Packed lunches: I just want the right to say no!
Do you want the right to ban packed lunches from your setting because of Health & Safety concerns? The recent legal challenge to the Early Years in February, was…
LEYF News and CEO Blog
Read the latest news and updates from our CEO and the wider LEYF team.
Supporting ECEC for Infants Under Two
What We Learned from the Nursery World Webinar The Governments policy to expand “childcare” for children from 9 months by funding 30 hours ECEC is driving demand and anxiety in…
The Launch of the first Early Years Chef Academy
I recently found a letter I had written in 2014 to the London boroughs arguing that if we were serious about stemming childhood obesity we needed to work together to…
Child Poverty Affects Us All… and that means YOU!
There is no poverty in the UK I hear you cry. Really? Let’s start by looking at what we mean by poverty and the statistics. There is currently no formal…
Ready, Steady: The New Education Inspection Framework has Arrived
It was the longest and largest consultation Ofsted has ever undertaken (four months with 100 focus groups and 250 pilots across the sector) and consequently 15,000 people replied. Lesson to…
Whatever happened to lifelong learning?
The debate about what is education continues unabated. The DfE annoyed and baffled many last month when they announced that they did not advocate using the word learning because…
Cultural Capital in Action
Last week, one of our LEYF nurseries curated a pop-up art exhibition at a central venue in London’s Soho. The art which was auctioned by the manager…
Social Enterprise: using ethical fashion to change lives and save the planet
Many will have watched the Extinction Rebellion unfolding on the streets of Westminster with probably a mixture of bemusement, support and irritation. In the last week I have experienced all…
What is Cultural Capital?
To be honest, cultural capital is not the usual conversation piece. But it is both a conscious and unconscious part of our everyday lives. Now that Ofsted has introduced the…
Going to Bath for a Bath
I arrived on Friday evening (15 March) in a wet Bath for the Firm Foundations Conference. A wet bath was also just perfect metaphor for my life at the…
Save the Curly from Losing Its Wurly
I have taken Brexit like the rest of the UK, a bit like a grief response, shock, anger, fear, sadness and gradual acceptance but a small piece of satirical…
Happy International Women’s Day
Everything starts somewhere, and as the notices for International Women’s Day (IWD) started to proliferate, I wondered about its origins and its purpose. IWD can be traced back to…
Enjoy Books on World Book Day, Don’t Worry too Much about Dressing Up!
I grew up in a world where reading was a normal pastime. I didn’t have access to many books at home but I was an avid library fan. I went…
Reclaim the Outdoors For Children
I was invited to talk to Eamonn Holmes at talkRADIO the other week about a news story that commented on our intention to try and ensure that of the…