Welcome to the FSF February newsletter.

The FSF is celebrating its 20^th birthday today, 14^th February 2023! A lot has changed in 20 years - we have seen statutory and guidance documents come and go, governments and policies move on, and we have experienced a global pandemic. But the dedication of early years professionals remains. And the Forum remains a place for you to share support and advice with other educators and early years specialists. If you have a question, or an experience you think will be helpful to others, come along and join in the discussions. We have a new Forum conversation opened especially for our 20^th birthday, where you can say hello and share positive memories of your work with children.

Throughout our 20^th year, we are planning some exciting changes to the FSF which we hope you will enjoy sharing with us. Look out for these over the next few months.

Toddlers, Tech and Talk

Led by Professor Rosie Flewitt, Manchester Metropolitan University is collaborating with the universities of Lancaster, Queen’s Belfast, Strathclyde and Swansea on a project researching how the home lives of children aged three and under intersect with digital technologies in diverse families in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Through survey research, interviews and innovative participatory research methods, the project will generate new understandings of contemporary home learning environments, and generate guidance for parents and educators on creative and fun ways to make the most of the early learning opportunities offered by digital media. You can read more about the project here.

The research team need your help to disseminate the survey, so if you are able to, please share the survey link with parents at your setting. If you are the parent of a child aged 0-36 months, then please also complete the survey yourself 😊. The survey is available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese, Farsi, French, Gujurati, Polish, Panjabi, Romanian, Ukrainian, Urdu and Welsh. This Forum post includes a poster in English which you might display in your setting. If you would like more information about the poster, as well as posters in languages other than English, or if you have any questions about the study please email Rosie, r.flewitt@mmu.ac.uk

On the FSF this month we have a couple of new articles for you. Author, researcher and educator, Suma Din, shares narratives from educators and mothers about their experience of community-based support. And Early Years Teacher and academic Emma Davis asks us to connect closely with young children’s awe and wonder. You can browse through these and all our articles from this link.  

In our podcast episodes for February, Jules and Jack chat with teacher and senior leader Kiran Satti about Reading for Pleasure, and coming up later in the month we hear from teacher and author Anoara Mughal in a conversation about metacognition. You can check out all our podcast episodes wherever you like to listen, or from this link.

Over at Tapestry HQ, the team are very happy to have made it to the BusinessCloud EdTech 50 ranking for 2023! Thank you to BusinessCloud for shortlisting Tapestry, and to everyone who voted for us.

And finally, thank you to all our visitors and members now, and over the years, for making the FSF a vibrant and thoughtful community. 

Wishing you a safe and happy February.

Helen, Steve and all of us at the FSF and Tapestry