. Discover our 3 favourite activities.

Though sometimes parents may not see the method to the madness, play is a vital part of early years development. Children are fully involved in play and use their bodies, minds and emotions; they learn to be in control and confident about themselves while interacting with others. Here are a few ideas for stimulating activities which get children exploring and encourage independence.

1. Dressing up

Children love to dress up and to pretend to be other people, animals and superheroes in different settings.

Tip: Section off a role play area with curtains to make it more theatrical, and provide for all the senses with special lighting and sound effects.

2. Building a den

Outdoor environments allow for plenty of different types of play with wide spaces for movement, den building, climbing, running, and messy play.

Tip: Provide a box of den building materials such as old sheets and blankets, bamboo canes and ropes, bendy sticks and pipes.

3. Building blocks

Blocks are an open-ended resource and can take many different forms from empty food packets and boxes, to big wooden crates, and traditional wooden building blocks.

Tip: Add small world, people, animals and vehicles to a collection of different types of blocks to help children create situations and stories.

Partnerships with parents

by Lizzy Jones

No one knows a child better than their parents, and harnessing a strong working relationship with those parents is key, especially in early years education.

Partnering with parents is key to being an Outstanding school or nursery: Parental involvement needs to be identified as highly valued by the school or nursery and should be promoted through parents’ involvement in the planning and assessment arrangements, regular review meetings, workshops and stay and play sessions.

A two-way flow of information

The key to building a good relationship is communication and that’s especially important when you’re dealing with something as fundamental as a child’s early years education. Gather examples of ways in which you enable a two-way flow of information with parents. Look at them and explore how these might be improved. Communication channels might include:

1. Send out a regular newsletter

Parents often have a lot of information to process. Keep it short and to the point with important dates highlighted. Can it be done more visually? Maybe try a video message or include lots of photos.

2. Face-to-face meetings

Do these take place at times that suit parents? Do parents feel that you have time for them; that you’re not rushing to get on to the next one?

3. Informal chats at drop off or collection times

Is there one member of staff available to talk to parents while others are settling in the children? Do you have information, photos or displays on what the children have been learning?

4. Surveys, forms and requests for evidence of home learning

Can these be made easier for parents? Can they be done online? Do you offer guidelines or examples on what you’re looking for, particularly when asking for home observations?

5. Reading records or home learning diaries

Do you offer examples of how to fill these in to get the information you need to support the learning and development of the children?