Nursery World Show: Seminars - Talking sense

Visitors to the Nursery World Show can hear from leading early years consultants and practitioners at thought-provoking seminars over the two days.

The themes of this year's seminar programme include:

- special educational needs;

- the key person approach;

- treasure baskets and heuristic play.

Speakers will share their insights into best practice within the EYFS and draw on their personal knowledge and experience.

The programme kicks off with a member of the EYFS team at National Strategies, Helen Moylett, whose seminar will focus on Observation, Assessment and Planning.

This will be followed by a talk on the place of risk and challenge in young children's learning by risk expert and principal lecturer of early childhood studies at Roehampton University, Helen Tovey. She will explain why it's important for children to play adventurously and how to introduce challenge into an enabling environment.

Liz Cross, Quality Improvement Manager for Surrey local authority, will draw on her experience of introducing the ECERS and ITERS environmental scales, and show how the increasingly popular scales can be used to create environments that will meet the needs of children in the EYFS.

Julian Grenier, head of Kate Greenaway Nursery School and Children's Centre in London, returns as a a speaker, this year talking about the key worker approach, now statutory under the EYFS, and his centre's involvement in a community kitchen that challenges popular ideas about children's diet and provides positive ways of working with young children and their families.

Creativity in the early years will be the subject of Bernadette Duffy, head of the Thomas Coram Children's Centre in London. Her seminar will look at the scope of creative learning in the EYFS and how to plan, resource and support creative experiences.

Wendy Rowlett, deputy head of the Portman Early Childhood Centre in London, will speak about treasure baskets and heuristic play and how practitioners can use them most effectively. An expert in this area, Wendy has delivered training sessions for the British Council in China.

'The seminar will draw on my own practice and experience of the children I work with, using film footage and written observations to evaluate children's learning with reference to the EYFS and Every Child Matters frameworks,' says Wendy.

She aims to help early years practitioners understand the benefits of using treasure baskets to nurture a baby's desire to explore and the best objects to arouse their curiosity. The seminar will also consider how to understand the needs of children in their second year for exploratory activity and look at the adult's role as a facilitator.

On day two, child psychologist and early years consultant Jennie Lindon speaks on child behaviour, positive approaches and strategies. She will discuss why early years practitioners need to put adult-child relationships at the heart of their strategies, especially when dealing with challenging behaviour.

Attachment and well-being are the subject of the seminar by early years consultant Maria Robinson. She will look at the role of the early years practitioner in helping babies and young children to feel safe and secure.

'I will focus on the importance of emotional well-being and the particular significance of attachment relationships,' says Maria.

This will be highlighted by a short video of the 'still face' experiment that shows how important the parent/caregiver connection is to babies' social and emotional health.

The effect of transitions on young children and the importance of resilience and well-being in handling change are the agenda for early years consultant Anne O'Connor.

Anne says, 'The seminar will be very discussion-based. We will look at the emotions related to change and compare these with our own experiences as adults in order to consider what children need to deal positively with transitions, and the practical ways that we can meet that need.'

See the full programme and book tickets at nurseryworldshow.com

- Further Details

The full programme and timetable of speakers is available on the Nursery World Show website.

Tickets for the seminars cost £10 per session if booked in advance, and £15 on the day. Demand is likely to be very high, so book now to ensure your place at the seminars of your choice on www.nurseryworldshow.com/node/6.