The Superpower of Playful Learning

[00:00:00] Simone: The food was pretty good, wasn't it? Yeah, it was young. Yeah. Okay. So, this next session is all about play, as I mentioned before. I know this will resonate with many of us. On stage we have three very passionate and experienced voices in early education. So first here is Tracy Kilpady from Xplor, along with Dr Mel Miller and Beck Seger from First Five Early Learning. So, thank you. Yes, thank you. Together they'll be exploring something that's at the very heart of early learning, the universal language of play. So, Tracy will moderate this great conversation. As we said, it will be broadcast live as well with some of these conversations. So, we may have some questions at the end as well. Over to you. Thank you, Tracy.  

[00:00:48] Tracy: Appreciate that, Simone. As mentioned, I have Dr Mel here and Beck with us today. Are you both able to give us a little bit of an introduction what you do who you're with today? We do know what we're talking about, which is great to see, but leave it away, Dr Mel. 

[00:01:01] Dr Mel: Thanks Tracy. Hi, everyone. Warm welcome to you all. I'm an early childhood teacher and I'm also a researcher and a consultant in the early childhood sector. And in my current role, I'm the director of early learning for First Five Early Learning. So, what that means is that I guide the direction of education across our five services. Thanks Tracy.  

[00:01:19] Beck: Hi everyone. My name's Beck Seager. I am the head of operations for First Five. So, what I do is I support our centre managers and our centre teams. My experience that I draw on is that I've been in sector for over 25 years. I know it doesn't look like it. And I have owned my own centre. I've worked in management, I've worked centre teams, worked in corporate and yeah, now working with Mel and the team at First Five.  

[00:01:45] Tracy: We are incredibly lucky today. There is a lot of experience between the three of us and I will say very varied experience across the sector as well. But let's go back a little bit. 

[00:01:53] I would love to hear from both of you, your own experience with play in childhood. What do you remember? What did you enjoy? What did we gravitate towards?  

[00:02:02] Dr Mel: I'm old, so I think back to my childhood experience of play, I grew up at a time where children and families in the neighbourhood knew each other. 

[00:02:11] And I think as children, I was the youngest of three. We belonged to the neighbourhood, but the whole neighbourhood belonged to us. So, it was a time where we travelled far from home, often to play. We rode our bikes, we rode our skateboards, we'd play in natural bushland. And it was often away from adult observation, and supervision and surveillance. So, we would often make up the games that we played. We would play sports together. And the older children were tasked with taking care of younger children. But it was certainly an unstructured childhood and certainly an unhurried one, which I'm really grateful for. 

[00:02:51] And we were not over structured, we were not over shrivelled. And it was charmed childhood, to be honest. Yeah.  

[00:02:59] Beck: I think I'm also old, but I think, growing up in the eighties, yes, the eighties, I was an only child. So, for me it was about going out and seeking play with others, playing with children in the neighbourhood and playing on my own as well, a lot. So, it was a lot of solitary play. It was video games in my bedroom. TV had come in, I remember I had a TV in my room. But if I go back to early childhood and I think about my first experience in a kindergarten setting, I remember I was that child that cried. And wanted to go home clinging onto the gate, crying for my mom, wanting to go home and then ringing my mom coming and picking me up. And I think that's what for me, gravitates me towards children, those children. And it's about making children feel safe in our care and ensuring that that things that we learned as a child and all the things may be very different for children these days, we can draw on our own experiences and ensure we bring that into the care that we give today.  

[00:04:05] Tracy: It's actually really interesting to hear. I think the three of us, again, much like our sector experience, different experiences of play. I'm the oldest of two girls, so a lot of my play was very much decided by myself until it did get to a stage where, "There's another person. I've got to respect what they want to do and what they want to play with." But a little bit differently to you Beck. School was a very interesting place for me. I do have quite a memory of my parents not being upset, but quite surprised that I didn't cry. And I knew who my friends were from Kinder, and I walked right on over in prep and it was, "Why is she not sad to leave us?" 

[00:04:38] And again, birth order really comes into this play, what we like to do. No one in this room is immune to the fact that play is important in the early years, but Dr Mel, what makes play such a superpower in early childhood?  

[00:04:50] Dr Mel: I think children are naturally motivated to play. And through play children show us what they know and can do. And we have a really strong evidence base that tells us that play is the most effective vehicle through which children develop and learn. And it supports their wellbeing. And I think play is developmentally appropriate. And because of that, children can experience success as learners in the first five years. And that really matters because when I feel successful as a learner, it means that I am generally willing to give things a go. I'm curious about things. 

[00:05:29] I'm willing to try things that are hard and persist in learning. I develop confidence. And I can problem solve. And all of those really positive dispositions for learning matter for then the learner who transitions to a formal schooling context. So, I think play is incredibly important in the first five years and we have a role as adults to uphold children's right to play. 

[00:05:55] Tracy: I think that language is really important, right? To play. We talk about what we should be giving children and what they should be getting access to. Play, it's a massive one. The term play mastery comes up a lot in your research, very especially in the blog that you very kindly wrote for us and we shared with The Sector as well. When we talk about play mastery, you describe it as the real work of childhood. In your research, what can that look like in development?  

[00:06:19] Dr Mel: Yeah, I think mastery is the way we learn and there is a role for both children and adults. And when we're talking about play mastery, we're talking about children having the opportunity to meet materials, resources, learning processes, time and time again in multiple modes. 

[00:06:36] So if I think about a 4-year-old who can recognise the first letter of their name in a storybook. And they're wanting to play with sounds and sound out letters, and they're willing to have a go at emergent writing. That child has experienced thousands of hours of shared book reading and language play with trusted adults. And they've had repeated opportunity to engage in meaningful mark making using a range of materials and surfaces. 

[00:07:07] And if I think of a 5-year-old who jumps from the top of the fort with confidence, that child has had thousands of hours and repeated opportunity to test the limits of their own body in physical environments. But they've also been trusted to assess and mitigate their own risk. So, I think play mastery is about these things. 

[00:07:29] I often use the example from a pedagogy and education perspective of learning about the concept of colour. And colour as a concept is in itself quite broad and deep. And I often think about the colour blue, which has over 200 distinct shades alone. And as an educator, I have a pedagogical choice. I could pull out some flashcards and I could hold them up to children daily. And I could test their knowledge on whether they could correctly label the colour blue. And the card is likely to have one shade of blue on it. Alternatively, I could invite children to explore the colour blue through nature. Sky blue, sea blue, cornflower blue, the electric blue of a fairywren, how the bowerbird collects blue objects. And we could explore blue through fabric and textiles and artworks and gemstones and ochre. 

[00:08:33] We could explore how we make different shades of blue through mixing paint or other materials. So as a learner, I know which approach I would prefer. And I think when we invite children and I invest in play mastery, it means that we have those repeated opportunities to meet those materials and resources, and the learning becomes richer and more meaningful for children. 

[00:09:01] Tracy: Hearing you talk about all those different examples there's so many ways to go in early childhood. There's paths that children take you down. There's paths that your research will take you down. How can we as educators, support play and support development in that space?  

[00:09:15] Dr Mel: I think the most important thing is to employ what we call a pedagogy of listening. And what that means is that I'm genuinely listening for the ideas that children are exploring in play. And when I do that, I'm looking for both those nonverbal and verbal cues. And it tells me as an educator when they're ready to engage with materials in different ways or more complex ways. But I have to genuinely listen to children because they will lead, and they will tell me what my role should be. 

[00:09:51] Tracy: The educator role is really important. We know this. This is the core of what everyone in this room does. It's what we've studied to do. It's what we continually grow towards. How can educators help children in their own unique play journeys? We've talked about listening. It's going to be different for each child. How do we support that?  

[00:10:09] Dr Mel: Yeah. Look, I think we need to have that real balance between child-led play, guided play and learning. So, the child might lead, but then I guide in the play, as the adult. And then adult led learning as well. So, all of those play a role in a really balanced program. And I think we have to know children well. And when we know children well, as I said, they will lead and then we can make pedagogical decisions based on children.  

[00:10:38] Tracy: I've had the pleasure now of working with you both across businesses and at Xplor in a couple of different roles myself. At Xplor's vantage point of connection, education and technology, how do you both see digital tools being used to support playful learning at the services and also a hand in hand home environments? 

[00:10:56] Beck: I think I think it's really important too. It's needed and it's, as we move through evolution of what we have in front of us, and I think it's important that children use it at home. It's good to include it and what they're doing day-to-day. So, they're taking their own observations of their own work. 

[00:11:14] Taking photos and analysing what they're doing with their peers or taking photos of their peers and talking about that with each other and with their educators. And they're getting words from their educators around what they're doing and what that looks like. To be able to then share that with their families when they go home. 

[00:11:30] Yeah.  

[00:11:31] Dr Mel: Yeah, completely agree, Beck. And I think too, digital tools can augment more traditional approaches to what we do with our young children in early education and care. So, I often use the example of an iPad. So, I might have an iPad set up in a clay area. And I use, for example, the ChatterPix app to invite children to bring their clay creation to life. 

[00:11:55] So they take a photo of their clay creation, they draw a mouth. And they can record their voice. So, clay is something we use frequently in early childhood education. It's a wonderful tool for learning, but we can augment it with a digital tool. And I think about shared book reading. We can again use an iPad, and we can use the Draw and Tell app. 

[00:12:15] And through that, children can explore narrative construction and characters and scenery. And they can retell favourite stories in their own words, or they can make up stories. So, I think digital tools absolutely have a place. And I think it comes down, I read something the other day about the difference between screen quality and screen time. 

[00:12:36] And talking about screen quality matters, because in those two examples, children are content creators. They're content generators. So rather than just passively receiving information from a digital tool, they're actually contributing to the creation of content. And I think that gives real quality in terms of screen time. 

[00:12:58] Tracy: I really couldn't agree more with that. We've been really specific here today and intentional, and we haven't ourselves defined what play looks like. And I think that's because there's so many different approaches and everyone approaches it differently, both educators, adults, and children. Dr Mel, can you share an example with us when your work or research you've seen any form of play spark a real growth or change? 

[00:13:20] Dr Mel: Yeah. So, intentionality matters, and I'll preface this example with this. So, there's a myth, I think in early childhood that intentional teaching is about content teaching children content. And often in services, I see it happen between 9:00 and 11:00 AM in the morning and mostly inside. But intentional teaching is far broader than that. And we need to set up the environment and have play-based pedagogies that carry intent across the day, both inside and outside. 

[00:13:49] So I might, for example, set up a dramatic play space. And I might have the teaching intention to embed literacy and numeracy within the context of the play. So, I could have, say, a hospital set up or a doctor surgery. And I can be intentional by having things like books in the play space that go with the plaything. I could have patient forms for meaningful mark making. I could include environmental print that children might see in a hospital or a doctor's surgery. So, things like a reception sign or a wheelchair access sign, or the universal symbol for medical first aid, for example. I might have labelled diagrams in there of skeletons. I might have a telephone and a notepad to invite children to, again, record a booking or information. So, when I set the environment up like that, it then leads to transformative play. So, the example I want to give is a young child, and I'll go back to the hospital setup, who took on the role of doctor and he had a peer playing with him who was the role of patient. 

[00:14:55] And in that moment, the doctor was incredibly thorough in his examination of the patient. So, he checked heartbeat, temperature. He checked the child's reflexes. He went and consulted this big book on bones and came back and did a few other tests. He asked the child about what medicine they'd taken and how much they'd taken. And then he came over to the desk and he started writing in the notebook. And you could see him writing sort of long lines of what we would say is text. And occasionally there would be lines and shapes that looked like letters, but there was one point where the pencil stopped at the end of the page. And with his other hand, he wouldn't let that pencil leave the page, and he took off the top page and kept writing on the second page without the pen or the pencil leaving the paper. 

[00:15:51] And so I was observing this. And I know this child well. I thought I'm going to come in as a coplayer here because I'm really fascinated by what he was just doing. So, I decide to enter the play as a coplayer, and I come in and I say, "Doctor, I can see that you are writing up your patient's diagnosis." So, I'm introducing language in this moment. And I said, "Can you tell me what you've written?" 

[00:16:17] And he said, "Oh, it's not good." And I said, "Oh goodness." I said, "Okay, what is it?" And he said, "It's diarrhoea." I said, "Diarrhoea, goodness." I said, "What's your treatment plan for that?" And he went on to explain quite a detailed treatment plan, which I will not go into here. It involved tubes and other things, but we won't talk about that. 

[00:16:40] But what I was interested in bringing back around as a coplayer was this writing that he'd done on the notebook, remembering that my teaching intention was to embed literacy and numeracy in the context of play. And this is where I wanted to see the growth. I come back and say, "Diarrhoea, that's a really long word. It's got lots of letters in it. Can you show me where you've written diarrhoea on the page?" And so, he flicks over a couple of pages, and he comes to that point where he didn't let the pencil leave the page and he continued the writing over the second page. And he showed me that very long line was the word diarrhoea. 

[00:17:20] And so in that moment, we can learn so much about what this child knows and can do. He understands that marks on a page carry meaning. He understands that letters are made up of these lines and shapes. He understands that he can read back what he's written. He understands that writing and standard Australian English moves from left to right. 

[00:17:42] There's an incredible amount that this child knows. But you can see the growth that just that 20 minutes of play gave that child in terms of learning about literacy. So that's the power of play. Only need 20 minutes for amazing things to happen. 

[00:17:58] Tracy: Hopefully it does happen outside of 9 to 11 and sometimes outside as well. 

[00:18:02] Dr Mel: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. 

[00:18:04] Tracy: I would be really impressed though if anyone in this room could spell diarrhoea on the first try, let alone someone who's five. Play is really important. Like we do know this, we talk about transformative... the richness that goes into that observation, that active listening, that active observation as well to be able to ask that child follow up questions and give them the language. 

[00:18:24] It's very obvious from this example that, dare I say, this child maybe has had some experience with diarrhoea and perhaps visiting the doctor. But all of that has come to this experience that they've had with themselves and in that space with their very lovely patient who is being very patient with them themselves. 

[00:18:40] Dr Mel: It was a very dutiful patient, I have to say. 

[00:18:42] Tracy: Yeah. I do wonder if they are perhaps second born in that birth order. But Mel, from your perspective, what types of play can be the most transformative? What does that need to happen in the room?  

[00:18:53] Dr Mel: I think it's understanding how young children play and learn and then facilitating learning. Understanding developmental sequences, but also individual children. 

[00:19:01] So I think for younger children, everyone in this room and those joining us online, you would've seen a toddler, for example, collect a variety of objects and transfer them from one side of the room to the other. And you would've seen a toddler enclose their whole body in a space or cover something over with a blanket. You would've seen them look at the world through their legs upside down. 

[00:19:25] And all of these repeated patterns that we see in toddler play is called schematic play or schemas. And schemas are repeated patterns in play, and it's a useful theory to understand how toddlers, for example, play and learn. If we want to be transformative, we need to understand developmentally, but we need to look at individual children and their capabilities as well, because not everything occurs in a linear sequence. 

[00:19:51] But I think certainly for younger children, understanding schematic play is helpful. And then I think for older children project work and inquiry-based learning is really meaningful. Because again, they get to meet concepts and ideas time and time again in multiple modes. So, I think back... I’m thinking of an example of the project at Reservoir, one of our services where children had discovered an egg that had fallen out of a nest in a playground. 

[00:20:17] And so began this months-long project around ornithology, which is the study of birds. And if children can say pterodactyl, they can say ornithology. So began this study of ornithology. Everything about the science of eggs. There was this whole month-long thing on chickens because a child had chickens at home. 

[00:20:38] They looked at nest construction. So, it was an incredible project really focused on deep learning around ornithology. And it ended up with the children engaging in an ethical hatching program. And all of the children in the service became involved in that. They were so excited about it. So, I think that, and then inquiry-based learning, is again, deep sustained learning, but it brings in those scientific processes of hypothesising testing, designing, evaluating. So, I think those kinds of opportunities for children are transformative. Yeah.  

[00:21:14] Tracy: We have spent a lot of time today talking about the theory, the best practice. Beck, probably best spoken to you on this one. The operational aspect, our team leadership, how we want our adults to work and what we can give them opportunity to do. Given your leadership experience and your operational roles, how do you help teams action, play based pedagogy in the room? 

[00:21:35] Beck: Look, I think it's that it's that balance between compliance and pedagogy. And I think that, they both play hand in hand but are very separate as well. And I think, Mel and I often talk about that dance, that that skilful dance between pedagogy and compliance because both are everyone's responsibility. 

[00:21:54] I think that you have to meet your team where they are. So, it's understanding whether when they're joining you. So, what their knowledge is around compliance and pedagogy. Because we know people come to us with different barriers of understanding around pedagogy. Some don't even know what that word is. They've never heard it before but yet been in sector for a really long time. Yeah, it's really understanding. Where your team are at. 

[00:22:17] I think it's really important too, that you have, like Mel and I are very active in recruitment. So, through the recruitment processes, we're asking questions around compliance. We're asking questions about pedagogy. So, we can see from that point where they will fit into the team and then what support they need, what support is needed. I think a really robust induction is really important. We do a two-day induction, so we do a full education day induction as well as compliance and HR. And that is generally led by our centre manager and our educational leader. Without support. 

[00:22:51] But I think it's, again, it's just understanding where someone's at and what their knowledge is so that once they do come into a space or in a learning environment... And we know their strengths as well, so we get to know, okay, this person is task orientated, so perhaps they'd be better at, looking after the compliance side of things. And then we can support them a little bit more in that pedagogy space. A lot of our team forums, we talk to pedagogy, and our educational leaders drive those team forums. So, we don't use them as laundry lists to catch up on what you're not doing. We use it as a time where all of our team come together, and we go through pedagogy and what the team want to learn more about or know more about. Or we recognise the areas that we think maybe they could learn more about to support them in that space. 

[00:23:40] Tracy: There's always going to be a balance. That doesn't go away in this role. We've spent a lot of this morning talking about compliance and safety. Kinder school readiness comes into this. We're spending this afternoon talking about some of the more pedagogical curriculum-based updates as well. Beck, culture shift in a team can be tough. Culture shift in the sector is really tough. We know this. What time can you draw upon on an experience where you saw, you've seen the team's attitude change towards play for the better?  

[00:24:05] Beck: Look, we've got a really good example. So, we took over a service, our first Melbourne service that was Montessori. I personally have never worked in Montessori. Mel obviously knows, has knowledge on Montessori. So, when we took over the centre, obviously it was going to go to play based. Some of the team decided to go with the previous provider and stay with Montessori, which is absolutely fair enough. 

[00:24:31] The rest knew that it would be, moving to play base. I think that on top of them, that current, what they were currently delivering was Montessori. Not only that, but half the team had only worked at that centre, so had only known Montessori. So not only did we have to, we've got some people who are, have some knowledge on play base, but we have some that have none. 

[00:24:56] So then we had to really decide how we were best going to support that team to deliver a play-based program. It was from changing the environments. If, Montessori is very structured. Ours is open-ended. And I think it was about gaining their trust. So, gaining their trust and also giving them the skills, so the skills and the knowledge to be able to transition. 

[00:25:18] Was it easy? No. We. If we can build that trust with them, then we can take them on that journey with us. So, Mel did training with them. So, we did group training around what environments look like, how to play within the play-based curriculum. So that was really important. 

[00:25:35] You can't just go, okay, we're play based and let them figure out for themselves. I think setting your team up for success is really important. And yeah, there were challenges. And I think it was really important too when we were recruiting, so looking at recruitment. So, bringing in really experienced people to help support and guide the team that we had. And that went a long way and that, that supported some of those challenges.  

[00:25:58] Dr Mel: It's such a great example, Beck. And I'm thinking back to... I mean there are similarities between Montessori and play-based, obviously. But one of the big changes for this team specifically was a shift from a very structured resources and ways to use those resources to open-ended materials. And open-ended materials don't automatically signal to children what they do or what they're for. So, it means that children need to talk to each other, they need to negotiate, and they need to think about how they're going to use them in play. And our team had never used open-ended resources before. 

[00:26:29] So Beck said, we had to teach them to play before they could then play alongside children. So, the change process was long, yeah, and large, I'm going to say, yeah.  

[00:26:40] Tracy: Significant. We'll use that word. We've talked a lot about the team, about what you guys, as the leaders coming in have had to train and change for. How are our families reacting to this and what was the change management efforts there that were required? 

[00:26:53] Beck: Yeah, that's a really good question. I, yeah, I think the family piece was big in that situation because again, especially in, we've learned that Montessori isn't as popular in somewhere like Queensland where, we were based. So, when we came to Victoria, Montessori is a lot more popular and well known and sought out. 

[00:27:14] So it was big for us to change from Montessori to play base. And a lot of the family, we held an information night to discuss around, there are similarities. It's not completely different. But how you see it may be different. So, I think it was, yeah, it was really important for us to educate families on what play base was. 

[00:27:35] So communication was really important. Those, and we were on site, so Mel and I were on site. Jason, the provider was on site. We were there having conversations with families because we knew that this was a big shift. And that's important to us that we're involved in supporting our team and our management team to give families confidence in what we're here to do.  

[00:27:58] Tracy: It does sound like things have been going well in that space having shouted to you guys recently. So, all that work really has paid off. If we think operationally now, once that culture shift has happened, once we've done the educating both of the adults and the children in those spaces. What sort of changes have you had to make to things like routines and timetabling staffing to protect the children's right to uninterrupted unstructured play? 

[00:28:20] Beck: Yeah, I think there's a few things that we've done as First Five. So, I think that we've been really lucky that our approved provider is all about over ratio when required. So, whether we have funding or not, it's if we have children with additional needs that we are providing over ratio to support children, to support families, to support our teams, 'cause it can be challenging. 

[00:28:44] So I think that's really important. The way we structure our management team is that we top and tail. So, we have one of, we have... Our management team is made up of three, so our EL, our assistant centre manager and our centre manager. So, for us it's really important to have someone there in the mornings and someone there in the afternoons. 

[00:29:01] And then we have someone else structured in the afternoon-ish. And that is to help support conversations with families, to support the team whenever they're in need. And also, to have a presence. So, on that pickup and drop off, families are seeing the management team presence within that space. 

[00:29:17] And it also just allows the educators to feel supported. So, if anything comes up that, there's someone there, there's a presence there to support them, to ensure that if anything's happening or they need to go and have a conversation with the parent, that someone is close by to support them with that. 

[00:29:36] Tracy: I think engaging families and supporting them, that's one of the big key parts here. You sound like you're doing a really good job with your team. That's become really obvious. But when we do work with families who aren't familiar with play-based, and it does somewhat look to them like unstructured, uninterrupted play, what are we doing here? What's the point of this? What conversations or tools can we use with these families to help guide them on this journey too? 

[00:29:58] Beck: I think we're really lucky. Mel does a lot of blogs for us. So, we have blogs on our website. We link those out in newsletters or family comms. We listen to our teams, and we listen to our families' feedback. So, if there is a topic that around sleep, so when children... We have families that come in and say, I don't want my child to sleep anymore. And we direct them to, Mel did a blog around sleep and the importance of that and the different stages of sleep and then around risky play. If anyone has seen, our playgrounds, Mel has designed our playgrounds around child development and what's required, around those age groups. And it can be a little bit daunting for some families. We have sharp edges, we have swings, we have forts we have high slides. We offer that to children because it's what they need for development. And if you go into a playground in a park, that's what you'll also see. But that's scary for some educators and it's scary for some families. So, they question why would we have sandstone edges with rough edges on our sand pit? Or why is your fort so high? Why do you have swings if there's injuries and all that kind of thing. It's around teaching. It's educating families around what's required in a child's development. So, I think it's sharing that information with families, and it's how we do that. So, I know that we in our newsletters, we'll talk about play. So, our ELs, our educational leaders, are in charge of our newsletters predominantly. So centre managers, yes, include information, but it's the educational leaders who work with our centre teams to share with families what's happening in the rooms with their children. Other things that our reservoir centre has done is around inviting families in. 

[00:31:40] So the Mother's Day, father's Day, they did a beautiful art gallery. They have, we're lucky enough to have a spare room at the front of our centre that they set up as like and set up the artwork from the children as if it's a gallery. And they were able to have photos of the children at work, as well as having the finished product and an explanation as to what skills and what they're developing through that activity. 

[00:32:07] They had that open for a whole week from open till close and invited families, grandparents, friends, aunts, whoever to come in and walk through the gallery. Things like that. It's about how we can open that space up and invite families in to see what children are doing and why they're doing it, and what they get from that. 

[00:32:27] Dr Mel: Yeah, and I think one of the headings in our newsletters is "Playing With Purpose". And so, we're helping families to understand what it is that children are learning through play. And we use the Xplor Home app for that too, in sharing stories of learning. But in those stories of learning, we're not just talking about what children did that day. We're talking about what do children learn that day through play.  

[00:32:48] Beck: I think if I go back to when I was first introduced to Playground back before it was what it is now. And I still remember what really got me about Playground... and that was this little video that you're still visible on YouTube now. Where you know this little girl's holding up her picture and you see the notification come through to mum at work and she's like seeing it in real time. And I think we're really lucky now that we're able to share with families. They can be a world away as that says but yet it's right here. And we're able to bridge that gap between there and here, and they're able to see it in real time. 

[00:33:29] Tracy: Our lovely product team who spoke to us about trust and transparency. Some of it is safety and compliance, and a lot of it though is learning and engagement and feeling happy and supported at your environment that you're attending when you're away from, the two adults or the group of adults that you're with all of the time, rather than those in the service. 

[00:33:49] It was a lovely segue into documentation. I really do appreciate that guys. Our experience in the sector is varied. How has documentation evolved over time, especially in how we engage families and making children's learning visible? 

[00:34:02] Beck: I think it's for those of us who've been in sector quite a while, I think I was having a conversation with someone earlier who is quite younger and around what documentation used to look like. 

[00:34:13] We didn't have photos, we didn't have anything digital. It was just writing on a piece of paper. It was anecdotal records. It was time sampling. It was work samples. That's what we used. A child cut something up and we just put that in a folder and wrote notes about it. I think, and then that evolved into us taking photos on a camera with film, and you would go and get that developed at your local, Kmart or whatever. And then two weeks later, you'd get your film back and half the time it was blurry. Or you're like what observation was that attached to? So, we've come a long way, and I think that to have digital platforms now that you can share in real time and it helps and prompts educators with the learning that children are doing. 

[00:35:00] And it opens it up for families to have that visibility over what educators are doing. And I feel like back in the day, it was very it was probably more hidden... And unless like at the end of the year, you'd probably give out your portfolio and they would see it, and they would probably just look at the artwork and put it away in a cupboard. And we'd probably all got that folder or book somewhere that our parents would be like, "Oh, do you want this now?" Or and you're like, oh, so all our own children, you probably experienced it, with your own children where you've gotten either a USB if you're a bit younger. Your child probably got a USB rather than a folder or something like that. 

[00:35:35] But I think that that's the evolution. It's I think it's made it more visible for... Educators put a lot of time and effort in what they do. And I think that it's great that families have that visibility now. Whereas we probably didn't have that before. It was put away in, in a folder or something like that. Where now it's online, parents can access it 24/7 and have that visibility over what their educators and what their children are doing. And it gives educators a presence around and meaning behind what they're doing.  

[00:36:05] Dr Mel: I think it also shows the intellectual nature of our work. We always say to our teams, don't shy away from showing what you know and can do as adults and professionals in this space. So, documentation does make children's learning visible, obviously. But it's also an opportunity for us to share what we know as early childhood professionals as well. 

[00:36:25] Tracy: No, it's really obvious to everyone here. The work has always been done. It does look different again, from those portfolios to the USB to what I hope is lots of people sharing things in Playground and sending that home when it's meaningful. I guess for our families as well, it also helps them support that at home. 

[00:36:40] What are they playing with? What are they talking about? What do they want to learn more about? What are they showing away from? The second prong to this though is the environment. Beck, you mentioned that Dr Mel had designed your playgrounds. It comes into safety, it comes into compliance. There's a lot of discussion about how we design environments for play. 

[00:36:56] What are some ways that our good intentions, Dr Mel, might sometimes get in the way of real play as adults?  

[00:37:02] Dr Mel: Yeah, that's a good question. I think sometimes in sector there's too much reliance on Pinterest and making things look really good. But sometimes when that's the focus, we can lose the focus on pedagogy. And pedagogy knowledge is unique to education professionals. And I think we need to speak about it more and we need to share it more. I often say to our teams, we could have a team from Bunnings come in and present them with a range of materials, and they could probably make a space look really good. But what they couldn't do is share their pedagogical decision making and why the materials are arranged that way or how the space is set up. So, we've got this pedagogy knowledge, and when we look at environment design, that sits alongside our knowledge of child development. It sits alongside our knowledge of learning theories. And it also sits alongside the aesthetics. 

[00:37:53] But we need those four key elements to interplay in terms of environment design. So, I think we do get tripped up sometimes on making things look good, but we have to really think about the interplay. And it, I can make a really beautiful physical environment, but if children don't feel a sense of belonging in that space, if they don't feel safe and secure, learning will be impacted. 

[00:38:18] And I can set up a play space that has a really beautiful intellectual element to it. But if as the adult, my flow of the day means that I'm continually interrupting children's play, learning will be impacted. So, I have to think about, yes, I've got this physical environment, but it sits alongside this emotional environment and this intellectual environment and the temporal environment. 

[00:38:42] So I have to be really mindful of all of those elements and have a really good language around it so that I'm not getting tripped up in ensuring that these environments really do offer children the best opportunity for planned learning.  

[00:38:57] Tracy: I think that emotional environment really comes into it. Children are such good antennas of how the adults in the room feel. They will pick up when you're stressed, when we are time poor, when we may not have time for what they want to do, and we would call it making a mess and they would call it exploration. And striking that balance is really key as well. Beck, how do we strike the balance between risk and exploration when creating and managing the physical environments with that sort of safety lens and risk management? 

[00:39:26] Beck: I think that…you know as we spoke about before, I think compliance and safety is everyone's responsibility. So I think it's important that it comes from management down, that we're all aware of what safety looks like in our environment and how we can best facilitate that as management and ensure... and it comes back to ensuring that everyone has that knowledge, so that the knowledge and shared understanding. Yeah.  

[00:39:55] Dr Mel: And I think we do involve children in risk assessments as well. We do risk assess child-led risk assessments. And we certainly have particularly done this as we have redeveloped playgrounds and redesigned playgrounds. In that respect, educators work alongside children to tour the playground and identify what could be unsafe here or what might be risky in play. And the children have the opportunity to draw, to have their voices recorded or to engage in emergent writing where they are recording what they assess as risk in the space. So, it is about adults doing what they need to do responsibly but also involving children and helping them develop a language around risk. And what we then see is children policing that themselves. They'll remind their friends to, "Oh, watch that there, it's a sharp rock." Or and they give names to things in the playground through their own language. " Watch the spiky tree." So yeah, I think it's everyone's responsibility, but children are very capable of being involved in that conversation as well. 

[00:40:59] Beck: I agree. And I think that, with us encouraging our centres to do these risk assessments with children, you often... I know I've been out in yards and they're like, "Oh Beck, this is broken. Someone needs to fix it." So, it's empowering them to call that out as well. It's not... And they feel confident to talk to us about safety concerns that they have, and I love that it provides them that voice. 

[00:41:23] Dr Mel: As part of the implementation of the Victorian Child Safe Standards, we have a display and reception, but we have photographs of people who visit the service regularly. So, we have our gardener, our maintenance person, the person who comes and cleans the fish tank, the posty. Yep. And all of these people are displayed in their uniform. So, children have a visual representation, but they also know that person's name. And it's not unusual for the children if they see something broken or something needs fixing to ask to speak to that person. We need to let so and so know that this is broken and they need to come and fix it. So, involving children does really matter. Yeah.  

[00:42:01] Tracy: That's such an intentional creation of culture for those children, that agency and that ownership of where they play and what they play with. It's no secret that you sure are both such champions of play-based pedagogy. If you both had any advice for new educators who are trying to champion this themselves in new workplaces where especially where it needs defending, what would you want them to know? 

[00:42:23] Dr Mel: I would say trust in play. And always come back to guiding frameworks that give us definitions, examples, outcomes for play. So, I think trust in play, draw from an evidence base always. Beck and I often talk about this as is not your opinion. You're actually drawing from an evidence base to justify why you've got a particular approach. So, I think trust in play and really develop a language and a means to articulate to others why play matters in the first five years.  

[00:43:00] Beck: Yeah, I think that often you hear, especially, from our educators, it might be either First Five way. No, it's not the First Five way. It's, we draw from evidence base, we draw from research. And so, I think it's really important for us to reiterate to them that this isn't our way, this is just the way. And I think yeah that's really key for educators to understand. Yeah.  

[00:43:26] Tracy: The same advice I'll ask for ops managers, for directors, for our decision makers, what do they need to know about play? 

[00:43:36] Dr Mel: I think they need to have a shared language with their team, and I think cohesive messaging matters. We always say that an absolute killer of quality in early childhood services is inconsistent messaging from management. So, the management team need to have a shared language. They need to support and back educators in what they're doing. And it needs to be a whole of service approach. For sure.  

[00:43:58] Beck: Yeah, and I think that also pertains to us. So, for Mel and I, it's important that we're on the same page. Because as we spoke about that beautiful dance that that ops and education need to do to work harmoniously together, I think, it comes from us. And they see us working together and complimenting what we do. And being considerate of each other and the work that we do and the importance that each has in what we do every day. So, I think that's really important for them to see and that they feel that from us.  

[00:44:30] Dr Mel: We do have robust conversations, at times. But we both have children's best interests at the heart of decision making. And when you have children's best interests at the heart of decision making, you can't really go wrong. So, both from an operational and educational lens, we negotiate, and we work out the way forward. And Beck said, the teams see that. It's a very respectful way of working. 

[00:44:53] It doesn't mean someone's right and someone's wrong. Doesn't mean someone wins and someone loses. It's just a dance. And you have to have two people in the dance.  

[00:45:01] Beck: Yeah. And I think, we really encourage our teams to sit and have conversations with us. I'm like always, " If you want to talk through anything, just give us a yell." 

[00:45:10] We'll jump on a call, and we'll talk things through. I want our teams to challenge us on things because we're not always right. We don't know everything. Yeah, I think that's really key that our teams feel they have a voice at First Five and in what they do. 

[00:45:24] Dr Mel: Something we say to people during recruitment is we position ourselves as a learner. So, it doesn't matter our qualifications or years of experience, everyone in the organisation positions themselves as a learner. And with that comes a responsibility to continue to engage with research, meet with more learned others to learn different perspectives here, different perspectives. So, we model that at the highest management level. And then we have an expectation for our services and our teams to do that as well. 

[00:45:55] Tracy: I really like that. It's obvious that you're here today to do some learning. I know we call ourselves educators. We work in the early childhood education sector, but we don't come here to finish what we know. It's constant. 

[00:46:05] It's definitely a growth period here. A big thank you to everyone who's joining us in the room today, as well as those online. I will ask our lovely tech team today. We do have a question for all of you. If we do hop to my next slide, it should have a QR code on it. We would love to know what play looks like in your services. 

[00:46:21] We didn't give you a definition today. We have spoken about some great experiences and examples of it, but we'd love to hear from you if you could please scan this through. Let us know what play looks like in your services. If you have the benefit of having children at home or very close to you, please let us know what play looks like in your home as well. We're always looking to see great examples of it. 

[00:46:39] I might take the chance here as well, did we have any questions? Either from the group in the room, did we have any come through online? We'd love to have a little roving mic and go around. Oh, perfect. So, any questions in the room, now's the time to ask. Otherwise, please go on ahead and scan that QR code. We'd love to know. 

[00:47:02] Beautiful. Who have we got there? I'll come down. 

[00:47:14] Spectator: Hello.  

[00:47:15] My name's Maria. I work for YMCA SA as the education and inclusion leader for the OSHC services. Sorry, I'm not very good at public speaking, so I'm a bit nervous. But I do have a question for you, Dr Mel. It was something that you said earlier about your play as a child. You did say that a lot of your play was unstructured and unhurried. In a world like today where technology's everywhere and everyone's so busy, everyone's rushing and with older children as well, their life's a lot different now than what it used to be. How can we make play unstructured and unhurried in the world we live in today? What are your suggestions? 

[00:47:55] Dr Mel: Yeah, I think it's a great question. In our philosophy, we have the importance of slowing down. And I think as adults, if we can take a breath and slow down with children, it's a really good approach. I will say, digital technology is here. It's not a matter of saying we're just going to do away with it. But what I'll say to adults is think about where it could go next. 

[00:48:15] So if I've got a child who is really invested in a game and they really enjoy playing it, I can ask questions about and observe what is it about that game that's really capturing their attention? Is it the different levels? Is it a character? Is it scenery? And how can we then transfer that enjoyment and that learning to other types of play? So, I might invite a child to draw something about the game. We might create the scenery in the block play area, for example. Or I might have a family do something outside and set a challenge based on the different levels of the game. So, it's not an "either or", it's an "and". But if we can slow down and really listen and see what children are invested in, what ideas they're exploring, we can transfer that to other types of learning and play. 

[00:49:07] Tracy: Ask again, any other questions today? Oh, beautiful. I'm running today. 

[00:49:14] I did. Thank you.  

[00:49:16] Spectator 2: Hi. I'm Lee. I'm from Insight Early Learning. We've got a couple of questions. So, the first one was what's the name of the app that you mentioned the children can use with the clay?  

[00:49:26] Dr Mel: Sure. So, ChatterPix. And the other one was Draw and Tell, and they're both available for iPad. 

[00:49:32] Spectator 2: And then the other question is, we're working a lot with a team about slow pedagogy and we're trying to move away from large group times. I just wondered if you've had any experience with that challenge and how you go about it.  

[00:49:45] Dr Mel: Yeah, sure. Group time's always an interesting one. And again, there's not one right or wrong way. But I will say that early childhood services, particularly centre-based services, are group learning environments. So, it means that children are going to operate in groups across the day. That could be in a pair, it could be in a small group, it could be in a whole group. It's okay to let go some days of this idea of everyone coming together for group time because children are already operating then that way in a group learning environment. There is value to doing whole group and small group, of course. But I think if you're going to do it, make it meaningful and think about whole body movement and really engaging children in that moment, rather than having this kind of captive audience on the mat who have to sit and listen to the educator. So that would be my suggestion. 

[00:50:31] Spectator 2: Thank you. 

[00:50:35] Tracy: Any other questions in the room while we're roaming? We've probably got time for one more. 

[00:50:44] If that's all the questions for today, I did want to say a big thank you to Dr Mel and Beck. Thank you for joining us today and sharing your insights. A big thank you to all the adults in the room as well. We do appreciate that it's after lunch. You guys are engaged. We could tell that you're listening. Thank you for joining us today, but if we can, a big round of applause for our guests today.