Chris Colley 0:07

Welcome back, everyone. Here we are, starting off a new year. We've already had a great conversation about AI and AI literacy. And now we're gonna come back to you know this, listeners. I love play, I love preschool, I love early childhood development, and getting our kids to a point where they can become who they're intended to become, um, with guidance, but also just letting them be. I have an expert here today coming all the way in from Australia. We don't spare guests around here, people. We go and get we go and get the big guests, and I have Stephanie Lord Darby here, who's an educator, researcher into early childhood education. Uh, she works at Jimbaroo Kinderoo as an educator education program coordinator, focusing on those early years of development and curriculum around it. And big on movement, big on getting kids ready, but at their pace. So I'm really excited about this conversation, Stephanie. Thank you so much for your early rise and um all the great words that you'll be sharing with us.

SPEAKER_05 1:15

Thank you for having me, Chris. It's excited because I'm very passionate about shifting education as well. So it's nice to be here.

Chris Colley 1:23

So, Stephanie, I'd like to start these off just with a little kind of look down memory lane of what what were some of the moments or some of the experiences that you had that kind of gravitated you towards early childhood development?

SPEAKER_05 1:37

Oh, interesting. I love this question. I do. Uh I started in the primary years and I fell into education because I didn't have a positive education experience myself. You know, I went through, I came out the other side, and I thought, hmm, that's interesting. I feel like I'm capable of more, but the system's telling me I'm not. Uh, so I was very lost in those early young adult years. And upon reflection, I started uh just hobby looking into books and things around neuroeducation and began to realize the power of telling a seven-year-old and a child under the age of seven-year-old, uh, so any child from one to seven, that the greatest gift we can give them is telling them they're smart and intelligent. And it's not actually the curriculum itself, but it's the experiences and the belief and the affirmations we give around them that a longitudinal study found out they will most likely succeed then.

unknown 2:48

Interesting.

SPEAKER_05 2:49

And I just fell into that passion and then went back and started working with kids, and it really grew from there.

Chris Colley 2:57

Interesting. Well, it puts you in a position to kind of support um early childhood educators and enforce the positivity around a child growing up because it's a magical thing. I mean, maybe not. I mean, I think it's magical. I mean, it's nature, right? At the heart of it. Um, you bring these kids into the world, you put them in the world to experience, make sure they feel attached to you, and they will learn.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

They will grow. Absolutely.

Chris Colley 3:26

Right? It's kind of like one plus one equals two, right?

unknown 3:30

Right.

SPEAKER_05 3:31

You know, we get forgetting about those core competencies for a human, really, like shelter, love, and safety, right? Yeah. And we if we can grow from there, the our brain will grow naturally.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Absolutely.

Chris Colley 3:43

So, I mean, I guess my first question, Stephanie, is this this assumption of learning, right? Like teachers in and the world, we've built this idea of learning that it's a sitting thing and it's it's it's an academic rigor. It's but if we rewind to earlier times in our preschool, why is movement so important? Um, just as a base for that development to happen.

SPEAKER_05 4:10

Yeah, absolutely. Um, I call it the firing and wiring. So under the age of five, we the Western doctors have put it down to some sequential milestones. And I say the Western doctors, but because culturally, milestones can look very different. Um, so if you come from an Asian background versus an Australian background, uh, culturally those milestones can change. But what doesn't change is the movement and the foundations that need to happen that are causing the firing and wiring of the brain to build neural pathways. And if we allow children to envelop in a natural style of environment, and play we understand easily is very natural to a young child, and movement we understand is very natural to a four-year-old running around. We start to question an eight-year-old running around in our system. I beg to differ. But uh, you know, we see naturally that movement, that fun, that playfulness in those early years, well, they are important milestones for that firing and wiring. And neural pathways can just develop from there.

Chris Colley 5:22

Interesting. And this is a natural development. Like this is not, we're not trying to engineer anything here. We're we're giving this the kids the natural development. Does that mean that it has to be like it doesn't have to be based outdoors all the time? It can be based inside as well. I guess my question is how do we get that happening in both environments? Like oftentimes we think movement, okay, take them outside, you know, like get them into big open space areas, but we can also provide movement within our classrooms.

SPEAKER_05 5:55

Oh, absolutely. There's some research around small things uh as simple as crossing the midline. And there's a figure eight pattern, and you can get before writing, you can do a figure eight like this. And just having a person cross the midline can open up a part of our brain that allows us to invent an imaginative story. I'd have to double check the stats, but it's supposed to be like 20% better than you would have written it before you had done that movement. And there's tiny things like that that you can incorporate, as well as just understanding the foundations of movement. So the foundations of movement and play are social and emotional benefits, you know, tactile, fine motor. Uh, you look at alternative education programs. Do you have Steiner schools in Canada?

Chris Colley 6:44

Yes. Yes, yeah. And they use Montessori and Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 6:48

Well, they use like alternative fine motor skills, like knitting, hand knitting before you begin writing. And little playful things like that that are supposed to neurologically engage the brain before you begin the rigid learning.

Chris Colley 7:03

Right, right. Because I heard too, like kids' hands are just not developed enough yet to hold, you know, a pencil or, you know, something where they're writing. It's just they're not there yet. And for us pushing that, it just kind of like, I don't know, must make the child feel like, what's wrong with me? Absolutely. No.

SPEAKER_05 7:23

Absolutely. But also the question is, are we giving them the opportunities? Like, even a personal thing with me the other day, I took my five-year-old to get a pair of shoes. And he's a tall five-year-old, he's about the size of a grade one, and uh, he's in a size two, and they said, sorry, we don't start shoelaces to size four. And I said, Sorry what? And they said, we don't start shoelaces because the kids these days can't do their shoelaces up. And my mind was like, but it how can they learn to do a shoelacer if we don't give them the shoelace? I think that ties beautifully back in here with, you know, we we talk about provocation and in the classroom and bring that indoor um movement and play. And often we give them provocation with a specific outcome and one tool. And so a teacher lies down a whole bunch of Lego and says, look, here's the picture. Oh, but play and have a go. And so the kid already has the outcome of a test, you know, an expectation. The the whole route has been planned out, and we still think we're giving them play.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Right. Yeah. That's so interesting.

Chris Colley 8:41

Yeah, I can solve it in there. Sure, sure. Yeah, I never thought about laces like that, you know. Like, I mean, it's just like things that we do sometimes without really like understanding the root why.

SPEAKER_05 8:56

You know, like it it Yeah, and that neural development of being able to understand how to do something like that.

Chris Colley 9:03

Right, right. And not putting kids in situations where it's going to cause frustration or kind of withdrawal from like, you know, I don't know how to do that, or like I think it starts setting those kind of fixed mindsets with these expectations, like, here's your card, here's the Lego, but you know, no pressure, go play.

SPEAKER_05 9:23

But absolutely, absolutely, absolutely. I mean, as young as 10 months old, we talk about in Jim Baroo the importance of frustration and leaving the child's baby toy, and there's a lot of research behind this, just that little bit out of reach for them, and allowing them to sit in a space that encourages movement through problem solving and making a brain and body connection of understanding it's time to start commando crawling or crawling if they can, or moving towards the object. And that is that firing and wiring we're talking about when they're really young age.

Chris Colley 10:01

That's so cool. Or are we making a bit of a mistake by separating movement and motion from our academic environment?

SPEAKER_05 10:10

Uh, I do believe so. I do believe they go hand in hand, but that that's a that's a personal answer for a lot of people. But look, Australia recently in our mainstream system has removed it a lot, or it is the reward. So if you get through this, we'll take you out for a 10-minute brain break, you know? And I'm thinking, well, why the brain break when we could do a brain warm-up? When you could have a whole morning of connection and build that understanding of um wiring the brain to get ready to learn. There's something also we talk about at Jim Baru, which shocks a lot of teachers, which is the greatest form of bounce is actually sitting still. And if we don't have the physical opportunities to build a level of coordination when we can sit still, because there are times in learning we need to really focus and zone in, and that's just a part of learning. It can't all be movement. But the movement of true bounce is stillness and building that coordination through activity and playfulness and climbing over a ladder and bouncing on a beam first is so vitally important and more important than people truly deeply understand, I fear.

Chris Colley 11:35

Right, right. I mean, which which brings like the fundamentals of play um to the forefront. And what is what would meaningful play look like or feel like where you know that the child is engaged in developing, figuring stuff out, like you said, the firing that like getting things to start to connect in your experiences, what is meaningful play? What what would that look like for for for an educator or a parent?

SPEAKER_05 12:06

To pick an overall word, it'd probably be engagement. Um, you know, you need to see the child truly consumed and engaged without an adult-inspired outcome.

SPEAKER_03 12:16

Right.

SPEAKER_05 12:17

Um, so you know, a bit before we mentioned that, yeah, you gave them the Lego, but the outcome was adult-inspired. Um so we want to see them engage and we want to see it child-led. Um, an educator, they can provide it like the provocation, the environment, and the interesting materials. Uh, but we don't want to control it. Um, you know, and we talk so early, so much in the early years, and it's much easier, but it's harder to think about with our older children. It's it's harder to think about how can I know that they're doing something valuable? Well, social and emotional is a good scale. If you see them happy and you see them start to answer questions, clever questions an educator can ask. You know, what what is the plan here? You know, what is the intention? You know, will the bridge that you've built hold this cup? You know, and they start, and you and you can honestly, like you would talking to an adult, begin to see an engineering or a STEM style of thinking if that's the goal, or you start to see a team building thinking, if it's a collaboration goal within the play. And that's dependent on, yes, the provocation you put out, but think about the start of the journey rather than the outcome.

Chris Colley 13:43

Right, right. Yeah. See an end result, like great. I mean, the kid built the Lego that represents his house or whatever, but it's it's the journey to get there that is the goal, right? Like we're we're the learning, where you want to be observing what's going on rather than here, miss, here's my my Lego house.

SPEAKER_05 14:05

Yes, absolutely. So, so the provocation can be easily based on a STEM activity, and you're thinking, um, I hope they get through to engineering and I'll base my questions around there. Or the provocation is collaboration. You've had, you know, some social problems within your class. Um, so you put together a very classic 90-style camp outdoor education activity, probably as a provocation, you know, something that you know they're going to have to work together. Um, and and and you sit back. I think we don't sit back enough. Um, and in those situations, you know you have purposely put something out that's going to be team-building and collaborative and need patience and problem solving from those perspectives. Um, and you you're it's going to be hard for the first few times, but sit back and watch.

Chris Colley 14:58

Yeah, yeah. Patience sometimes, right? Is yeah, pay it's hard for teachers, right? Because we're like trained to help and support and like be there for the kids. It's so it's really hard for teachers to like do that.

SPEAKER_05 15:13

Absolutely. But it but if they're curious and they're engaged, you're winning.

Chris Colley 15:18

Right. You're right. Now, Stephanie, you've mentioned provocation a couple of times here. And I mean, I love that word. Could you flush that out a bit? Like you've observed something, and then you need a response to it, right? You want to either encourage for more development to happen or to curb maybe like, you know, pushing or you know, whatever that is maybe a little less. Um what would what are provocations? I guess my question is.

SPEAKER_05 15:46

Excellent. So think of the root word, like provoke, to provoke the children into the learning. Um let's say your topic is birds. You know, you're doing an inquiry about birds and you're or or mega beasts. I'm not sure what you're working with in um Canada, but I would imagine some animals are in there in the cool lots of animals.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

Yep. Lots of animals, birds and stuff, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 16:12

Absolutely. So you take the time to understand you have different styles of learners, right? Not everyone's going to learn the same way, they're not going to sit still. So you've got a tempting table that has tactile feathers, you've got another tempting table that's got um, you know, non-fiction, very detailed books, you've got uh another table that is set up with um the actual birdhouse and egg and life cycle, very science-based. Um, you know, and this is just thinking, and then hopefully they start to engage with the environment. They walk around, they're not told to start, you'll you'll have five minutes at that table, and then we'll switch, and you'll have five minutes at the next table. We are allowing them the time to immerse in that environment, choose if they're going to learn about the bird through the feathers and art table, choose if they're going to learn through the life cycle table, choose if they're going to sit down and actually read about it because that's what suits their style of learning. Um, but the couple of keys is to carefully have those opportunities ready. Secondly, have them engage, make sure they're curious, encourage the curiosity through uh provocative questions, like, oh, what do you think this red feather came from? You know, what do you think this brown feather came from? Uh, you know, and starting to discuss the difference of birds, you know, why do they have an egg? Who comes from the egg? Um, and just that that role of true facilitator around the room. But very importantly, is coming back at the end and that shared experience of summarizing what did you take? What did you what did we take as a group from the learning, you know, and this is very early years focused, this answer. But that sitting down and the teacher scribing and that taking that five minutes or so, and that's your mat time of the reflection. And, you know, Henry found out that the red feather was from a Rosella. Chris found out that the brown feather was from a, you know, or my son would say a bird crushing eagle because that's his favorite animal at the moment. But, you know, and then um, you know, and going from there, and that the opportunity for the teacher to maybe put rigid answers in and consolidate the learning, you know, and say, oh, that's a wonderful, you know, idea. I did collect and notice this bird, and then they could show a particular bird, and that's a connection and building connection, uh, rather than just sort of barking the learning at them.

SPEAKER_00 18:54

Yeah, yeah.

Chris Colley 18:55

And Stephanie, do you like, is the start of a provocation where it's just exploratory? So I love this idea of theme table. You you said theme tables, was it?

SPEAKER_05 19:06

Or yeah. Well, I I like to do them in themes. So I like to think about or out like different learners. So I like to think about an artistic learner, a science learner, a literacy learner, and you know, a numerical sort of f falls under the science, a social learner. So one that needs to collaborate. And I always try to put a table where there's a a team play and they do it together. Um, and then an independent learner, I also like to put out. Um say something that, you know, some a child who's shy and uncomfortable, because shyness is a temperament. It's not something that needs to be fixed. And some children need to go into an activity alone.

SPEAKER_00 19:44

Right, right.

Chris Colley 19:45

And do do you as a teacher set any of this up or is the provocation enough for them to go and explore? And then you do kind of that bringing together at the end of their free play session that they might have around birds or animals or dinosaurs or whatever their interests are. Like, what's the flow of that provocation?

SPEAKER_05 20:06

Good question. I set it all up in the morning. Um, it takes me time. It, you know, it takes me.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

It's your work, right? Like that's the work of preschool teachers, right?

SPEAKER_05 20:16

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 20:17

You gotta set all this up.

SPEAKER_05 20:18

I call it work at work somewhat. Right.

SPEAKER_01 20:21

Right.

SPEAKER_05 20:22

But it's fun and it's engaging. And uh, you know, I I look at other there's a beautiful I take a lot of inspiration actually from uh a Reggio Amelia base, and I take a lot of inspiration from a new school called Attilia 21, uh, which is a lady called Hailey Peacock. And recently I've been very keen on following a lot of her work, and she's got pedagogy she's created called Plioneering, which she has taken this idea of provocation and as the beginning pedagogy and grown it into the entire primary school, not just the early years. And it's beautiful. Um, and so I set the morning up and I the morning starts with inquiry. Often we start or put inquiry quickly after lunchtime in Australia. We say, oh, that's when we give it to them. Their brains aren't open yet. Um, you know, they're a bit tired. So we'll put that play in there. You know, let's get their brains when they're first awake in the morning and we'll nail them with one hour literacy, one hour numeracy, and we'll get our outcomes. And I would argue we're doing it the wrong way. I would argue we need to start with the exploration, the engagement, the curiosity, the exploring. And then naturally they'll come back and easily visit those outcomes that we've may have taken an hour, might now take this child 20 minutes. Because how easy is it to write a beautiful story? Story about the bird you've already learned.

Chris Colley 22:02

Absolutely. And that you got to choose how you chose to, you know, I wanted to play the feathers. I wanted to explore how you can pull them apart and push them back together. Like the child goes to where they already have kind of this intrinsic kind of curiosity about whatever the top the provocation that you're providing.

SPEAKER_05 22:20

Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, so yeah, connection and curiosity first, I say. And that's the key to the provocation. So yes, you've got to pull up put a lot of materials out. It needs to be tacked down, needs to be provoking. Um, but once you do that and once you get the hang of it, trust me.

Chris Colley 22:39

Yeah. It sounds, it seems like the um a natural flow of you know setting things up. I I guess I mean I see our time's coming to a close here. I mean, we could talk for hours, Stephanie. I know it. I feel it in my bones that we could just go on and on. I do want to respect our time. I mean, we have a new school year coming up, and you know, we have some teachers that are going to be coming into preschool, and others, you know, like what are these kinds of things that you think about when you first start a new school year, you know, from the perspective of that preschool teacher?

SPEAKER_05 23:18

Uh, social connection. Connection's my probably my favorite word in education.

Chris Colley 23:22

Right.

SPEAKER_05 23:23

I think with a lot of things, and especially in the background of like your extra work with AI and screen time, we've forgotten to connect and build a village. And we want that child to feel like that classroom is their second home. It it needs to feel comfortable. They need to feel regulated. You know, often at the start of the year, a child can be quite dysregulated, especially if they're young. Um, they're leaving a parent, they've just had six-week summer holidays with them, uh, they're not quite sure why mum's going back to work, you know, so many little things for their brain. And if we build a gentle, soft community and connection where the environment allows you to coexist with another student that isn't force pressure to say hello, like picking up at the bird feather or, you know, playing with a rabbit basket, you know, or going out and shooting a hoop with a basketball. If that connection starts first, then they're naturally going to regulate. Movement allows that regulation to happen. And if we're calm and regulated, or the rest sort of speaks for itself, our brain is ready to grow.

Chris Colley 24:42

Right. That's amazing. That's I mean, if I I love those words that connection is key. And we all I often preach like those relationships when you first start are just so crucial to set up the rest of the year with that child, you know, like because they're gonna be there. And if things are insecure and not done thoughtfully, it it can really cause an effect down the road.

SPEAKER_05 25:10

Yes.

Chris Colley 25:11

Amazing.

SPEAKER_05 25:12

It can it can and and thinking of those multiple rubrics outcomes once the lesson's coming in. So is the outcome one way to do something, or do they have multiple, because we have to meet the curriculum. We're all gonna admit that. And do they have rubrics that allows for a multiple uh, you know, discipline to be able to approach the learning? Um, which makes, you know, we're all thrown into this one classroom, but we're all different people. We all want to explore the world differently, and we need we need some of the outcome opportunities to show that.

SPEAKER_00 25:49

Amazing.

Chris Colley 25:50

Love it. Thank you so much, Stephanie, for this. Thank you. I feel ready for this school year and talking with teachers and getting those littles developing. Absolutely. I love the idea of provocations. Like, I just think that that is something that we really need to start flushing out a little bit more, and that you can have these theme tables around a common theme. Like, I love that. And thinking about this is for this style learner, this style, like give like not so it's not limited, right? So any user, any learner can find access into the way that they learn best, you know, or think about things. Or I love that. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 26:34

Yes, yes, yes, absolutely. I find it too, I must admit, I find it too hard. Some people introduce screens in that provocation. I find it too hard. I find that the kids fight over it because they're so conditioned at home to use it a lot. And I find it takes away from the opportunity. Um, but you know your cohort, you know your dynamic. And and some find, you know, or the older children, you know, grade three and up, they seem to some of them seem to manage that, you know, internet investigation very well.

SPEAKER_00 27:06

Right, right.

Chris Colley 27:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:08

It's true. Yeah.

Chris Colley 27:09

They're they they want to touch those screens, but I do like that this idea of keeping it loose parts and exploratory and movement is needed. I mean, when your screen, you're kind of like anchored, it feels, to a spot instead of getting those little bodies out there moving. Because they are built to move, correct? Like little kids are are they're flexible, they're like they can fall, they can get up, like it's like nature isn't is has engineered small kids for movement, like as we could say. Amazing.

SPEAKER_05 27:45

Like Japan, I don't know if you're saying what they're doing in Japan, but in all the early years, they've just they're pushing a whole lot of funding to build it all indoor, outdoor space. So if you've got like a three, four-year-old class, they actually have a tree that they can sit in while they're learning or or swing on, or and it's it's all about having it constantly. Like it's quite interesting, some of us are doing there.

Chris Colley 28:06

Yes. Well, I'll definitely put my your link to your Jimboo as well, because like you have some amazing outdoor ideas for spaces for small kids. I mean, I I mean I I love them. Like it just seems like it's built for that movement and like exploratory, yet also like to chill, you know, to like just kick back and look at a book if you want. Like it has like this adaptive kind of feel to it that's all inclusive.

SPEAKER_05 28:34

Yes. Well, I'm glad you got that feel from it. And you know, and we we are all about mo movement is key. We say movement is the key to learning, and that's our big motto.

Chris Colley 28:43

Amazing. Well, we'll leave it at that. Steffi, thank you so much for your time, and I really appreciate your your insights into uh our our littles.

SPEAKER_04 28:53

It was lovely to meet you, and and big hi to Canada. I love Canada. Soft spot for Canada.

Chris Colley 28:59

Amazing. Well, a big hi to Australia. Have a great school year, and um we'll talk again one day.

SPEAKER_04 29:06

Sounds good. Thank you, Chris.

Chris Colley 29:08

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 29:09

Have a good one.

Chris Colley 29:10

Bye-bye.