Sizzling Hot

As I sit on my balcony in Athens feeling the glorious sunshine here, I receive numerous texts from UK Twitter about the continuous proposals and changes to how services for children and families through the early years are being supported and offered.

Its seems that the climate is not the only cause of raising temperatures !

New qualifications, funding, organisation, testing, formality, cries for humanity, equality, justice, creativity and play. 

Presenting wisely during these Sizzling times can be extremely challenging. 

I always enjoy reading Julian Grenier's blog on these matters. 

When I return to the UK at the end of October to resume my work in Education I wonder what I will find there. 

What is certain for me is that no matter what the changes are, I will continue to lead workshops and programmes that speak to the heart of humanity. Raising standards aimed at children reaching their full potential, strengthening families and communities. 

If you would like to know more see www.tracyseedassociates.co.uk

Here in Greece I'm working with those who come to rest, to recuperate, to reflect, to contemplate;  joining people in reconsidering their life styles, their values and perceptions about what really matters. If you would like to know more see www.tracyseedcoaching.com

Here are some extra tips for reducing the Sizzling.
Most of these were taken from a social network posting that my friend and colleague Karl Smerecnick made, concerning how to  cope with the heat. 

Tips on keeping cool

• Wet down your hair (especially at night). 
• Wear a wet shirt and turn a fan on yourself. 
• Wear hats outside (and sunblock!)
• Drink plenty of water. 
• Make slush puppies
• Wear a cold washcloth around you neck. 
• For quick relief use an ice rag to the the bottom of the soles of your feet, this helps the core temperature and the heat drop quickly and heat.
• Drink cool water infused with cucumber
• Drink cool water infused with mint and lemon
• Eat cooling foods such as cucumber, yoghurt, most berries, sweet fruits, sushi, seaweed salad!
• Run cold water over your wrists and the back of your neck 
• Finish every shower with freezing water. 
• Have a little siesta. 
• Breathe slowly
• Walk in the woods
• Visit the sea
• Wear a bandana doused in peppermint oil...if its dry heat, keep the bandana wet because it evaporates.
• Wear cotton clothes allowing your skin to breathe. 

I hope you enjoyed reading, feel free to add on the comments section

Tracyx

Empowerment Through Compassion

I am reminded over and again of how much I love sharing nonviolent communication, the work of Dr Marshall Rosenberg.  

Last Sunday with my fellow facilitator Karl Smerecnik,  we provided some fun exercises which were designed to support people to explore how: 

• self-acceptance is the foundation for empowerment
• we transform our beliefs to have greater freedom and peace
• empathic listening as the key to navigating tough and uncomfortable situations
• awareness of our intention empowers us to ask for what we really want.

Having fun responding to the messages that are so difficult to hear from others in every day life does sounds rather strange and yet it is true, I hear people laughing as they hear their own inner thoughts and I witness changes in people regularly, even when there are situations that seems so stuck!  

When we are fully aware of all that happens to us  - what our inner voices say and we connect fully to our feelings and wants, with empathic understanding, we are able to think more clearly and we often discover solutions to problems that we didn't know were possible. 

We learn that we can hear messages and we have the choice to respond in many different ways. 

This is how Dr Dan Siegal explains the process:

"Response flexibility enables us to pause before responding as we put a temporal and mental space between stimulus and action. From a neurobiological perspective, this space of mind enables the range of possibilities to be considered, to just "be" with an experience, to be reflected upon, before engaging the "do" circuitry of action. 
Response flexibility offers the individual a way of choosing to be the "wisest self" possible in that moment."

NVC Process is

What are we observing that is affecting our wellbeing?

How do we feel in relation to what we are observing?

What are the needs,values,desires etc that are creating our feelings?

What are the concrete actions we request in 

order to enrich our lives?

 Words are Windows (or are they walls?)
by Ruth Bebermeyer

I feel so sentenced by your words, 
I feel so judged and sent away, before I go I've got to know
Is that what you meant to say?
Before I die to my defines,
Before I speak of hurt or fear,
Before I build that wall of words, Tell me did I really hear?
Words are windows, or they're walls, 
They sentence us or set us free, 
When I speak ad when I hear, 
Let the love light shine through me. 
There are things I need to say,
Things that mean so much to me,
If my words don't make me clear, 
Will you help me to be free?
If I seemed to put you down,
If you felt I didn't care,
Try to listen through my words
To the feelings that we share

Want to know more ?




These are some of the comments that participants shared with us at the end of the day:

“This is a very rewarding process and I am very grateful for these group workshops.”

“The two NVC workshops I have been part of have been strengthening events within themselves but have continued to resonate with me in the weeks that followed.”

“It was great to have the space to look at thoughts, feelings and needs in such a simple straight forward way.”

“The workshop enabled me to understand that past events don’t have to dictated my emotional responses – or that I can understand and move past that response.”

“I gained more clarity about how I can achieve better communication with others.”

“The workshop highlighted many areas of my life that these skills would help improve – all relationships such as work, family, children, friends, partners, etc.”

Next group meets on 10th November in Forest Hill, South East London 9, Havelock Walk SE 23 If you would like to know more do email me

mail@tracyseedassociates.co.uk 

Democracy and Freedom in the Early Years and Beyond

Democracy and Freedom in a Swedish
Pre-School,Gothenberg

I have visited and worked with a number of  Swedish preschools during the past 5 years and my experience is that their thinking about democracy and freedom is central to their work with children.

Last week I visited a preschool in Gothenburg,  and interviewed Maria a teacher in a team of three who works with 4 and 5 year olds. The philosophy of this particular school is inspired by Reggio Emilia.. Maria, tells me:

“Democracy and freedom come together”

“The children have clear rules and these rules are changeable”

“We don’t say no unless it is dangerous”

“We can be in rooms alone and we trust children to do the same”

 Groups of children alone in rooms is not something that would be allowed here in the UK, but in Sweden I have seen this many times. Children calm and confident working together and it might be quite sometime before an adult returns to see how they are doing. 

Maria tells me that if we can be in rooms alone so can they, we trust them, she says, they know the rules which are very clear and they know that if they break them they cant be in the area. 

We are standing in the Art area when she tells me that this is an area where children can be trusted to work for quite substantial periods without adult intervention – say 20 minutes…it is well organised and stocked with paints, paper and collage materials, much of the material is in glass containers.

I ask her about conflicts and  she says again that  we trust them, we don’t feel stressed about them at all, we believe that children are inherently good and want to learn and they care for each other. 

In this area she tells me it is so calm, they sometimes all complete a piece of work as a group, which will be on a large piece of paper.

The only conflicts that occur are maybe that the room might be untidy, or there maybe paint on the walls, but this is ok, they learn and we all clean this together.

Mainly conflicts that occur are outside, when the play is more physical. They know its not acceptable to use language that provokes another to protect themselves or games that are required to be someone underneath or on top, if this happens Maria says they have to talk about it and they know this.

Interview

Once a week the children have a meeting to discuss their questions about rules, concerns etc . One child will chair the meeting and will record the question and the decisions. All children vote on decisions using their name on lego pieces, a tower is built as the voting takes place, this makes it easier for them to see where the most votes are.  Maria tells me that mostly, the children are able to do this completely alone. 

This week they voted on being allowed to bring in toys from home. Previously they have not been allowed to do this. It was interesting said Maria because when this happened, they found that the noise was very loud, many of them bought toys in that made a sound. They met together again and agreed that volumes needed to be turned down, or batteries removed. 

There have been many questions/concerns discussed and decisions made during the past few weeks. I saw the notes of each meeting.

These  included :

• Its too crowded in here at registration
• Some people don’t flush the chain in the toilet
• Why don’t we have pizza for lunch?

Maria clearly explained the process that the children followed in each case and the extensive work that was undertaken to resolve issues that concern them they were involved in discussions, reading, interviewing etc….these are just some of the things we talked about…she told me much more about how they share information with parents and specifically how they do this via technology, how they keep individual records, undertake projects and what are the most important qualities and skills needed by the teaching team… if you are interested to read or hear more…do let me know and I will continue to share..

Children are the living messages

we send to a time we will not see-

 Author John W Whitehead

For children to be able to work in this way (and I'm not suggesting that we leave them to work alone in rooms) they need to develop language and thinking skills and the social and emotional capabilities for partnership, equality, mutuality,  solving problems and discussing their concerns etc ..they need a host of skills and competencies that are grown primarily from innate human potentials (to be nurtured from the inside out.) It is our job to support this process of development, helping them to express themselves as unique individuals who have the confidence, creativity, passion and empathy to know their own views and be able to listen to others … and it seems to me that this requires all of us..parents, teachers, practitioners, social workers etc....to work with ourselves around these skills and competencies too, how can we nurture these capacities in children if we don’t practice them ourselves..

If you would like to know more see:
http://www.facebook.com/LeadinginEducationandFamilies

http://twitter.com/#!/tracyseed

http://www.linkedin.com/in/tracyseed

www.tracyseedassociates.co.uk

or contact me directly to learn more about the work I am doing here in UK.

 More from Sweden soon!!

It's Just Not Good Enough

“It’s just  not good enough” this recent article in Nursery World caught my eye and held my interest,  it was written by Julian Grenier, Early Years Advisor to Tower Hamlets Council, London. 

I appreciate the eloquent and skillful way he presents this key message about the importance of:  What we say and how we say it and caution over  institutionalisation relating versus genuine human relating.

It’s short, concise and in my opinion, he describes without judgement, the current trend of a language being used in nurseries that is based on evaluative statements such as “good sitting, good listening” and he uses humour to illustrate how the term “good looking” would be understood outside the school gates!

He offers practical examples of the descriptions for behaviours that might relate to what is meant by “good sitting” and he expands this too by describing other behaviours concerning sitting i.e  fidgeting, and generally moving about.  He suggests how it might be much nicer  if practitioners considered using clear and genuine descriptions, ordinary language instead of a language that is distinct from the way that other people speak.

I so enjoyed reading this article…thanks Julian…..hopefully, I may one day hear less of this  language spoken, when my grandchildren are playing schools together…….

I am reminded of another article written by Rachel Underwood many years ago…here is a little extract…about considering what praise teaches…

This is what she shared

“Once as a twenty eight year old teacher, I remember spending my time after school putting up a wall display of the nursery children’s work in the school hall.  Each piece of work had been carefully mounted and labelled and there were explanations for parents to read about the significance of the work.  After I had finished the display, I found myself loitering in the hall - I was hoping the head teacher would come by and make some positive remark about my efforts.  I caught myself doing this and smiled.  Here I was, a grown woman, lead teacher in a nursery unit waiting for my wall display to be acknowledged by someone I perceived to be significant so I could go home feeling content with my day’s work.  I didn’t have the know how at that point to acknowledge myself for my efforts.”

In Rachel's article, she talks about how closed comments like “lovely picture” do not enable Julie (child in the article) to develop her own views and enjoyment about her work, instead she explains how this can lead to the child’s need for adult approval.   She describes how Sasha, Julie’s key worker is well intentioned in her acknowledgement of Julies work, but the message Julie creates for herself from the comments Sasha makes are very different from Sasha’s purpose. Julie ends up looking to the adults to let her know if she is doing well, maybe she plays it safe too instead of trying new things.

I have many conversations with friends and colleagues about the approaches we use when we want others to do what we want them to do…..and about the way we communicate and relate with others so that they feel emotionally safe to be themselves.  Most of  my work  now days  relates to this area…working with practitioners, parents, leaders and managers and the general public wanting to find ways to communicate and relate authentically with care respect and equality..  

If our goal is to provide a world where people flourish and are able to express themselves, where we care about each other as well as ourselves , then I guess it would be great for us to be able to express ourselves honestly, openly and in a true way.

This applies to us at work, in our teams, families and communities.

How do we do this…

It seems to me that our own emotional awareness and being able to empathise, alongside clear and careful communication,  plays a key role in adopting such an approach.

What do you think about this?

Leadership Is for Everyone

For contemplation…..

Leadership is supposed to be for everyone,

So every child or every person is supposed to act like a leader;

So you should lead your own family, you should lead your own life.

As a child grows, he’s given responsibility of taking care of the lambs, the goats, the sheep, she’s shown he’s responsible. When he grows up more he becomes a warrior.

We are initiated to become warriors and we then go to the bush for training;training to be leaders, training how to take cour community forward, how to protect our community and all that wisdom.

 To become a respected leader in the Massai community, you have to first of all to show a good example.

When you are a leader you should respect everybody, you should respect children, the whole community. You don’t bullying people, you don’t tell people “do this”, commanding people no.

Instead you have respect

Emmanuel Manjura, Massai Leader published recently in Resurgence Magazine No 264

 
The four pillars of Education (UNESCO Learning – The Treasure within)

Learning to know: “concerned less with the acquisition of structure knowledge that with the mastery of learning tools. It may be regarded as both a means and an end of human existence.”

Learning to do..”how do we adapt education so that it can equip people to do the types of work needed in the future?”

Learning to live together “…education should adopt two complementary approaches. From early childhood, it should focus on the discovery of other people in the first stage of education. In the second stage of education and in lifelong education, it should encourage involvement in common projects.”

Learning to be:”..All people should receive in their childhood and youth an education that can make up their own minds on the best courses of action in the different circumstances in their lives”

Jean Piaget said " The principal goal of education in the schools should be creating men and women who are capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what other generations have done;men and women who are creative, inventive and discoverers, who can be critical and verify, and not accept, everything they are offered." 

Cathy Nutbrown, Respectful Educators, Capable Learners (1996) "If children find learning difficult, it could well be that there I something wrong with the way in which we are asking the to learn."

If you would like to explore your own leadership and or the way you perceive and approach education and curriculum implementation contact me mail@tracyseedassociates.co.uk view my website www.tracyseedassociates.co,uk and if any of the work that we are doing inspires you we would love to connect with you..

Connecting with the Elements

Not bringing the inside out - celebrating the very special nature of all that the outside has to offer - Last Saturday, over 50 Swedish early year’s professionals arrived in London for an event with us. They are the staff of Angbybarnens Forskolo, a group of five pre-schools in different locations in Norra Angby, Stockholm. These pre-schools are led by my colleagues and NVC companions Annika Sparrdal Mantilla and Ninni Jarnehall, they are pre-schools which are even more progressive and forward thinking than any average setting in Sweden

How could they afford to do this?

For the second time they have won Stockholm's Quality Award prize. They first won this during 2010 which is when they took the whole team to Italy, this time their visit is with us here in the UK and I am so grateful to have have he privilege to work with them on both of these occasions.

Here is a short video showing photographs of the event in Italy and in the UK and some of their own outdoor environment and of Chelsea Open Air nursery's very unique city garden. 



A Further description of the event in the UK
We met in Norway, during May, to discuss their needs and settled on working with a theme and intention to advance their experience and thinking around learning outside -not an easy challenge, considering that, unlike UK pre-schools they already offer children all day access during rain, snow, frost, wind and sunshine. They are very comfortable with children exploring freely, climbing, digging, hiding, running, resting etc.

I wondered what we could offer?
We agreed on an innovative plan to commence on the first day, with a three hour session of music, movement and dance: a session based on biocentric principles.

What was our intention?
It was to bring them into connection with the elements, through their bodies and their emotions, to experience outdoors in a fresh way; to embody this learning. Our music (except for the opening and warm up) was the sounds of nature combined with some urban sounds too of course! Day two would be a more traditional training session. 

We commenced in an indoor training room meeting and offering some outline of the session that would follow. We walked in silence to a beautiful private garden, 5 minutes away, close to regents park, walking barefoot on the grass, running, jumping, making cartwheels and handstands, smelling the earth and lying on the ground; feeling the warm rays of the sunshine on our faces, dancing to the breeze of the wind..and allowing our lungs to fill with air and to move our bodies subtly opening up to in a fluid way, slow and graceful dance  and then dissolving into a deep state of relaxation and accessing a blissful sense of being with nature and ourselves. 
Smelling the flowers and examining bugs with a gentleness and softness that returned us to our early memories of multi-sensorial experience. We awakened the old and anchored the new, our senses heightened and the body’s neurology embedding these experiences along with the emotional states of relaxation, awe and wonder. 

The experience was very challenging for some of them and yet, they engaged themselves either fully through the exercises or as observers, whilst
sitting under a tree.
On day two or our event we were joined by Jan White, early
year’s consultant, author of playing and learning outdoors: making provision for high quality experiences in the outdoor environment’ is published by Routledge (2008). Jan is an international advocate and supports high quality outdoor provision for services from birth to five. During her time earlier in her career, as a Senior Development Officer, she played a key role nationally in developing Learning through Landscapes’  When I met Jan a few years ago, my impression  was that she possessed a depth and breadth of experience that continued to evolve, I like this and her openness, flexibility and humour too. I sensed her potential to work with and to connect with a group of people in an authentic way and I was right, within a very short time and in spite of some hiccups with our equipment, she captured the group with her warmth and enthusiasm and began her session by introducing them to her thinking about the very special nature of outdoors and the distinct difference between what this environment has to offer compared with being inside - its highly multi sensory nature and vegetation. 

Jan's work and my own input helped them to be conscious of the embodied experience of the previous day. She facilitated a dialogue around characteristics including;the experience of different surfaces, open spaces, opportunities for refuge and reverie, the softness of being cushioned in the grass, kissed by the rain and caresses by the leaves;exploring schemas of trajectory, enclosure, boundaries, envelopment, rotation and much much more;the right kind of materials - affordance (meaning those that meet the needs of the individual children, those that are inviting, stretching, accessed, used and shaped). Flexibility and responsiveness of the environment to the needs of the children and the importance of transition areas and the comfort of the adults to really engage with the children.

She completed the day by asking them to think about the messages they want children to believe about themselves and she shared some of hers with us:

They are good to be with
They can feel good in their body
They are capable and competent
They are trusted and responsible
They can be curious and adventurous
They are creative and inventive

My conversations with participants during our time together and at the close of he event seem to indicate that they felt stretch and challenged to think more deeply about their experiences of being outdoors and this they say, has moved them forward. We will follow up with them in a few weeks too, to see what impact the event has actually had on their practice.

I'm thinking that if all of our early years setting developed their practice in this way, surely this would go someway towards growing the kind of citizens in the UK that we would like to be with, with a love of ecology and the the likelihood of less violence and destruction.

I am so grateful for the work with Sue James who led the nature session with me and to Jan White who was a very flexible, thoughtful and creative partner and I am thankful to Ninni and Annika for continuing to work collaboratively and enthusiastically together and to Nisimo, Vigdess and Beverly for assisting in many ways to make this a memorable event - what a great team!

If you are interested to learn more about this group of nurseries see www.angybarnensforskolor.se/

If you would like to visit them in Stockholm sometime do let me know as we will be organising a study trip in the near future. Funding may also be available through various European funds.  Also, do remember too that if you would like an event that is something more extraordinary to meet the needs of your group, or if you would like to attend one of the programmes specified on our website please do contact us see www.tracyseedassociates.co.uk. 
Click here for a link to an older blog entry that also contains information about outside play.

Riots at Home

As I return to the UK from my time in Greece I wonder what I will face in London. The violent scenes I saw on the front pages of the newspapers seemed a million miles away when I was sitting in a quite Taverna in a small village in the mountains of Pelion; the suns rays beamed through the trees and gently warmed me as I listened to the soft rippling sounds of the stream in in the background. Old men chatting, children playing and then a text...from my daughter telling me that events had occurred in Bromley and Shortlands and how scared she was feeling and another text from my friend in Lewisham and I realised that some of the riots had been right outside another friends front door http://dorothynesbit.blogspot.com/2011/08/there-were-riots-outside-my-front-door.html
I text her to see if she was ok.

As my plane lands and the doors open and the air hits my face, I notice a cold feeling, not only from the wind, but from my feeling of sorrow that our young people in the UK became so very angry and overwhelmed;causing damage and harm to people, families and communities. I wait in the cue to show my passport and the lady standing next to me expresses her anxiety about what has happened while we have been away and she tells me that her daughter was so distressed when she watched the scenes on the TV that she asked her mum to turn it off.

It is a very important time to think about how we talk with and listen to our own family members.I'm wondering what my grandchildren are feeling and thinking as they witness this.

I ask myself how did crowds come together for such destruction ?

I reflect on the amazing potential we have for such immediate communication, collaboration and organisation: the Internet and its social networking sites and also the power of such a system to work for destruction too

I wonder about the issues underlying this outbreak and guess some of the needs being expressed might include: ...a need to belong, to be part of a group, to be accepted feel significant, a need for justice, fairness, to be noticed and listened too, a need for power, for freedom and for revolution

"Punish them"  and ..."zero tolerance"..are the main messages that I hear and I feel this too as I hear the pain and see the damage that has been caused and at the same time, I want much more than this. I want to see restorative justice to help them to recognise what pain and damage they have caused and to support them to express themselves and to hear their plight.  If we simply punish and continue to repress this violence through control, fear and punishment I really don't think it will disappear, instead it will fester and boil until another opportunity arises and it will erupt again and we will be engulfed in its lava.

Here are a few of the comments that caught my attention on face book

"More than 90,000 people have signed an online petition calling for anyone convicted of taking part in the riots to lose any benefits they receive. Yeah that's going to really help isn't it. Not"

"I think it starts with education. Pay good teachers more money and show the kids that they can educate themselves out of the poverty trap.

"Oh for goodness sake. How does evicting people from their homes help make anything better?"

"If the youth are not welcome into the tribe, they will burn down the village to feel its warmth!

What are your thoughts on this?

Mine are that as a nation and in our own communities we need to do so much more to address these issues, they are varied and have depth and have not arisen overnight.

It would help if we had more investment in:

• Intervention for families living in poverty and those who need support to transform the emotional impact of the experiences they offer their children ... early years intervention is key for young people to develop empathy and to prevent violence.....
• Services for children and families that listen, hear and understand and work in trans formative ways to connect with heart, not with judgement and to empower parents.
• Children's centres, early years settings and schools that work as small communities and are inclusive and have the resources to support the social, emotional and behavioural issues that arise within groups and between individuals in the settings as an everyday part of life. We need to be confident in our management of conflict in a way that develops our capacity to live in peace with each other not in war.
• Family support attached to these settings.
• Systems of restorative justice.

Just some thinking out loud!