Natalie Young - Early Years Education Consultant

03/06/2020

Performance won’t end racism. Change your heart. Change your home. Change humanity.

02/06/2020

I understand that I will never understand, however I will stand

30/05/2020

13/05/2020

🦶

Going Barefoot Helps Children

27/04/2020

Math in the bath! 🛁 ⁣
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I like to add a few containers to our bath time. Any container that you can more or less see through, for example, plastic bottles, cups, Tupperware etc. Georgia currently enjoys filling, emptying and pouring, all great motor skills. But also it’s the foundations to the mathematical concept Capacity! Georgia is 19 months and her language has suddenly sky rocketed! She’s also beginning to demonstrate her understanding of simple concepts. So we’re starting to talk about full and empty with water in different containers. ⁣
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I always remember on my teacher training when I was asked to prepare a worksheet where the children coloured in half full, full and empty on 3 drawn bottles 🙈 I wanted to cry! What do the children really learn from that?!?!?⁣
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Let’s get them doing it for real! And give them different shape and size containers. Some containers that look smaller but in fact hold a larger volume are great for challenging children’s understanding of capacity. ⁣
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23/04/2020

Mix it up! Change the character!⁣
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🐅 ☕️ So my daughter is currently obsessed with The Tiger Who Came to Tea! We’ve read the book a zillion times and even watched the movie. She likes to act out parts of the story using her tea set. Mainly me, modelling phrases and vocab from the story. Today we mixed it up and a penguin came to tea! This gave her the opportunity to apply what she knew from the story with a new character. It also allowed me to see what she had understood from the story. ⁣
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🐯 Changing the character in a story is a really simple and easy way to get children to engage deeper within a story and understand new vocabulary and phrases. It’s also great for getting their creative juices going to think of what else they could change in the story! 🤔⁣
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👉Remember repeating stories is great for language development!⁣
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@ Buckhurst Hill

21/04/2020

One size DOES NOT fit all!⁣
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In teaching and parenting you often see schemes of work or strategies to teach something.⁣
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My child has decided sleep is overrated this last week 🙈 hence my lack of posts....but she’s clearly going through a developmental phase and no sleep strategy is going to work on her right now, I know, I tried them all when she was a baby, ALL OF THEM. I just sometimes forget to apply my knowledge of unique learners and learning to everyday basics such as sleep. ⁣
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I’m not a believer in a one size fits all method...because we’re all different, we’re all unique. There is no one way of doing things, learning things or teaching things. ⁣
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Different learners, different ways of learning.⁣
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All of my 1-2-1 sessions (currently via Skype) begin with a free 20 minute phone call to discuss your needs and if you choose to go ahead, I then design a bespoke session to suit your child/family needs. ⁣
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Is there something you think I may be able to help with? Drop me a DM for more info! ⁣
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16/04/2020

Please look after me!⁣
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So some children sometimes need a storyline or a bit of magic to get their creativity going! In previous school settings we introduced creative starts! A problem to solve or something mysterious that has happened or simply a new resource or addition to an area of provision.⁣
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When the caterpillars arrived from in the nursery instead of telling the children what they were I wrote a simple note saying “please look after me”. As a class we would discuss what we thought they were, where they came from and how we would look after them! Children came up with the idea that they were wiggly worms, baby dragons or baby crocodiles! Together we observed them and as they grew bigger the children then began to recognise that they were caterpillars! ⁣
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By discovering together and asking ‘I wonder....’ the children became far more involved and engaged. If I had have just told them what they were there would have been far less interest or questioning. By discovering together they hypothesised, changed their minds, discussed with one another, argued with one another! All good problem solving skills! ⁣
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“Please look after me” can be used with lots of different things! Maybe a new toy animal! In the past the children found a toy dog in the bushes with the same message. The children were coming into school with pet food 😂 they even made a bed in the modelling area! ⁣
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Share your ideas of what else could mysteriously arrive! ⁣
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@ Buckhurst Hill

12/04/2020

Not so instagram pretty! Swipe right for photos! ⁣
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Just wanted to show you a couple of extra things we’ve been doing during lockdown. Extra areas of provision as we can’t get out and about! ⁣
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They’re not Instagram pretty but the point is the learning. Obviously you want it to look appealing to children and for them to want to play with it, but the main focus is what are they learning from it!
The final photo is just some post it’s on the door. This is good for bubbas who are now standing and cruising encouraging them to stretch and reach! This will work lots of muscles!
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09/04/2020

My child won’t play on their own 😩⁣
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Is this a problem for you??? It’s a problem for many and I would often have a large group of children that started nursery and struggled to initiate play. ⁣
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Now obviously children benefit massively from playing with others, but it’s also important for children to be able to play and explore independently. To initiate ideas of play and follow them through. Children who can play well independently show great problem solving skills and creativity. And for many right now it’s VITAL so that you can work at home!⁣
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So I have a few tips and ideas to help them along.⁣
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1. Set up your provision so children can access the resources independently.⁣
2. Make sure you have open ended resources available such as a grimms rainbow or building blocks.⁣
3. Don’t have too many resources. This can often overwhelm children and encourage them to move quickly between activities.⁣
4. Model it first. Model choosing resources, playing with it and tidying it away. This may need to happen everyday to begin with. Talk through your thoughts as you’re playing!⁣
5. Toy rotation - rotate toys every week or fortnight, or whenever you feel is right! Not all, just a couple! Look back at my previous post on this! ⁣
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Skype parent consultations are available. DM me for more info.⁣
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