Guest Blog: Love-Based Management Approach

Written by Victoria McAvoy

My name is Victoria, and I am the nursery Principal for Belmont Farm Nursery School in Mill Hill. We hold 110 children a day and have a large staff team to match. I have a passion for childcare, and truly believe that the first 5 years of a child’s life are the most important and believe we are so lucky as nursery workers to be a part of that.

Having your staff team all following the same ethos can be challenging but is essential for the learning outcomes of the children to be delivered. I follow the ‘love-based’ management approach, put simply this is all about respecting your staff and understanding that they have a life outside of the setting. I have personally found the ‘love-based’ management approach allows your staff team to feel appreciated, respected and listen to. I have then found the same is then given back to myself and my deputies.

Ways in which I use the love-based approach are:

- Showing appreciation

This could be a thank you note, a kind word or walking through the classroom and finding three positive things to mention. We also have a rewards app we use to send recognitions and provide ‘perks.

- Offer encouragement

If I notice someone is struggling, I will always lend a hand and support them through that situation, to help them gain confidence and self-belief. Saying well done for how something is handled or hearing that you are proud will give the pride needed to continue the good practice. If we don’t encourage or guide good practice, how do we expect staff to know what they are doing is the right way for the setting.

- Open door policy

I have an open-door policy for my office space, the door is only closed for confidential meetings. Having a safe space for the staff to be able to come and chat about anything that is on their mind is improving mental health within the setting and actually allowing for some great changes.

- Gaining opinions of the staff team

The staff team on the floor are the ones trying out all the managers ideas, gaining feedback on what works and what doesn’t is a great way for the team to feel listen to and respected. If I am coming up with new ideas, I will hold a senior meeting (room managers, 3rd in charge and deputies) where the idea will be put out to them, for them to share their opinion on if it will work on the floor. If they feel it won’t work, I ask for other ways we can reach this goal/an alternative they think could be a good idea. We also hand out regular staff questionnaires and then share the feedback with a ‘what you said, what we have changed’ this is another great way for staff to see you are listening to them and making the changes you can make.

- All members of management to be on the same page

This may be the most important part, I have regular meetings with my deputies, third in charge and room managers. My goals, targets and ethos need to match my senior teams’ views of the nursery and what it can achieve. Without my senior team on the same page as me, following the same ‘love-based’ approach the nursery would not run as well as it does.

- Getting the team on the same page

This becomes a lot easier once the senior team are believing in the vision and following the same management style! A similar approach by gaining ideas from everyone, asking questions, and gaining feedback. I get the staff to review the curriculum regularly and ask what they do well and what they can improve/add on from it. Giving staff members the space to come up with ideas for their classroom based on the ethos of the nursery gives the staff the time to understand the ethos and how it can reflect into the classrooms. I also spend a lot of time in the classrooms, as does my deputy so we can show how we understand the day to day of a room, and that we can practice what we preach. If the staff are not seeing your practice, it can cause friction when something isn’t working or not established enough yet as they will feel you do not understand. Staying connected to the children helps to remind me what I got into childcare for in the first place.

I truly believe if we show our staff that they are cared for and thought of in the day to day running of the setting, as well as thought of in terms of their life outside of the setting it supports the atmosphere around the nursery to be a positive place to work. Working in a positive environment not only makes the staff happy to be at work, it makes the children’s day more enjoyable and the learning opportunities greater. If the staff care about the nursery as much as you do, the possibilities are endless.

Have you filled your bucket today?

A wise friend once asked me what do you do to fill your bucket? The idea behind this is that in order to give love, compassion, patience, kindness and are all for the children in our care and our colleagues that we work with that first we have to fill up our bucket; because we can’t give to others and help others if we are always running on empty.

As we come up to the hustle and bustle of Christmas at the end of a very uncertain year with lots of challenges, added pressures and a pandemic that has certainly changed all of our lives. I think now more then ever is the time to take stock and think, how do we look after our own well-being and ensure that we don’t run on empty. Whether, that be having a bath, going to the allotment, snuggles with the dog on the sofa, a nice relaxing walk or cooking a lovely meal. How do you give to yourself and show yourself compassion and kindness?

We currently are half way through our second lockdown (we hope) and this has been a challenging time for all of us on so many different levels. And although we know that we are doing all of these things to protect those we love and everyone, it can be incredibly hard on our well-being and mental health.

Together as a company we were very lucky to get an allotment just a few days before this lockdown, the growing together allotment for Susan and myself. Today as I pottered around the allotment on my own digging and pulling out weeds and raspberry bushes which we have in abundance. I thought how blessed I am to have this space outdoors, but also how important it is to me; this is one of the things I do to refuel and fill my own bucket up. I love being outdoors and just taking it all in, going outdoors and most importantly having that relationship and connection with nature (which most of us have lost in recent years – Richard Louv calls this a nature deficit disorder).

So, my challenge to all early year’s practitioners, teachers, professionals and parents is to fill up your bucket in the coming weeks so that you can support and give the children in your care and your colleagues all that they need from you, without causing yourself to run out and run low.

Research from Harding et al (2019) concluded that there was a strong association between student’s mental well-being and psychological distress and their teacher’s well-being and psychological distress. It is estimated that in the UK 1 in 6 people in the past week have experienced a common mental health problem (Mental Health Foundation, 2020).

If you are interested in learning more about well-being in relation to the children in your care, we offer a range of webinars that begin to explore some of this, such as:

·         Nature Connection and Well-Being in the Early Years (book on by clicking here)

·         Emotional Resilience in Early Childhood (book on by clicking here)

·         Supporting Pre-School Children’s Emotional Intelligence (book on by clicking here)

By Pauline Milsted

Director of Growing Together

(Photo credit: Jeff Kingma)

We Love Autumn…

Today whilst walking in the woods I was reminded of the natural beauty and majestic nature of autumn. Autumn has always had a special part in my heart and soul, a time of the year that I find uplifting, exciting and enjoyable. A brisk walk in the autumn air, as the leaves, acorns and conkers fall around you. A changing landscape of colour and regeneration all around you. A chance to take a deep breath pause and just take in the world that is so rapidly changing around you and appreciate the wonderful world that we can see and the unique connection we all have with nature. Just spending 30 minutes outside a week is said to improve our well-being and I don’t know about you but being outside to quote a good friend “blows away the cobwebs in our souls!” – that nature connection is not just a personal one but also a spiritual connection.

The complexity of this incredible world around us, like the way trees know to drop their leaves, to reserve the limited energy they will get from the sun in the cold winter months, in order to regrow and stay alive in the coming years. The way nature is forever changing around us and easily taken for granted or not understood. Autumn is also an exciting time to for children and a real opportunity to connect with nature, we love to collect conkers, acorns and leaves just like us Early Years Practitioners. I couldn’t help but, on my walk, today collect a few conkers, I think it is ingrained in us to do so to make the most of it.

After all conkers are a wonderful free resource for early years practitioners. From using conkers as loose parts, to tuff trays full of them for filling emptying, to using them for mathematics activities matching numbers to amount or conker rolling painting. There are just so many opportunities for that one conker! I personally love them as natural loose parts in the small-world and mathematics areas as I always think children find something amazing and incredible to do with them.

For example, I remember one child who spent hours engrossed in conker play, who had collected kitchen roll tubes from the art area and his conkers and he explored dropping them through the tubes, standing the tube down and seeing how many he could fit in what would happen if he picked the tube up and so much more. There were high levels of engagement, involvement, problem-solving, application of mathematical skills, working together with others as more children joined him and developing his ideas as they poked sticks through the tubes to see what happened next. As well as building upon his trajectory schema of learning, this child loved to drop things and watch things full and this supported his schema of learning.

Over my many years of working with young children I have been humbled by there understanding of the seasons, but have always found that Autumn just has a really special spark in them. I remember one child, many years ago, who thought “the sky was falling! The world is going to end!” because acorns, conkers and leaves were falling of the trees in the nursery garden. Obviously, we followed this the only way possible by reading the book ‘Chicken Licken’ which became a nursery favourite and doing many activities exploring the season of autumn; for weeks and weeks on end as this little boy and his interest grew and grew and was infectious to all of his friends around him.

But more then this autumn is also a magical time to see the world through children’s eyes. Last year whilst collecting coloured leaves with a group of children to make a physical pictogram on the floor outside, looking at numbers, sorting, colour, more and less and so on. I posed the question to a group of two to four year olds, “Why are the leaves falling of the trees?” To which one 3 year old replied, “Because it is autumn and the trees need to breath!” What an incredible insight and poetic way of putting it and it is very true in a way, the leaves drop in order to allow the tree to have the energy to live.

As people such as Richard Louv talk about a nature deficit and the fact that children are becoming more and more disconnected with nature, for example, many children could not identify trees by leaves anymore. It is a dying art, we do not know the trees around us, even me on my forest school training who loves nature and being outside, this is something I tremendously struggle with. But I always think autumn is a great time to explore this with the children. Take out some ID cards, match the leaves to the picture cards, sort them, look at size, look in detail at the veins on leaves as you do leave rubbings and printing.

A top tip I have when leaf printing is to use cotton buds on the back as you will not end up with to much paint and get a wonderful clear print of all the veins and details of a leaf. Other ideas, are to take your magnifying glasses with you and draw natural sketches with children. I think some of my happiest most memorable experiences with children that I have cared for has simply been, playing with the leaves outside in autumn. Sweeping them up, making pretend bonfires, throwing them in the air, repeating, singing songs around our bonfire or having tea outside around our bonfire. Simply magical times we have had together!

We hope you all have a magical and lovely autumn, wherever you are and whatever you are doing. We are running a webinar ‘Nature Connection and Well-Being in the Early Years on Wednesday 14th October 2020 at 7:30pm and you can click here to book. Or we are running the same webinar again on 21st November 2020 at 2pm and you can click here to book.

Promoting Communication and Language in the Early Years.

Communication and language development are core aspects of development in the Early Years Foundation Stage. This is because children need a secure foundation in communication and language to be able to achieve in all areas of learning and development. Now more then ever it is important that as carers, parents, nursery practitioners, managers, teachers and anyone within an early year’s role are working to promote communication and language in the early years.

Currently within the UK more and more children are believed to start nursery/pre-school below where they should be for communication and language development and this is specifically seen as being higher in areas of deprivation. The Communication Trust in 2014 stated that 50% of children from a disadvantaged background started school with a language delay. A more recent study in Ipswich which was identified as one of 12 opportunity areas found that 1 in 4 children from an area of deprivation by the end of the early year’s foundation stage (reception year) are not reaching the attainment expected for speaking; while 1 in 5 do not for understanding (National Literacy Trust 2019).

It is believed from a piece of influential research implemented by … that we have a 30 million-word-gap by the time children are of the age of 4 years old between those from lower income families compared to those with a higher income. Although, there are some critical responses to how the number 30 million was exactly arrived at and the sample size, it is fair to say that there is an identified gap of vocabulary that children from lower incomes are exposed to within their early years. Additionally, some studies have shown that children with a higher range of vocabulary have less behavioural problems and achieve more academically (Hempson 2019).

Additionally, there is a link between children from a disadvantaged background who receive free school meals who are 2.3 x more likely to have a speech and language delay. Currently within the UK it is estimated that over a million children have a speech and language delay or impairment. The Communication Trust in 2014 stated that 7% of children have a speech and language delay or impairment. This is roughly 2 to 3 children per class in the UK.

There are lots of easy ways we can promote communication and language in the early years from nursery rhymes, to story time, to playing alongside our children and modelling language, to cooking with them, to discussing the weather or doing the food shopping. Communication and language are part of everything that we do and essential to development in the early years; but it doesn’t have to be some fancy activity or hard work. We don’t need to make it elaborate and overthink it, mainly our children need us to speak to them, to model a wide range of vocabulary, to listen and respond to them, to be with them present in this moment.  To repeat back to them what they have said. To help develop their understanding through using visual and props.

Nursery rhymes are so beneficial to children’s development and learning, but in particular to their early communication and language development and literacy skills. Nursery rhymes can go back as far as the early 1700’s and research implemented by Kennedy (2005) showed that there was a direct correlation between nursery rhymes and children’s vocabulary and language development. Furthermore, Mem Fox reading magic states that if children know 8 nursery rhymes by the age of 4 year olds they will be better readers at 8 years old. If you would like to know more about the value of learning through music and nursery rhymes, we have a webinar on Thursday 17th September 2020 that you can click here to book. Or another one on Tuesday 13th October 2020 that you can click here to book.

Story time is another great way of helping to promote children’s communication and language, it exposes them to vocabulary, rhythm, rhyme. Make it engaging and use props, puppets, toys and pictures to engage the children. Take your time and focus on getting familiar with 1 or 2 stories rather then reading lots of different stories, as this will extend their learning and development. There are numerous research studies that indicate that children who are read to on a regular basis (every day) have better communication and language development.

There are so many things that we can easily do within the early years sector to promote children’s communication and language development, but also help to close the language gap. On the 26th October 2020 at 7:30pm we will be running an online webinar exploring the language gap where we will unpack this even further. To book a ticket now click here.