A nursery practitioner from Nightingales Day Nursery at Airedale Hospital is celebrating after successfully completing her teaching qualification, where she’s giving the best possible educational start to the children she cares for.
Katie Whitehead from Riddlesden now has her teacher status, giving her an in-depth knowledge of creating and planning learning activities for children, and how to best support young children with additional needs in growing and developing and enjoying their time at nursery.
Katie looks after the 2-3 year old children in the Wagtails room at the nursery. She has worked at Airedale for 2 years, having previously working in a Montessori nursery and two private day nurseries. Katie’s one year teaching course was led by the Best Practice Network and funded by the Department of Education and followed on from her degree in Children’s Learning.
Katie says:
“I always wanted to do my teacher training and when I came to Airedale I was really supported and encouraged to be able to do it.”
Katie explains how education starts at nursery:
“It starts with the babies, we go with their routine at home and we try to follow the curiosity approach, which means using natural things rather than plastic play. So for example a box to them could be a car, so we let them use their imagination. We create a homely place too so don’t have lots of bright colours, like your own home, so children aren’t over stimulated.”
One of the significant things she’s learned from her course is in matching and planning activities around her children’s interests, rather than choosing for them. In this way children can get involved in things that are really important to them, and that match their individual likes and needs.
One of the children Katie looks after is 2-year-old Teddy and she already plans his day around what he loves.
Katie says:
“Teddy likes to move in and out of lots of different activities in a day, so I try and set up things in each area that he really likes. Today I’ve set up a dark den for him because he’s in awe of all the sensory toys, so he can sit in the den reading his stories, with the sensory lights on.”
“He loves the singing bag too – it has different props in for each nursery rhyme so he can get the mouse out for ‘Hickory Dickory Dock’ or a smiley face for ‘Happy and you know it’. All the children love picking their own and holding it and showing it to their friends while we sing.”
The nursery team have also set up excellent links with parents, other nursery nurses in different rooms as the children move up through nursery, and the reception teachers in the schools where the children will eventually go.
Every child has an ‘All about Me’ profile, explaining who they are and what they like and it includes input from parents and nursery nurses from when they first started at nursery, and this is shared all the way through nursery and with the new school once they graduate.
The nursery also sets up visits so all the teachers from the new schools visit the children in nursery before they start – so the teachers get a really good knowledge of each child and what makes them who they are.
Katie was supported and mentored to do her training while working by nursery manager Vicky Yates and the whole nursery team. She also spent 6 weeks at Kildwick School and was able to learn and share new ideas with them, so making nursery and school education even closer together, so children can be even more prepared for when they start school.
Vicky Yates, Childcare Provision Manager at Airedale NHS Foundation Trust says:
“We want to say a huge congratulations to Katie, her extra skills and knowledge will help massively in making our nursery practice even stronger than it is through all that she’s learned.”
