We're delighted to be working alongside Birmingham Early Years Networks (BEYN) to support Birmingham City Council's Public Health division to share and amplify important COVID-19 information to families with children 0-5

Our dear friends, colleagues and wider CREC community

It has been an incredible year; although it has brought a lot of challenges and change, we are proud of how our small team have met those head-on.

A couple of weeks ago, CREC Learning Circle hosted a consultation event which was an opportunity to hear about the Birth to Five Matters project initial survey results from the project lead, Nancy Stewart and contribute to the work of the Early Years Coalition by sharing views and ideas on the emerging findings and issues.

Today sees the launch of Famly Children’s Champion Award 2020 . In partnership with CREC and other EY organisations, this new award aims to raise the profile and celebrate unsung early years heroes and, through nominations and vote, crown Famly Children’s Champion, and award them £5,000.

Today sees the launch of an online survey by the Early Years Coalition (EYC), a group of sector representative bodies, to find out practitioners’ views and needs for guidance to support the revised EYFS. This is the first stage of a process to help shape a revision of the 2012 EYFS non-statutory guidance Development Matters in response to feedback that showed practitioners want to keep the best aspects of this highly valued guidance, while updating and improving it to reflect current challenges.

We have been working hard over the past few months to set up our offices and training rooms ready for the new academic year, ensuring that the environment is COVID secure but retains that welcoming and nurturing feel that we’ve worked hard to develop over the years.

These last months have given all of us personal and professional challenges that have demanded extraordinary reserves of energy, creativeness, resilience and compassion as we have navigated life during this ever-developing COVID pandemic. As the new academic year begins we are writing to assure you all of CREC’s commitment to keeping you safe and well and our excitement about working with you all on a new year of study and professional development.

Today sees the launch of the Early Years Workforce Review, a new report from the Sutton Trust and the Centre for Research in Early Childhood that reviews recent developments in early years policy and sets out a framework for urgent action to improve social mobility in the early years.

In this guest post, Sharon Colilles, early years advisor, academic and researcher, explores ideas for developing a space in curriculum frameworks that support children's ethnic identity and invites dialog on strengthening our approaches to inclusion in EY settings.

We are delighted to announce that our Certificate for Music Educators: Early Childhood course has reached capacity bookings for the 2020/2021 cohort.

The Certificate for Music Educators (CME): Early Childhood is a recognised National Qualification validated by Trinity College London; it offers a flexible, part-time, distance-learning qualification in early childhood music

This week has seen a large number of reports, briefing notes, and campaigns launched to highlight the devastating impact that the coronavirus has had specifically on the Early Years sector in England.

Last night, The Sutton Trust published their latest coronavirus impact brief on the early years, co-authored by CREC Directors Prof. Chris Pascal and Prof. Tony Bertram, along with Erica Holt-White and Carl Cullinane.

Following the success of our recent Hybrid Pedagogy webinar, we will be holding a second special Virtual Learning Circle event on Wednesday 8th July.

This FREE online event will be hosted via Zoom Webinar and led by two fantastic voices in the Early Years, Helen Moylett and Nancy Stewart, who will be discussing 'Play and Language in Transition'.

Back in December 2019, we wrote a blog about ‘Hybrid Pedagogy’ which has garnered a lot of interest from around the world.

During the past few weeks, members of the CREC team have been variously working to support local authorities and individual schools as they look to welcome more children back, safely and supportively, over the coming weeks and months.

At the same time, we are refining our plans to make sure our learning environment at CREC is ready for our MA and SCITT groups in the Autumn.

The world these past weeks has been shocked by the brutal killing of George Floyd in Minnesota, USA and the overbearing force and violence used against protesters angry at his death and at the response of the establishment, but also at decades, if not centuries, of social, economic, and political inequality and injustice.

Like all organisations and individuals, we have been facing COVID-related challenges. But 10 weeks on, we continue to work for and with our partners, colleagues and students in this new odd reality and here's an overview of our recent activities.

07-Apr-2020

Dear CREC students, tutors and friends,

We hope you are all well and safe during these incredibly challenging times.