In recognition of our growing team of Early Childhood Teachers we started our recent meeting by inviting participants to share why they are passionate about teaching in the early years. Responses included, nurturing and contributing to the growth and development of children, working within a team environment, experiencing the relationships with children and families and providing a play-based program that supports children to learn through exploring and self-discovery.
The teachers also shared their individual interests, experiences and skills, and how their practices and programming is reflective of their unique strengths. It was inspiring to hear about the creative ways that our teachers are incorporating their strengths into the curriculum through sharing cultures, languages, music and movement, cooking, sports and science.
Embedding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Perspectives
Following on from professional development provided at the previous meeting, participants shared how they were supporting their centres to further embed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) perspectives within the curriculum at their centres.
It was great to hear feedback from individuals about how teams were gaining confidence in their inclusion of ATSI perspectives through blending content through the curriculum. Some of the initiatives shared included:
- establishing bush tucker gardens
- referring to group times as yarning
- embracing the use of Indigenous symbols in literacy experiences
- building on authentic resources and blending them within play spaces
- engaging in ATSI art and exploring natural resources for creative art experiences
A highlight of the meeting was the rich and robust discussion had while reviewing a number of ATSI books. Discussions concluded that as individuals our responses and approaches to the content within each book are influenced by our pedagogies, life experiences, biases and beliefs. It was determined that how the book is presented to children could influence children’s perception of the content shared.
We discussed how important it is to introduce a number of the books reviewed with a carefully thought through plan. Story telling is an art and how it is delivered is just as important as the words written on the page. This workshop assisted in addressing barriers of knowing where to start, and concerns of making mistakes.
Summative Reports
In response to our previous meeting discussions, our mid-year Kindy reports were revised. We took the opportunity to reflect on the outcomes of this updated documentation and continued our discussion, reviewing our End of Kindy Year reports in our journey of continual improvement.
Early Childhood Teacher Hubs- Networking
We finished the day by gathering in small groups to yarn about a number of topics including teacher progressions and registrations, teaching practices and resources as well as professional learning and general interests.