Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. GDPR & the EYFS Of the many questions being asked about the GDPR changes, a couple stuck out to me: Can we have children's names on the wall with their artwork? Can we have information about children (such as an allergy) on display for staff? These questions are interesting, they err on the side of ridiculous - should we meet GDPR while … [Read more...]

I promised that in my next blog (here and then here for the previous two) I would start to give some suggestions of how I would incorporate STEM subjects into Early Years.  I've not quite finished that off yet, and something exciting came along that makes an exciting interlude. I was lucky enough to be invited to speak (about STEM of course!) at Madresfield Early Years Centre during their special event to celebrate 25 years of being open on … [Read more...]

Not that long ago, I wrote a brief blog explaining what STEM meant, you can find it here.  Today I'm going to list the reasons why I think it is an important area to work on in Early Years.  I'm going to make a special effort not to waffle on for ages, so I'm going to keep it to shortish bullet points! STEM subjects are criminally under represented in the EYFS.  For subjects that give children a greater understanding of the world around … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. We find it hard to deal with change, like most people we presume, so when they changed the size and price of soft drinks, we had a good moan in the office. The sugar tax may be used to add £26 million to support breakfast clubs though, so that's something! But maybe some things should change; NCTs (SATs) in KS1 for example, or the amount of … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. Something we haven't talked much about in Inspirational Insights before, is just how hard it is to find staff at the moment! A recent survey by the NDNA shows that there are almost 20% less L3 qualified staff than there were in 2015. And with the 30 hours 'free childcare', nurseries are as poor as ever so this doesn't look set to … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. As is becoming the custom, after the second half of 2017, not a great deal has happened in the News. We had a reshuffle of the government, naming Damian Hinds (pictured) as the new Education Secretary. We will keep you informed how that works out! Without much news, we spent our time (or rather Matt spent his) writing about the key topics that … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. Christmas is fast approaching and we have had some cold days to remind us that it's officially winter. Or maybe that the weather has been colluding with Russia (which it denied when asked). Early Years looks set for some serious changes in the coming months and years. We heard from two prominent people, and they were both saying that the current … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. With 30 hours rolling out across the country (with reasonable success by all accounts) it's been a relatively quiet month from the news front (unless you include all the, rather depressing, Children's Centre closures). We did give you some more interesting blog content though, and if you haven't seen any of our blog posts this month (or signed … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. As you might have guessed already, the Childcare Expo took up most of our month. It was as fantastic as ever, but we did have some other news for you too. Our very own Marie Smith (SEND trainer on our current series of courses) wrote an article that might support any trips you are planning. We also wrote some short articles about school … [Read more...]

Welcome to Inspirational Insights - The monthly modicum of meanderings from MBK Training. Despite it being the holidays, we still found a few things going on in the world of Childcare. Remember, if you want to know when we post then you can register on the website.If you haven't seen it yet, then you should absolutely be checking out our Top 10 Tips for an Ofsted Inspection (written by an inspector of 16 years none-the-less!). We also … [Read more...]