SOLD OUT Conference: Inspiring Early Learning

Beverley has 17 years' experience as an early years educator. She is passionate about early childhood experiences and development - with a particular emphasis on outdoor play, exploration and engaging with nature. She is the nursery manager at Tiddlers Wraparound in Caerphilly, Wales which has been recognised as a 'Lead Setting' offering support, guidance and good practice to other nurseries and early years settings. Beverley is a founding member of the Wales Froebel Network.

An experienced Further Education Lecturer and Trainer, Shirley has a proven track record in teaching and training Early Years/Childcare and Health and social care programmes. Following a brief spell as a general nurse, in the early eighties Shirley trained as an NNEB nursery nurse. Employed by Lewisham Council, initially as a nursery officer, then student placement supervisor, liaising with further education colleges, and subsequently a nursery manager and NVQ assessor.

The core aspect of her work has always been co-ordinating and delivering vocational courses. This enabled strong community links to develop guidelines for standards in practical training and support workplace supervisors with practical assessments. She also developed strong links with awarding bodies, and as an exam writer gained greater understanding of curriculum and assessment frameworks.

Following her long career in vocational training and study skills programmes, Shirley currently works for City Lit as a community outreach childcare tutor, delivering accredited and non- accredited courses and family learning programmes. She also delivers introductory courses to ESOL learners.

Rachna is an early childhood teacher, action-researcher and consultant. She works with under-threes, Nursery and Reception children in classroom settings and holds an MA in Early Childhood Studies. Rachna also writes for organisations like Tapestry and Early Education. Her recent work includes embedding music into settings via grants to purchase outdoor music walls, open-ended music resources and workshops for children and their families.

Paula Lester, an independent Quality Consultant, has been a senior leader in Early Years for over 25 years, including as a Group Manager and a Director of Quality for two nursery groups in the South of England.

Paula is a member of the Froebel Trust Education Committee and an active Froebel Trust Travelling Tutor (since 2017) and currently delivers many courses in England, Scotland and Wales in addition to teaching online. She has a Master's Degree in Early Years Education from the University of Roehampton.

Julia Manning-Morton is an author, trainer and lecturer in early childhood. Her career spans 40 years and diverse roles as a nursery nurse, manager, adviser and lecturer in Early Childhood Studies. Julia is now an independent consultant, an associate trainer for Early Education, a Froebel Travelling Tutor and a member of the Pikler (UK) Association.

Julia’s research, writing and teaching is focused on practice and provision that meets the needs of children from birth to three years old and on the personal, social and emotional well-being of children. Her aim is to promote the well-being of all children and all aspects of their care and learning; emphasizing inclusion and anti-bias, and to promote the well-being and professionalism recognition of all practitioners.

Thelma Miller trained to be a Primary school teacher at Goldsmiths College, University of London from 1968- 71, studying Drama and Art as her main subjects. Her first teaching experiences were in schools for children experiencing emotional behaviour difficulties and/ or physical disabilities. Following the birth of her children she became interested in how children develop in the first years and retrained at the Froebel College, Roehampton in 1983 to become an early years teacher.

Throughout her long and happy career as a teacher, a family literacy tutor, headteacher and early years adviser she has tried to nurture the imagination and creativity in children, finding this the best way to motivate, interest and engage them in their learning.

In 2017 Thelma was invited by Professor Tina Bruce to train to become an accredited Froebel Travelling Tutor. She found it inspiring to revisit Froebel’s principles that are so comprehensive, practical and relevant for our work with children in the UK and around the world. She was delighted to make 3 visits to Kolkata, India to complete a programme introducing Froebelian principles and practise to a charity working with street children.

Pete Moorhouse is an Early Years Creative Consultant and works regularly as an artist educator in settings. Froebelian principles very much inform his work with children. Pete is a Froebel Trust Travelling Tutor and an associate trainer for Early Education and delivers CPD training and conference presentations throughout the UK and overseas.

Pete is the author of several books and journal articles including ‘Learning through Woodwork: Introducing Creative Woodwork in the Early Years’ (Routledge 2018), and ‘Outdoor Environments’ and 'Learning Outdoors' (Community Playthings 2019) and 'The Wonder of Woodwork' (Froebel Trust, 2021). Pete is an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Bristol, researching children's progression in their creative and critical thinking. He is a Churchill Fellow through which he researched woodwork in early childhood education around the world and in 2019 Pete was awarded the national award from the Creative Learning Guild for his work promoting creativity in education.

Dr Lucy Parker is Deputy Headteacher at Ludwick (Maintained) Nursery School in Hertfordshire. She has been instrumental in introducing a Froebelian approach at the nursery, including cookery and clay as core curriculum experiences. Lucy is a Froebel trained teacher and has received a BA, PGCE, MA and PhD from the University of Roehampton.

Lucy is a Trustee at the Froebel Trust. She is Chair of the Froebel Trust's Education Sub-Committee and Co-Chair of Education & Research Committee.