Tag: nursery

Forest School

by Lizzy Jones

What is Forest School?

Forest School, is an outdoor education delivery model in which individuals spend time in natural spaces to learn different skills. It has been defined in Liz O’Brien and Richard Murray’s research as “an inspirational process that offers children, young people and adults regular opportunities to achieve and develop confidence through hands-on learning in a woodland environment”.

Following success in the US, Sweden and Denmark, it has become extremely popular in the UK since the 90s. Many schools and other settings have established long term programmes with accredited training courses. Others have been solely setup as dedicated forest schools. The philosophy of Forest School embraces children’s natural curiosity, inspired imagination and promoted learning.

Formed in 2012 as “the professional body and UK wide voice for Forest School”, the Forest School Association (FSA) promote best practice, cohesion and “quality Forest School for all”. As a result, hey have helped over 10,000 educationalists undertake training to provide Forest School within their establishments. This includes nurseries, preschools and primary schools. This community is key as the demand for provision is rising and the quality of outdoor learning is growing.

Impact in the Early Years

Forest School promotes all aspects of children’s early years development. Forest School may have added benefits that learning indoors doesn’t provide. It endorses children’s physical well being by getting them more active and enjoying the fresh air. Similarly it gives children a greater wealth of experiences the outdoors can offer, thus instilling a healthier lifestyle.

Dr Janine Coates of the School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences and Dr Helena Pimlott-Wilson of the Department of Geography at Loughborough conducted preliminary research in 2017 within primary schools, including one early years foundation class (4-5 years). Their findings show that there is a clear impact of Forest School. Encouraging children to work with others in more challenging outdoor activities improves their social relationships. Secondly, this way of learning within early years appears to provide children with hands-on skills and an appreciation for the outdoors. Certainly a stark contrast to the ever-growing digital age where children are thought to spend less time in their outdoor environment.

Getting children outdoors is a great way of taking children and learning out of the classroom. In addition, it adds something a little different to the day-to-day schedule. Likewise, it gives children greater understanding and experience whilst helping all areas of their development in a different, stimulating way.

How can LearningBook help?

LearningBook allows customers to create and complete observations of children’s activities even if the safeguarding-aware tablets are offline and not connected to WiFi. For instance, it means settings who have poor internet connection and attend take part in outdoor sessions will still be able to record children’s development. Find out more features that can support your outdoor learning, here.

LearningBook joins forces with Just Childcare

by Lizzy Jones

Nursery group Just Childcare is teaming up with leading education technology company LearningBook to deliver a top spec recording and development tracking system across its sites.

The award-winning chain of over 30 nurseries will use LearningBook’s safeguarding-aware digital learning journey in a rolling multi-year contract, enabling staff to perform observation recording and tracking in half the time*.

Dr James Huntington, founder of LearningBook, comments; “We’re delighted to be joining forces with Just Childcare. Our system will help Just Childcare deliver a more comprehensive and efficient level of data collection, ensuring they continue to meet national and Ofsted standards, while having more time to help develop the children and engage parents.”

Liz Carroll, Nursery Operations Director at Just Childcare, adds: “Our team have found the system so simple to use, while allowing for a real depth of information to inform staff of children’s progress – and parents and carers really appreciate the unique safeguarding element and having the ability to view and contribute to their child’s education at home. We knew quite soon into our trial that we would be looking to roll the technology out across all our nurseries.”

 

LearningBook is based in Manchester and Macclesfield and is run by Dr James Huntington. The company was started when James’ family, who own Ofsted Outstanding nurseries, spotted a need for a more streamlined, safe and simple system for staff to track children’s early years development. James, a cloud computing company owner, combined his IT knowledge with ex-head teachers and nursery owners to create the system, launching it in 2014. It is the only company in the UK to offer the technology to clients on tablets which are stripped of all other applications, delivering a higher level of safeguarding than other companies. LearningBook now works with over 1,000 schools, preschools, nurseries and childminders all over the UK and further afield.

Liz concludes: “Thanks to LearningBook, we can spend more time improving the development of the children in our care, and communicating it really effectively to their parents and carers, who love the safeguarding element.”

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.