• Paramount consideration

Paramount Consideration

The Child’s Lens: Participation and the Paramount Consideration

  • NQS Areas
  • 5
    Area 5Relationships with children

Protecting children's rights and best interests requires more than adult interpretation. How do children's perspectives deepen our understanding of what matters to them?

Overview

What you'll learn

Holding children’s rights and best interests as the paramount consideration requires an ongoing commitment to understanding what matters to children and how they experience education and care.

Drawing on Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and Laura Lundy’s Model of Child Participation, this session explores children’s participation as more than ‘having a say’. Participants will consider how children communicate perspectives, how those perspectives are understood and responded to, and how they can meaningfully influence practice and decision-making.

Through reflection and discussion, educators will examine the role of listening, participation and influence in keeping children’s perspectives visible within the experiences, relationships and decisions that affect them.

The session will support you to:

  • consider the role of children’s perspectives in deepening our understanding of what matters to them
  • explore children’s participation as more than ‘having a say’
  • identify opportunities to strengthen how children’s perspectives influence practice and decision-making
Your facilitator

Our People

Jen Boddy

Jen Boddy

Jen is an experienced early education and care professional who has worked across long day care, preschool, and outside of school hours care settings. Through her work as a facilitator, Jen has supported leadership teams to build capacity in reflective practice, quality improvement planning, leadership, and governance. She has also developed key resources to support understanding of the National Quality Framework in practice.

Related courses

Paramount Consideration

Starting the Conversation: Understanding Paramountcy in Everyday Practice

Understanding paramountcy is only the beginning, applying it confidently in real situations is where practice truly changes.

This practical session moves beyond theory, supporting educators and leaders to work through complex everyday scenarios, manage competing pressures, and make child-first decisions that are clear and aligned with legislative expectations.

Delivery Method:

Webinar

NQS Areas:

2, 7

NEW topicsParamount Consideration

Available Dates

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