Guest Posted March 21, 2009 Share Posted March 21, 2009 (edited) Hi all, we had our outdoor play and partnership with parents training today. The trainer was so knowledgable and spoke passionatly about outdoor play. he began the training with the following facts : many young boys: ........... Many young girls: left eye dominant ................. Equal vision see far .................... see near binocular vision later ..................... binocular vision later speak first words later .................. wider range of words earlier 99% speech intelligable aged 4 .................. 99% speech intelligible aged 3 less able to multi task ......................... able to multi task auditory memory ....................... visual memory right ear dominant ........................ equal hearing buid high .............................. long and low action and adventure stories ........................ human relation stories unaware of victims ............................. empathy for victims interested in objects and things ............... interested in people and relationships greater speech problems ...................... fewer speech problems dyslexia rate of 1-4 .................. better at tasks involving language express emotions through actions .................. emotions through words shorter attention span ................ longer attention span 30% more muscle bulk ........................ 30% less gross motor skills ..................... fine motor skills watch each other ................ watch adults stand/lay to work ................... sit to work thumb metacarpel aged 7-8 ................. thumb metacarpel aged 3-4 risk takers .............. careful of consequences difficulty thinking and acting .................... find easy to think and act OUTDOORS ......................................... INDOORS we found the list above very interesting, especially since we have a lot of boys in nursery. it really helped me with understanding one boy in particular. the boys in our setting will now be treated so much more fairly with oiur new found understanding. The trainer mentioned something to do with boys brains and RAS... along the lines of if they loose their RAS then it is hard for them to maintain attention, largely noticed at register / story time, and also since they have 30% more muscle bulk they are unable to sit comfortably.... explains a lot Froebal was spoken about a lot and is definatly a theorist i will read up more about sicne his theory basically is the EYFS!. we have now come to see our outdoors as another room to the nursery, and instantly we feel like we have gained so much more space in gaining the understanding that there are absoloutly thousands of opportunities outside. one thing the trainer told us that i did not know was that as long as the whole nursery is in ratio it does not matter if you have twenty children outside with two members of staff or visa versa. (two members of staff being the minimum). this has opened up our eyes to realising that the children will be able to use outdoors more... obviously we will always aim to staff outdoors as well as we can, but if an odd one or two children bring the outdoor staff over ratio momentarily then that is okay.... as i say we did not know this. the trainer gave us 51 cards each with a commitment form he EYFs and asked us to lay them any way we wanted (as long as the same colours were not touching). we formed a large hexagon and he asked us to pick a commitment, talk about it and talk about the connecting commitments..... a great visual way to see that each commitment links with the next no matter how you place them. he then pulled out the 'planning' commitment and asked us about it..... we all sighed, since planning is the bain of our lives (trying to get it 'right'). he pointed out quite rightly planning is ONE commitment out of 51, and no where in the statatory guidance does it say we have to plan (that's what he told us anyway!), he said it says we 'should' plan, but not how we should do it. we showed him our continuous provision plans (very detailed) with activity ideas and links to the EYFs and then the chidlren's learning journey's... as he said that is our planning.... we do not need weekly (or indeed daily) planning, continuous provision planning is fine when tied in with updated (regualrily) and relevant learning journey's. so as of tommorow we will no longer weekly plan, we will have regard to continuous provision planning and of course follow the child. this does not mean that the staff will do nothing, it means that instead of filling in planning sheets to sit on the wall and then gather dust in a folder the staff will use the time to contribute to a child's learning journery, and to engage with the child.. in my view, a far better use of time.... and definatly a point i will argue profuesly (sp?) with OFSTED. partnership with parents... the trainer said immediatly this is notoriously hard in early years, he asked us what we are doing (newsletters, parents boards, parents evenings, induction forms, key worker and parent communication board) and how effective we felt they were. well parents never read the parents boards, a percentage read the newsletters, a few attend the parents evenings, they all complete an induction form when child starts but rarely update. key worker and parent communication board has about a 60% update, so we are pleased with that. the trainer suggested sending our induction form home before the child started so parents can complete at their leisure, and to ask questions on it such as marital status, birth order, type of birth, likes, dislikes etc etc. sending it home will give parents more time to complete at their leisure. he said ofsted are hugely impressed if we can show how fathers are valued in the setting, and suggested a fathers board.... i am not sure how that would work yet. he also said that it is important to jog parents memories in order to get them to update relevant information on the child, we think that we may create a large board in the entrance hall along the lines of an image of a child and title saying ' in order to look after us as well as possible the staff need to know....' then list the things that it would be beneficial for us to be updating on. if i think of anymore i will update.... but all in all it was hugely beneficial for us as a setting Dawn Edited March 22, 2009 by Guest Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jennim Posted March 22, 2009 Share Posted March 22, 2009 fab list which put together lots of things I have heard elsewhere, can't wait for update! Jennim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aliamch Posted March 22, 2009 Share Posted March 22, 2009 Looking forward to the update Dawn, your list ticked so many boxes for my own son I can't wait to read more. Karrie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lynned55 Posted March 22, 2009 Share Posted March 22, 2009 Yes, looking forward to update as well. Not only reafirms things about our pre-school children but also my own (i have 2 grils & 2 boys) Does all this not beg the question Why do we insist on treating boys and girls the same all the way through their school life? It used to be, not sure if it still applys, that girls did better at O levels (or gcse) but by the time they did A levels the boys did better, presumbly they had caught up by then? Sorry, cant spell today!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JacquieL Posted March 22, 2009 Share Posted March 22, 2009 Very interesting Dawn, and summarises what we know to be true, in general, about child development. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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