Childcare News

Happy Easter! Welcome to our April newsletter! As always, we provide an overview of what is happening within our childcare community. This month we will focus on the power of personalised learning experiences for children.

Topic of the month - Personalised Learning Experiences for Young Minds

In the vibrant landscape of Australian childcare, a significant shift towards personalised learning is changing how early childhood educators approach teaching and learning. This new approach recognises that every child is unique, with their strengths, interests and learning styles. By tailoring educational experiences to meet these individual needs, childcare providers are fostering environments where children can thrive.

What is Personalised Learning?

Personalised learning is an educational philosophy that focuses on creating learning experiences tailored to each child’s needs, abilities, and interests. It moves away from the traditional one-size-fits-all approach. This approach anchors itself to the belief that children learn best when they are engaged, motivated, and supported in ways that resonate with them.

Benefits of Personalised Learning

1.Enhanced engagement

When children are involved in activities that interest them, they are more likely to engage and motivated to learn. This inspires their love of learning.

2.Improved outcomes

Because personalised learning addresses a child’s strengths and gaps, it can lead to better academic and social outcomes.

3. Increased confidence

Personalised learning helps children build their confidence in their abilities, crucial for future success.

4. Better teacher-child relationships

Knowing each child individually helps teachers build a better rapport and stronger, supportive relationships.

Strategies for Implementing Personalised Learning

Implementing personalised learning in childcare centres requires thoughtful planning and collaboration among educators. Here are some strategies to shift towards personalised learning:

1. Creating learning profiles

An individual profile helps teachers learn each child’s interests, learning styles, and developmental milestones. This can also be easily regularly updated according to a child’s learning preferences.

2. Flexible learning environment

Learning environments need to be adaptable to accommodate different learning styles and activities. Whether it’s a group activity, a STEM laboratory or individual learning time, the space needs to easily be adapted to the learning goal and activity.

3. Technology integration

Choosing the right educational apps and tools which offer interactive learning experiences can help children have a tailored learning experience.

4. Play-based learning

Interest-led play helps children learn aligned with their interests, fostering curiosity and creativity.

5. Collaboration with families

Seeking parental input will also help early childhood educators understand a child’s interests and strengths outside the childcare setting. Feedback loops also lets both parents and educators share progress and feedback.

The Challenges of a Personalised Learning Approach

While there are benefits, there are also challenges when it comes to shifting to a personalised learning approach.

1.Resource intensity

A personalised learning approach needs a lot of their significant resources, from time, materials, and technology.

2. Staff training

Shifting to a new approach that drills down to individual needs will require massive re-training of staff to develop the necessary skills for creating and implementing personalised learning curriculum.

3. Parental engagement

Parents may have a harder time to commit consistently in providing feedback.

The Solutions to Making Personalised Learning Work

A shift to personalised learning can work through careful and collaborative planning, professional development and/or re-training, and flexibility.

Early childhood educators should work collaboratively with everyone to share resources and expertise, leverage AI tools to make well-informed decisions, and reduce workload while still enhancing the quality of a personalised learning approach.

The staff will also need to buy in to the new approach and agree on skills re-training custom-fitted to understand how a personalised learning approach works with their current teaching skillset. It might be in the form of abandoning the established curriculum that’s a cookie-cutter approach, applied to every single child in the classroom. Instead, personal learning milestones are the basis for each child’s evaluation, instead of ranking and comparing children across their age group.

Flexible communication will also help secure parents’ engagement. The use of digital platforms and flexible meeting times to engage with parents and keep them informed will help bridge the feedback gap, without asking for more time into their already busy schedules.

The Future of Personalised Learning

As personalised learning continues to be adapted by more centres, it will continue to evolve. Trends like the increase use of AI and data analytics will help childhood educators learn more about a child’s learning patterns. This will help them craft better educational experiences that resonate with a child’s interests and cultivate their curiosity.

There might also be more focus on emotional intelligence. Eschewing the traditional learning approach where learning ABC’s and 123’s is more important than learning about emotions, personalised learning will help children in their holistic development. And that includes their social and emotional development, not just cognitive development.

There is also an initiative to reach out to the community to help in providing children with more diverse learning opportunities. Whether it’s a quick trip to the community centre or the bushes, children will have a learning experience rooted in real-world contexts.

The Takeaway

Personalised learning experiences are going to change how early childhood education. This new approach will empower children to be curious, confident, and creative learners. As we move forward, it is critical to invest in ways that support personalised learning, ensuring no child is left behind.

Childcare Development

0-12 month development

Feeding your baby butter won’t help them sleep through the night, whatever TikTok says

Authors: Karleen Gribble, Naomi Hull, and Nina Jane Chad

A new TikTok trend has mothers trying to feed their babies butter in the hopes it will calm their baby and sleep more at night. The trend talks about feeding a baby about two or three tablespoons of butter at night before sleeptime.

However, researchers suggest that feeding a newborn baby up to 6 months solid food is not recommended. Their digestive system simply isn’t equipped yet to handle solid food. There are, however, other ways you can help your baby sleep longer.

Read on to find out why feeding your baby butter is not a good idea and how you can reduce night waking here.

1-2 year development

There’s a New Alphabet Song–Should Your Kid Learn It?

Author: Evan Porter

Have you heard the new alphabet song? It’s still the same tune, but letter groupings have changed. LMNOP is gone, and the ending is XYZ–not X, Y, and Z. Not everyone is on board though.

Find more about how parents and educators are reacting to the new alphabet song here and here.

2-3 year development

Dreading the school or daycare drop-off? How to handle it when your child doesn’t want you to go

Author: Kylie Ridder

Drop-offs at school or childcare can be the most stressful part of a parent’s morning routine. Preparation, routine, and educator support can all help in making the transition easier for parents. However, parents, and educators should also remember each child is unique so what works for one child may not work for another.

Find out more techniques on how to make drop-offs much easier for your child here.

3-4 year development

Bog standard? Study seeks most effective toilet training methods

Author: Hannah Devlin

Researchers found out that children are using diapers for longer periods of time. This might mean current toilet training methods aren’t as effective so they are in a search for the best ones to help parents of toddlers move their little ones from disposable nappies to using the toilet.

Find more about toilet training toddlers here.

4-5 year development

‘Mum, what’s the meaning of life?’ How to talk about philosophy with little kids

Author: Ben Kilby

Children are full of questions about life, meaning, and everything in between. Meanwhile, parents don’t have an answer. And while it may be tempting to resort to ask an AI for the answers, researchers say the best way is to simply start a conversation. Prompting a child to reflect, generalise, and abstract from the question they first asked helps them exercise their cognitive muscles. Not all questions need to be answered immediately, but it can bring about memorable conversations.