Check out this new resource by Dr. Francis Wardle. 

A Step by Step Instruction manual to build your own outdoor playground.

Find it here in the members only Resource Library

Not a member?  Join today! 

The best line of the Trudeau government’s first day— widely reported and praised in the international media—was the new PM’s.  In response to a reporter’s question about why he’d chosen to create a gender-parity cabinet, he rather matter of factly observed “because it’s 2015”.  This ostensibly simple statement summed up a complexity of attitudes, beliefs and even world views in three words.  For those feminists who remain doggedly optimistic after a decade nasty enough to slay the optimism of Anne of Green Gables, it raised hopes that the first day’s lustre could foreshadow more significant changes to come.

Read more on Child Care Now Blog

CBC News - November 9, 2015

Minister of Education Liz Sandals has announced $498 million in funding to build 30 new schools, renovate 26 existing ones and create 2,135 new child care spaces across Ontario.

Sandals made the announcement at Davisville Junior Public School today, which she says will get a new school building through the funding.

Read more on CBC News

Ontario is investing $498 million in new and renovated schools as well as new child care spaces to provide students with better places to learn while also giving families more options for quality licensed child care that is close to home.

Over the next few months, work will begin on:

• 30 new schools
• 26 major additions and renovations
• 122 safe, high-quality licensed child care rooms, resulting in 2,135 new licensed spaces for infants, toddlers and pre-schoolers.

Visit Ontario.ca for more information

Vote Child Care 2015 has called a National Day of Action on October 8th 2015 to recognize that Early Childhood Educators and child care workers are the key to high quality child care.

Child care has been a key election issue and has been discussed by all major parties! Vote Child Care has collected publicly available details of each party's child care platform and compared them to the key components of our Vision. 

There are some great promises for child care in this election but the parties have been silent on their plans to support a well-trained, well-compensated ECEC workforce.

Visit the CCAAC website for more information 

In This Issue:

• THE EVOLUTION OF PROFESSIONAL LEARNING FOR RECES IN ONTARIO

Featured article available to the public

• 13 COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE: A Pedagological Approach to Professional Learning
• AECEO 2015 ELECTION RESULTS
• VOTE CHILD CARE 2015 CAMPAIGN
• ONTARIO SPRANG INTO ACTION!
• WELLNESS AND THE EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATOR
• SPOTLIGHT ON LONG-TIME MEMBERS
• BEHAVIOUR MANAGEMENT: Really Listening to the Stress of Children with Special Needs and Autism
• KIWANIS CLUBS OF NIAGARA AND THE ECCDC JOIN FORCES
• A REMEMBRANCE OF VIOLET MULHOLLAND
• and More!

We would like to thank the following advertisers for helping to support this issue of the eceLINK.

Seneca Faculty of Continuing Education and Training
Hi Mama
Johnson Insurance

The eceLINK is a quarterly publication of the Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario (AECEO).

Since 1992, the publication has been distributed across Ontario to all our members and affiliate organizations.  The eceLINK has a circulation of approximately 3500, reaching Early Childhood Educators working in different early learning and child care settings. They include students, frontline practitioners, administrators & supervisors, trainers and policy makers.

To access your copy of the eceLINK, you must be a member of the AECEO.  Not a Member?  Not a problem!  You can join today and access this issue in addition to our eceLINK archives. 

SIGN UP TO BECOME A MEMBER

AECEO MEMBER ACCESS

Co constructed by Shani Halfon, RECE & Melanie Dixon, RECE
eceLINK Summer 2015

Professional learning is an integral part of the early childhood education and care (ECEC) landscape. Decades of research have identified that the learning and ongoing professional learning of early childhood educators and staff is a critical element in the provision of high quality ECEC. As regulated professionals, registered early childhood educators also have ethical and professional responsibilities to enhance their practice and gain new skills and knowledge to cope with the ever changing needs of children and families. In the context of Ontario’s ongoing agenda to ‘modernize’ child care and the broader ECEC sector, increased attention has been devoted to the professional learning of the ECEC workforce resulting in significant changes in this area.

In times of such immense change it is important to stop and take stock of what is happening, where we have come from and where we would like to be. This article aims to begin to map out the changing landscape of professional learning for ECEs in Ontario in order to assess the ‘state of’ professional learning and identify outstanding issues or questions. A brief look back at the history of professional learning and ECEs will provide some of the context for evaluating a number of structural changes that have taken place to support a more formalized professional learning infrastructure in ECEC. An overview of current developments in Ontario will highlight the significant changes impacting the professional learning landscape and a review of what we know about how professional learning is being organized, supported and delivered across Ontario is included. Further questions for research, policy and practitioners will be presented in the conclusion.

Read full article

This article has been extracted from our eceLINK Summer 2015 issue available to AECEO Members

The University of British Columbia - June 7, 2015

New research from UBC and the Child & Family Research Institute at BC Children’s Hospital shows that risky outdoor play is not only good for children’s health but also encourages creativity, social skills and resilience.

The findings, published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, found that children who participated in physical activity such as climbing and jumping, rough and tumble play and exploring alone, displayed greater physical and social health.

Read more...

The Northern Echo, UK - June 17, 2015

Only two per cent of early years childcare workers are male. Lisa Salmon talks to the Fatherhood Institute about their drive to get more men into the industry

MOST men would love to be “a hero every day”. That’s the way working as a male childcarer has been described by men themselves, but there are still only a handful of males working in the field.

Despite years of progress towards greater gender balance in many professions, the early years education and childcare workforce remains stubbornly dominated by female staff – the latest figures show that only two per cent are male.

Read more..

Active Healthy Kids Canada developed the first Report Card in 2005 with the goal to power the movement to get kids moving. Over the last 10 years, more than 80,000 individuals and organizations have used the Report Card to advocate for and devise solutions to enhance physical activity opportunities for children and youth.

In 2014, Active Healthy Kids Canada began winding down its operations and the leadership of the Report Card was assumed by ParticipACTION, a long-term strategic partner. Read the press release.

ParticipACTION will continue to work with its strategic research partner, the Healthy Active Living and Obesity Research Group at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario Research Institute (HALO-CHEO), to deliver the much anticipated comprehensive assessment of child and youth physical activity in Canada.

2015 ParticipACTION Report Card on Kids - ParticipACTION

International Mud Day is children and early childhood professionals – and anyone else – all over the world celebrating nature, outdoors, and mess by getting really muddy. You can participate wherever you happen to be on June 29! Join children and adults across the globe on this day of celebration to grow awareness and honor the goodness of life experienced when children connect with nature.

More Information

ECCDC Event - May 13, 2015

Why do educators need to take a balanced approach to risk, and what does it look like?

Across the world, adults are becoming ever more anxious about children’s safety and well-being.  Read more...Paradoxically, these anxieties can end up harming children’s learning and development, fuelling unnecessary fears and undermining trust and confidence in ourselves and our children. How can those of us who work with children take a balanced, thoughtful approach to risk; one that honours and values children’s play, their freedom of movement, and, most importantly, the relationships they have with each other and with adults?  Tim’s talk, based on his influential book No Fear: Growing up in a risk averse society, will help educators and service providers to revisit their thinking; to strike a better balance between protecting children from genuine threats and giving them rich, challenging opportunities to learn and grow.

More information

Child care has long been acknowledged as a necessary component in closing the gender wage gap in two important ways. First, the lack of affordable, high quality child care continues to limit women’s opportunities to participate in on-going, full-time work. Second, child care is still a firmly entrenched ‘female job ghetto’ in which the predominately female workforce continues to be underpaid and undervalued.  

Read Full Joint Statement for Equal Pay Day

In this Issue:

• PIECEMEAL SOLUTIONS GET PIECEMEAL RESULTS: Addressing wages in regulated child care in Ontario
• PROFESSIONAL PAY FOR PROFESSIONAL WORK CAMPAIGN OVERVIEW
• FACT SHEET: $1 WAGE ENHANCEMENT
• AECEO BOARD NOMINATIONS SLATE / AGM PROPOSAL
• LEARNING AND LEADING TOGETHER: Reflections on leadership and continuous professional learning
• SPRING INTO ACTION FOR CHILD CARE
• CONTINUOUS PROFESSIONAL LEARNING: Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook as Professional Learning Tools

Please note* This content is available to AECEO Members only

Become a Member Today

On March 10, 2015, the Centre for Excellence for Early Childhood Development announced the re-vamp of the Encyclopedia on Early Childhood Development. This online encyclopedia is targeted to service providers and policy makers with evidence-based information on 51 topics on early childhood development from conception to age 5.

Date & Time:  Tuesday, March 10, 2015, 4:30 p.m.
Location: University of Toronto, OISE, 252 Bloor Street West, 12 Floor Nexus Lounge, Toronto, Ontario

Canada's leading scholars unveil the evidence for public investments in early childhood education and launch a new pan-Canadian network bringing together academics, stakeholders and grant makers involved in research and in the application/mobilization of research findings.  

The initiative is led by Dr. Jennifer Jenkins, Director of the Atkinson Centre and the Academic Director at the Fraser Mustard Institute of Human Development at the University of Toronto and Dr. Michel Boivin the Canada Research Chair in Child Social Development and a professor of Psychology at Université Laval

Sponsored by the International Network for Early Childhood Knowledge Mobilization (INECK) and the Atkinson Centre for Society and Child

more info

Vote Child Care 2015 brings together child care advocates and supporters from across Canada to promote the vision endorsed at the ChildCare2020 conference.

Affordable child care: The $7-a-day question

Atkinson Centre

The Schools at the Centre study explores the impact of full day kindergarten and extended hours programming on educators, families and early years administrators in three Ontario regions. By exploring the processes and partnerships developed between school boards, regional governments and community organizations the researchers were able to uncover lessons to inform policy and practice. The aim of the study is to strengthen child and family centred services in communities.

• To view the report (pdf)
• To view videos from the study
• To view the powerpoint presentation (pdf)