The early years is a crucial time in a child’s life where their learning and development can be rapid and where their experiences have a significant impact on their future life chances. Those of us who work with babies and young children…
We all have our morning routines.
A spot of yoga. A cappuccino from the little shop at the end of your road. Or a mad, tornado-style manoeuvre from bed to bathroom to workplace. Whatever your routine, I invite you to take a moment to a…
This is a special Coffee Break, welcoming Tapestry users who have come to us by signing on using their Tapestry login details!
Just in case you didn’t know, if you have a staff or manager login to Tapestry, you can use these details …
World Thinking Day is celebrated by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts on 22nd February every year. It began in 1926, as a day for Guides to think about their fellow members all around the world and to share messages of g…
Did you know there was an International Day of Maths? I must admit, I had no idea. It is on 14th March every year and invites schools and children to celebrate maths around a particular theme. This year the theme is Maths is Everywhere.
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To celebrate World Book Day this month, the FSF held our first story writing competition. Children in local schools were invited to send in a story they had written. Thank you to all the children who sent in their wonderful tales. Here is …
As we wait and wonder whether settings and schools will be closed officially due to the Coronavirus, all education and childcare staff, children and families, will be trying to carry on in the face of uncertainty.
You will all no doub…
How are you?
Each setting, staff member, family and child will be experiencing extraordinary change, and all the emotions that come with it. Educators are on the front line, providing safe spaces for vulnerable children and the childre…
Schools and Early Years settings of all shapes and sizes have spent the last week rapidly adjusting to new guidelines, expectations and responsibilities. The children now attending will only be those of Key Workers or those in vulnerable g…
Across the country, and the world, education teams are fragmented. Schools and early years settings are closed, some to all children, and many to all but the children of key workers and those who are vulnerable. Every school setting has or…
On Thursday this week it is International Dance Day (29th April 2020). This festival celebrates dance as a global ‘language’ and seeks to share the joy of dance with others. All around us we see dance being used as a form of communicat…
As a few countries begin to reopen schools and nurseries, cautiously moving forwards into a new way of life alongside COVID-19, there has been speculation about what a return to learning in a setting will look like in the UK.
The wellb…
Show me someone who isn’t family.
Ram Dass, spiritual teacher and psychologist
Every year on 15th May the United Nations leads celebrations for the International Day of Families. The UN recognises the family as the basic u…
‘Coffee Breaks’ are here to offer thoughts, pull strands of events together, acknowledge difficulties and celebrate good practice; a place to stop and think as you dip your biscuit into your cuppa.
So, this week’s offering is a poem…
In a recent article on the FSF, primary school teacher Clare Hancock wondered 'what will have been considered essential during these times?'
As we move forward, as schools and early years settings open their doors a little wider, as pa…
I have been thinking a lot about childhood recently. COVID-19 has changed the lives of every child, and everywhere children are finding ways to be children in a world that looks very different. At the same time, the struggles that many chi…
The words we are using about the global predicament we find ourselves in are changing. Instead of ‘back to normal’ we hear ‘the new norm’. We are realising we must adapt, embrace change and transition to a ‘post-lockdown’ socie…
I was chatting with a teacher friend of mine the other day (at a respectable social distance of course). We were discussing how the increase of children returning to the school was going.
She has about 12 in her Key Stage aged class b…
Transition from one year group to another, or from one setting to another, is a long journey rather than a short day trip. The transition suitcase inside each child needs to be packed with all the essentials – familiarity, confidence, or…
Last week the revised EYFS was released, with changes to the educational programmes, and to the Early Learning Goals (ELGs).
In this Coffee Break we take a moment to reflect on each of the revised programmes, the place where the EYFS…
Early years educators know how important it is for parents and carers to have the confidence to engage with their child’s language development from birth. The statistics are worrying: in England, 1 in 4 five year olds are behind with the…
For all of us who have explored something new with a child for the first time and shared the awe and wonder with them.
The Rain Stick
for Beth and Rand
Upend the rain stick and what happens next
Is a music t…
According to the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT), 7.58% of our children are affected by Developmental Language Disorder. DLD is a type of Speech, Language and Communication Need (SLCN) that affects the way that ch…
There has been a lot of discussion and data about the widening attainment gap for children which is only deepened by the current pandemic. Data aside, most children arriving in a classroom, or possibly in an early years setting in Septemb…
