Amplify! Blog

Gabrielle (Gaby) Flavin is a new contributor to Amplify and brings us a six-legged story of bug-care in early and middle years services.

Louise Grigg has been a teaching director in preschools and long day care services for 23 years. A new guest writer, today she shares her story of achieving a learning goal for many early and middle years services: embedding authentic Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives in the curriculum.

In recent times, outdoor classrooms have been in vogue. They are seen as innovative and creative: they connect children to nature and allow educators to extend their pedagogy and look “outside the box” of intentional and play based learning.

The Land Cruiser Workmate Emma Fenton and her colleague Vicki take on outback roads for a month at a time is packed to the brim with the resources they need for early learning and play sessions with children scattered across a 220,000 km square western NSW region that also touches Victoria and Queensland.

After last week’s story about the happy outcome of a completely unexpected Ratings and Assessment visit, we’ve been thinking more about quality ratings and about how ACECQA’s research shows families are still largely unaware of what they mean.

One of Amplify’s favourite writers and provocateurs, Jennifer Ribarovski, returns this week to look at what ‘goal setting’ for children might mean in your service.

What would you do if your service only had one business day to submit your Quality Improvement Plan (QIP) and just eight business days to prepare for an assessment and rating by the NSW regulatory authority?

As autumn weather arrives, many ECE and OSHC services will be looking to head outdoors to take advantage of the not-too-hot, not-too-cold season. 

Darren Brisbane has previously shared the innovative ECE-OSHC kindergarten transition program at his service, Sherpa Kids St Paul’s. He’s back this week and excited to share the work the St Paul’s team has undertaken to prepare for Australia’s National Day Against Bullying and Violence this Friday, 16 March 2018.  

Can a focus on the outward appearance of early learning centres distract families and educators from the most important questions of quality early learning?