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…
Let’s Start the Year Together
When I first submitted this blog to Jenny, she read it and then sidled up to me and said, “I see your point but could you not start the year with…
2014 : Blogging Through the Year (on a one horse open sleigh, o’er the field we go laughing all the way…)
Can we have whizzed through another year? Can you remember it all? I can’t remember the beginning of the week let alone the previous months, although with old age comes…
Creating Social Enterprises
Last week I was awarded the Social Enterprise Women’s Champion Award. I was completely shocked as my nomination was as surprising as the win. The award was…
There is Nothing as Practical as a Good Theory
This week we are hosting the launch of a book written by an ex LEYF staff member Mine Conkbayir and her co-writer Professor Chris Pascal CBE, who has been a…
The Ofsted National Consultative Forum: Read, Rage and Respond
Ofsted held its National Consultative Forum on the 12th of November and I was invited. This was my second meeting and I am there (in my mind anyway) to represent…
What Can We Do to Stop the Childhood Obesity Catastrophe?
Food and unhealthy eating is a regular feature on my blogs because what is happening is really scary. One in five children are obese and apparently 11% of toddlers are…
An Open Letter to the Minister, Sam Gyimah MP
Dear Minister I was sorry to miss your Policy Exchange lecture last week but maybe that was a good thing as it’s often better to read the script in…
Welcome To A Pioneering Qualification for Early Years Chefs
Last week I gave a speech to the Scottish Pre School Play Association in a hotel which was also full of Liberal Democrat delegates who had come…
A Trip to the Home of Democracy to Discuss the Democratisation of Childcare
Last week a colleague and I travelled to Greece to the annual EECERA Conference. I like to attend such conferences because I believe that if we do…
Baby Look into My Eyes…
This week I attended the 5th Annual Baby Room Conference organised by Kathy Goouch and her team at Canterbury University. The keynote speaker Annette Karmilof- Smith reflected…
The Shared Language of Childhood.
“If we do not keep on speaking terms with children, we become merely machines for eating and earning money” John Updike, Quoted in Arnold 2014 pg.
A Trip to Wales, where Plant has more than one meaning.
My family and I have been visiting Wales for many years including many of the countries beautiful gardens open to the public such as Bodnant. We had…