What to Buy?

I notice on the childminding forum that I go on that there are often questions about what resources should be bought when child minders are setting up for the first time.  There are usually a range of responses but often they focus on large scale and very commercial items.  Last week Nursery World magazine had a very sensible supplement with it that suggested what was needed for under threes.  I have summarised the main points here for anyone that is interested, and added a few comments of my own here and there! First off some quotes from the article:

"It is easy to get seduced by glossy catalogues offering colourful must-haves that actually have limited learning potential"

"Look for versatility, durability and longevity.  Wooden toys are more expensive but buying cheaper plastic items can be a false economy"

"It is the role of the adult to plan how children will be able to use the equipment, rather than buying the equipment without a purpose"

"Wood is more sensory than plastic and more durable.  Wooden toys retain children's interest for longer"

"The best resource for children is a knowledgeable and highly attuned adult"

"Invest in some high-quality items and then bulk out your provision with cheaper buys, natural materials and recycled items such as cardboard tubes and cartons"

Suggestions for resources:

• Cushions and mats for creating cozy spaces and defining different areas. 
• Rocking Toys.  I am cautious about having these indoors as a childminder due to the potential for squashed fingers underneath. 
• Stackable toys - good old blocks and bricks.
• Sorting toys - rather than shape sorters, that can be frustrating for little ones, collect 'heuristic play' materials - a range of natural materials and various small boxes and baskets for the children to discover shape and space for themselves.
• Small-world play - small wooden cars, trucks and planes and very simple wooden people, as well as a plain wooden, open fronted house that can be many things.
• Role-play - go easy on the fancy costumes that limit possibilities and stock up om various fabrics, hats shoes and accessories that expand the possibilities of dressing up.
• Pullable and pushable toys - carts, trolleys, animals, wheelbarrows, pushchairs.
• Soft toys - not highly rated by the author of the article but I value the gradually expanding collection of very beautiful and life-like British wild animal soft toys that I have.  They are used daily wither for play or cuddles!
• Dolls - a range of genders and ethnicities and fit for purpose such as hard bodied to go in the doll bath and soft bodied for changing clothes quite easily.
• Puzzles - simple is better, shape peg puzzles or those demonstrating size from largest to smallest.
• Mirrors - wall-mounted, infinity cube or hand held.

Dare to be different..... you don't have to have all of the same resources that everyone else has!  I decided a long time ago to declare an embargo on bleeping, buzzing and flashing plastic toys and I have never regretted the decision.  It makes for a more peaceful background where I can hear the children making their own sound effects!  Also consider that less is more - you don't have to have the super-giant sized tub of duplo or 30 figures to play with....... smaller amounts call for children to be imaginative and creative with the resources and you will see fascinating ebb and flow in the way their play develops!

I'd love to hear your comments on this article and how you decide what resources to invest in!

Developing the Outdoors Environment

I have been thinking about this and reading up on it for some weeks now and have today pulled together some initial lists and quotes (mainly from the EYFS).  I have cut them out and added them to a poster that I am making, with cutouts from magazines of equipment that I would like to have in the garden.  I'm going to put it up and ask the parents to contribute to the poster with their ideas about what is important to them about outdoors, what resources they would like to see out there, what their children enjoy outdoors at home, and any other ideas they may have.  I am hoping to be able to get the parents on board by giving them a wish list of 'found items' that would enhance the outside and see what they can ferret out for us to use!

Effective Practice (EYFS, 2008)

o Encourage children to help plan the layout
o Encourage children to contribute to keeping the area tidy
o Ensure that children can be outdoors daily all year round
o Help children to understand how to behave outdoors by talking about personal safety, risks and the safety of others.
o Link the indoors and outdoors so that children can move freely between them.

Challenges to tackle (EYFS, 2008)
o Promoting the value and importance of the outdoors to parents and other professionals.
o Meeting the needs of children of different ages in a shared outdoor space.
o Reflecting learning outdoors in observations and planning.

What the EYFS (2008) says about children being outdoors:

“Being outdoors has a positive impact on children’s sense of well-being and helps all aspects of children’s development”

“Being outdoors offers opportunities for doing things in different ways and on different scales than when indoors”

“It gives children first hand contact with weather, seasons and the natural world”

“Outdoor environments offer children freedom to explore, use their senses, and be physically active and exuberant”

“Children can learn to make decisions, solve problems and grow in confidence in their own abilities outdoors and they need plenty of time to investigate their outdoor environment purposefully”


“Outdoors, children can hear and respond to a different range of sounds, beginning to recognise and distinguish between noises in the outdoor environment”


“Outdoor learning complements indoor learning and is equally important. Play and learning that flow seamlessly between indoors and outdoors enable children to make the most of resources and materials available to them and develop their ideas without unnecessary interruption”

“Provide children with access to environments that stimulate their need to explore and which safely challenge them. The aim is to develop their risk awareness and an understanding of their own abilities as necessary life skills”

Developing the Outdoor Space
1. Evaluate where we are now.
2. Vision Planning – where do we want to be??
3. Action Planning – How can we get there??
4. Implementation – making the changes!

Resources and Play Materials
1. Open-ended and non-prescriptive, and can be used in imaginative ways that fit the children’s play, rather than dictating the play.
2. Different sized and shaped logs, poles, sticks and wood shapes.
3. Blocks, crates and tyres.
4. Natural items: sand, water, leaves, stones, bark, earth, mud, clay, shells, seeds.
5. Ropes and strings of different thickness and length.
6. Different colours, textures and sizes of fabric, cloths and tarpaulins.
7. Clothes pegs.
8. Pulleys.
9. Baskets, bags, buckets, containers,
10. Pipes of different shapes and lengths.
11. Chalks, charcoal, crayons, pens, pencils, brushes with water, paints, large paper and fabric, rollers.
12. Tools for digging, planting and caring for plants.
13. Tools and benches for woodworking.
14. Nets, bug pots, magnifiers, binoculars, trays, tanks.


Key Features to Plan For
1. Access and security.
2. Shelter and shade.
3. Appropriate clothing.
4. Appropriate storage.
5. Variety of surfaces.
6. The four elements.
7. Natural spaces.
8. Growing spaces.
9. Active spaces.
10. Reflective spaces.
11. Creative spaces.
12. Social spaces.
13. Offsite locations.

Plenty of food for thought here.... I will post about how I tackle each area over the next couple of weeks.  this is part of my ongoing review of 'The Learning Environment' section of the EYFS.  It has taken me, and some members of the childminding group on quite a journey so far; because the learning environment covers indoor, outdoor and emotional environment, there is a lot to consider, reflected by recent posts about supporting emotional development, ICT and others.  You might be interested to read the toolkit that has helped me review the outdoors, to be found on this post here!

Improving The Learning Environment

Last month at the childminding group we audited Inclusive Practice, but it was a bit dry and heavy so this month I put together a more interactive session.  The yellow strips had aspects of the Indoor environment printed on them, orange covered the Emotional environment and green was for the outdoor environment.  the three columns were headed 'Things I do well' 'Things I can improve' and 'Things I might need help with'.  It focussed everyones minds on the task in hand and there was some discussion about what a few slips as minders debated which column they wanted to put it in!

We then took it in turns to read out something from the 'Things I can Improve' column, and shared ideas about how we each achieved it or how we would like to improve it.

After that we wrote a plan:

• 
  
  One thing to change today.
• 
  
  One thing to change by next week.
• 
  
  One thing that needs more planning.
• 
  
  One thing we can all do together.

It was really great because it made it seem achievable rather than just another huge to-do list!  The things we decided to do together covered slips that appeared on everyone's charts - supporting children to recognise and label their own and other's emotions, so the next meeting we will look at some best practice ideas and make some resources together to help us do that. 

The thing I chose to change that day was to make outdoor access more child-friendly and to voice it as an option, instead of waiting for the children to suggest it, which in this grey and cold weather, they hadn't really been doing!

One thing to change by nest week was to have my groundrules up on the wall..... we all know what they are, I remind them umpteen times a day but they have never made their way onto paper!

One thing that we all agreed needed more planning was using ICT with the children.... it was something that we didn't know much about and needed to look into more, we will probably do that together too, and might try to access some funding to build a set of resources that can be rotated around the group members.

I was thrilled to have some really positive feedback about the session, such as:

"It helped me to put a label onto what I was already doing"

 and

"It will help me to show parents and Ofsted what I am doing to improve my practice"

I will be writing blogposts about the things we and I are improving upon so watch this space!!!

Choosing Toys

I have had the opportunity this week to apply for some funding for resources that will benefit the children in my care. I was given just six days to put the proposal together and has been hard work but I hope will be worth it!!  It has really made me think hard about the values that I hold and HOW I choose toys.  It was interesting to write the propsal with the EYFS open in fron of me and to see how resources support all the areas of the EYFS, not JUST learning and development.  I made a list of the criteria that I use when selecting equipment, everything I have meets one or more points from this list:

• Open-ended, meaning that it can be used in a variety of ways, for example, this pine dolls house is plain and simple and could be a house, fire-station, school, temple, shop, castle, whatever the child's imagination wants it to be.  Less can be more when it comes to children's play, as they become creative, rather than having it laid on a plate in front of them.
• Attractive - it has to call to the child to come and play with it because it is beautiful or intriguing and it meets a need that they have, to explore or express ideas, or role-play.
• Durable - it needs to be good quality and to last as I intend to be minding for a long time and i don't class toys as consumables!!  It is also important that young children learn to care for the toys they play with and things that look scruffy after just a few months don't encourage that.
• Inclusive - the doll house mentioned above is inclusive because it can be anything to any child regardless of their background, interests or experiences.  Also under this criteria I look to see whether positive images are portrayed and diverse cultures reflected.
• Simple, with clear cause and effect - this relates in a big way to the toddler toys that I source.  I want them to isolate one idea at a time, for example, if you press this button, the egg pops up.  This helps young children to make sense of the world and to build a knowledge base upon which they will eventually lay maths and science ideas!  Toys that are all-singing and all-dancing do not promote children's independence as they do not have a clear cut sequence of events that the child can achieve on their own.

I avoid toys that bleep and buzz and sing and have flashing lights for a couple of reasons, one is that I like to support the children's communication skills by talking with them and hearing them babble as they play and for that I need them to be able to listen and become absorbed in their play without distractions.  The second reason is the noise level that is reached when there are several children all playing with different electronic toys.  I find the noise distressing myself and don't personally think that it is very good for the children!

Through this process of thinking, I have come to realise that i do actually have a strong identity for my business and for vision for how it should develop.  It has made me really enthusiatic about pursuing those goals!  I used an auditing tool to look at the different areass of my resources and it was great as a way of assessing that area of my practice under the EYFS.

The photo below is part of my 'toddler shelves' showing some of the resources that I have out at present!