Food: A Fact of Life have added six new activity packs to the website.  Each pack is based on a food theme and combines learning about healthy eating, cooking or where food comes from, with early years curriculum areas such as numeracy, literacy and physical development.

The activity packs can be downloaded from the website .

Please share this information with your families:

If you’re more than 10 weeks pregnant or have a child under 4, you may be entitled to get help to buy healthy food and milk.  If you’re eligible, you’ll be sent a Healthy Start card with money on it that you can use in some UK shops. Money will be added to this card every 4 weeks.
You’ll get:

• £4.25 each week of your pregnancy from the 10th week
• £8.50 each week for children from birth to 1
• £4.25 each week for children between 1 and 4

You will also be entitled to FREE healthy start vitamins for yourself and children.

Who can apply?
In addition, you must be receiving any of the following:

• Child Tax Credit (only if your family’s annual income is £16,190 or less)
• Income Support
• Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance
• Pension Credit (which includes the child addition)
• Universal Credit (only if your family’s take-home pay is £408 or less per month from employment)

You will also be eligible for Healthy Start if you’re under 18 and pregnant, even if you are not claiming any benefits.

How to Apply
You can apply online:  Please visit here .

The Education Endowment Foundation has launched a suite of evidence based resources dedicated to early years. The evidence gives information about how effective different approaches are likely to be on children’s learning and development. It can help you make decisions about how to make the most of the adults in your setting to create great learning opportunities for all your children, particularly those from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds. The evidence includes strong support for physical development approaches, parental engagement, self regulation strategies and social and emotional learning strategies.

To view these resources click here .

Racism can present itself in different ways in a young child’s life. A child may have direct or indirect experiences of racism, but the impact can be felt all the same. Our new early years resource has been written by Dr Pamela Hamilton and Dr Bisi Showunmi, two Child Psychologists. Both have delivered anti-racism sessions for schools and local authorities, with the second author writing her thesis on race and identity development in school children.

This booklet introduces the idea of racial socialisation and how it supports child development. It identifies some ways to facilitate your journey in supporting racial socialisation in an early years setting.

View and download the resource here .

This webinar was held in February and was recorded and will be available to watch back on the Anna Freud Centre YouTube channel in a few weeks. You can subscribe for new content notifications.

Useful links from the session

• Value, Money and Me - online books, games and resources for families to learn about money: Click Here.
• Love Food Hate Waste - put the name of the food that you need to use up, and it will give you a list of recipes to use that food:Click Here.
• For low-cost recipes: Click Here
• Join the National Centre for Family Learning for Free: Click Here.
• Money Helper high-quality support and advice: Click Here.

KMEWO sends Her deepest, sincerest heartfelt sympathies to all families, relatives, friends and acquaintances victims of the Turkish, Syrian Earthquake. The affected Middle Eastern communities include Turkish, Kurdish, Arabs, and many Afghans refugee families in the area.

The death toll has risen to more than 30.000 (source: Guardian Newspaper) and tragically continues to rise, as the window for rescue narrows. Tens of thousands of people have lost their homes. The devastation will impact them for many years to come.

The conflict areas of Syria are occupied by thousands people living in the open air, under the threat from the harsh and horrific conditions, and the death toll is likely to rise significantly (source World Health Organisation (WHO)). We call upon the UK government to make all efforts so that humanitarian aid can get through to all affected regions, including these conflict zones, where the affected communities are less likely to receive aid and support due to years of political and armed conflicts.

In the UK , KMEWO stays concerned about the wellbeing of diaspora communities whose families and loved ones are in the middle of this crisis. We would like to extend our hand of support to all Syrian, Kurdish, Turkish, Afghan and other organisations leading on the effort to help the communities dealing with the severe impact on their wellbeing and mental health.  KMEWO offers counselling in several Middle Eastern languages, including Kurdish, Farsi, Arabic and English, and our doors will be open for anyone affected by this crisis. Please contact us at info@kmewo.com  and 020 7263 1027 if we can help in any possible way.

KMEWO Team

The government is providing a package of up to £180 million of workforce training, qualifications and support and guidance for the early years sector to help address the impact of the pandemic on the youngest and most disadvantaged children.

The programmes are designed for early years:

• practitioners
• leaders
• settings, including private, voluntary, independent organisations, childminders, school based nurseries and maintained nursery schools

Designed to support all areas of the early years sector, the package offers training in:

• child development
• communication and language, early mathematics and personal, social and emotional development through the third phase of our professional development programme
• Nuffield Early Language Intervention
• leadership of settings with a new national professional qualification in early years leadership
• supporting care givers in their home learning environment

Additional funding for qualifications:

• graduate-level specialist training leading to early years teacher status
• accredited level 3 early years SENCO qualification
• a review of the level 3 qualification and criteria

Support and guidance to all early years settings through:

• stronger practice hubs
• expert coaches and mentors

For further details -  click here.

You can encourage parents and carers to chat, play and read more with their children with the help of the Home Learning Environment campaign. Better Health Start for Life and the Department for Education will continue this campaign in 2023. From Monday 16^th January national paid media and search advertising will be encouraging Chat, Play, Read.

A range of resources are available on the Campaign Resource Centre including A4 and A3 Posters, Empty belly posters (so you can add in local activities such as chat and play sessions), Digital Screens, Social Media toolkit and Campaign Communications Toolkit (which includes guidance for healthcare practitioners).

Download Now!

Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust (CLCH) Oral Health Promotion Team are a dedicated team who specialise in the care and support of oral health for children and their families.

Despite being a preventable disease, dental decay remains the top reason for hospital non-emergency admissions for 5–9-year-olds across the boroughs with many children having teeth extracted under a general anaesthesia. Poor oral health may also result in poor general health as well as:

• Oral infection and discomfort/pain.
• Difficulty eating, sleeping, talking, and socialising due to pain.
• Absence from nursery due to sleepless nights caused by toothache or by visits to the dentist for treatment

The following support is available:

• Oral Health training to Staff in Early Years, Children Centres, and Schools (face to face or virtual)
• Visits to Stay and Play groups at Children Centres where information and resources are shared with families
• Parents sessions (face to face or virtual) 
• Attend coffee mornings at schools to promote oral health messages
• Provide resources to improve oral health in your setting 
• Offer various support in promoting oral health if you have chosen Oral Health for your HEYL Silver/Gold award project

For further information, please contact 

Fiona – f.flynn3@nhs.net

Rachael – Rachael.crosbie@nhs.net

The GP Infant Feeding Network  has a wide range of resources to support parents who are breast feeding.