Webinar Recordings
Explore our growing library of webinars featuring leading voices from across the Early Years sector.
Each session offers practical insights, reflective prompts and evidence‑informed strategies to support your work with children and families.
Whether you’re revisiting a session or catching up for the first time, this space brings expert learning straight to you.
Use this collection to inspire your practice, explore new ideas and stay connected with sector‑wide conversations!
Laura Henry-Allain (MBE) leads this session on the importance of supporting children as they transition through their Early Years stages.
During the session, Laura shares her top tips for building effective transitions, including:
Acknowledging the emotions children feel during transitions
Helping children deal with these feelings and emotions
Using transitions as a celebration for children’s next steps, where possible
Supporting children in making their own transition stories to strengthen their literacy, language and communication
Knowing how books can support children with their understanding of change, using 'Maya & Marley and the New Friend' to illustrate
Understanding the importance of sharing the concept of transitions with parents to support teaching and learning within the home environment
Related materials
Download [pdf] - Laura’s presentation slides from the session
Download [pdf] - Maya & Marley Origami Cat activity sheet
Resource - The Kitbag Approach (mentioned in presentation - slide 2)
Video - Roads From The Past Short Film (mentioned in presentation - slide 44)
A session led by members of the Young Minds Big Maths (YMBM) project, exploring Ramp Play and the hidden maths in everyday play.
Children are naturally drawn to ramps, quickly experimenting with height, speed and movement using whatever materials are available. What’s often overlooked is the rich mathematical thinking and language that emerges through this simple, joyful play.
This session introduces the Ramp Play booklet, developed through the YMBM project with early years educators and university mathematicians. Drawing on real observations of 3‑ and 4‑year‑olds, the booklet reveals the surprising maths in ramp play and offers practical ways to notice and nurture it in your setting.
Guest speakers:
Rachel Oughton & Sophy Darwin, Mathematicians from Durham University
Kathryn Nichols & Sarah Dixon-Jones from Houghton Community Nursery School
Related materials
Want to get a copy of the Ramp Play booklet for your team?
You can download a PDF copy of the Ramp Play booklet for free, directly from Young Minds Big Maths.
We also have lots of printed copies of the booklet to share with settings and schools across Birmingham. They are available to collect from:
Jakeman Nursery School
Adderley Nursery School
Osborne Nursery School
Our Early Education Advisor team will also have copies of the booklet available at in-person network meetings, or you can request a copy directly via email: info@birminghamearlyyearsnetworks.org
Debi Keyte-Hartland leads this session on loose parts: how they support early learning, and how to curate them to maximise children’s creativity and communication.
In this 90-minute webinar, Debi covers:
- How loose parts and found materials can be used by babies, toddlers and young children as a material to ‘think and express/communicate’ with.
- How to curate and organise loose parts and found objects (inside and out) that maximise and amplify learning potential.
- The theory of loose parts and how this relates to creative thinking, language and communication and principles of practice in the early years.
Related materials
Blog - Loose Parts as an Activator of Learning in the Early Years
Professor Tina Bruce (CBE) and Professor Chris Pascal (OBE) lead this session on reflective pedagogy, with a focus on the Power and Pleasures of Play.
They share their research with the Froebel Trust, which developed a tool called Reflection with Guidance. This tool is described, and then a key element is introduced, focusing our reflections on the deep importance of play and how we can observe it in children’s explorations from their earliest days.
They also introduce the Layers of Play Framework, a resource to support practitioners in ‘play-full analysis’ of young children, and use video clips of children in play to enable participants to try out the framework for themselves.
Related materials
Blog - The Power and Pleasures of Play
Toolkit - Reflection with Guidance: A Froebelian tool for developing practice and transformation
