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Telling stories always gives me that hygge feeling of joy and being cosy. It's also such a lovely way of celebrating coming together and sharing a love for storying!

Here are some of my favourite book recommendations;

• How to Catch a Star by Oliver Jeffers
• Four Seasons in One Day by Jessica Courtney- Tickle 
• Lost Words by Jackie Morris
• I Am the Seed That Grew the Tree - A Nature Poem for Every Day of the Year: National Trust 
• We're Going On a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen
• Little Red Hen

Classic books 

• Not now Bernard 
• Where the wild things are 
• Hansel and Gretel 
• Goldilocks and the Three Bears 
• Gruffalo 
• Bear Hunt 
• Little Red Riding Hood 
• Dear Zoo 
• Mr Gumpys Outing 
• Whatever Next 
• Peace at Last

Ideas to support practice 

• Get outside to story tell 
• Listen to music and move to the story it creates (Four Seasons in One Day) 
• Tell a story with just props 
• Tell a story in the forest 
• Sit around the fire pit with hot chocolate and tell stories from memory...

When it comes to planning for the first few weeks of the Autumn term with your new children I would focus on prioritising the following:

• Making sure new children feel safe and settled
• Building positive relationships with all children
• Establishing rules and expectations 
• Getting children used to the daily routine 

If you take a re-watch of my video from my Hygge Summer School you can see that I share the ways I would plan and organise the daily routine at the start of the year in Reception or nursery. 

When the time feels right for you and your children you can then start to spark new curiosities and interests by introducing these to the children. As much as I believe lots of what we teach from should come from the children I also understand that there needs to be a balance of us as educators offering the opportunity to broaden the children's knowledge through the exposure to different and new experiences. These might be linked to seasonal changes, festivals or celebrations.  ...

Here are a few tried and tested ways to start the new school year in a smooth way.

A tour of the school/ setting in small groups and showing who works in school and what they do. 

Tour of your provision in small groups and giving little teams the same tidy up job to do each day.

Share some getting to know you stories like Owl Babies. Offering children the chance to talk about who’s important to them and the things they like. 

No phonics or maths sessions! Instead have a focus here on building relationships and developing a routine. Lots of small group circle times and getting to know you games. Lots of opportunities to revisit phase 1 of letters and sounds. 

Make birthday crowns and display these around your setting. When it's a child's birthday they then get to wear it for the day!

A focus on good sitting, good looking, good listening during small group time. I like to reinforce the spoken words with makaton actions and symbols too.

I used to love writing a story about teach child'...

The whole fam under one roof, Christmas bakes in the oven, winter roaring outside the front door: It doesn’t really get much cozier than Christmas.

Christmas…oh that’s right I mentioned the C word and it's only the start of November! I have Michael Buble de-frosting as we speak and in this weeks blog post I’m going to be sharing my first few ideas with you for supporting behaviour over the festive period. 

Over the last few months we’ve been getting ready for our Christmas training events at KSEY Consultancy and I know that so many of you are super organised (a bit like me!) and want to get things ready early. I always used to use my half term week in October to do the majority of my Christmas shopping and start writing my Christmas cards…a job I really do love doing.

As I said we’ve been planning Christmas for a little while now…we worked with our fabulous photographer back in August to get some great Christmas Product snaps, we’ve booked in our Complimentary Christmas Event for Me...

Dottie’s Nursery and Dots and Tots are
currently taking part in the Hygge in Early
Years Accreditation to transform their
learning environments and practice. Look at
this fabulous lunch time transformation!

In Norway and Denmark mealtimes are seen as a time to come
together as a unit over some much-loved home-made food. Yet in
England I often visit settings and schools where lunch time feels
rushed, noisy and a process rather than an event to celebrate in the
day. Not only are young children often fussy eaters but they might
be worried about opening their yogurt, leaving the comfort of a
familiar room or being with different staff who support lunch time
cover. When planning lunch times these factors need to be
considered;


• Are the children in a familiar environment?
• 
 Are the adults familiar to the children and available to support
them and talk to them?
• 
 Does the menu offer a variety of choice across the week? Cooked
with seasonal produce.

• Is the lunch time environment c
...

Well hello there!

Many of you were be thinking about going back to work and how you can effectively support the transition into the school or setting for new children. So in this weeks blog I'm going to give you three ideas to try.

1. Create a Sense of Belonging

Here one of my fabulous members of the Hygge in Early Years Accreditation has reflected on ways she can create that sense of belonging during self registration. Look at these individual peg dolls that can be moved to show "I'm here!"

2. Why not recommend to parents reading this wonderful book 'A Kissing Hand for Chester Raccoon.' This is a beautiful story that's sure to help with separation anxiety. Can't wait to get your hands on the book? Head to this You Tube link (Turn the volume on mute) and read the book together. 

3. Ask your children to bring in a family photo or drawing that you can display in a frame or on the wall.

4. Why not record a video of you and your team telling the children how excited you are to se...

What a delightful afternoon I’ve had. Sometimes we just visit places where everything we know and believe in (to do with early years) just happens!

As I arrived the Reception children were putting their full waterproof suits and welly boots on. “Its Bush craft afternoon!” I was told by an excited voice. “Yeah Mr Hemingway (From Pennine Bush Craft) and Meg (the Sheepdog) come every Monday and we get to play in the woods!”
Josh Hemingway is a trained in NCFE Level 4 qualification in Bushcraft Leadership at the Woodcraft School in Sussex and founder of Pennine Bushcraft. He delivers regular sessions in settings and schools which are focused around children having time and space to think, solve problems and build up key survival and life long skills.