Unravelling the Art of Early Years Routines

How do we ensure children in their early years thrive in a structured environment? Join Sarah and  Steph as we navigate the importance of routines in early years settings. We'll reveal how these routines not only help children but also support adults. We dive into our personal anecdotes about how routines have been our saviour in tough situations like the end of the half term and school photos. There's a lot to consider when creating a routine, from the needs of the year group to staff collaboration - and we're here to help you figure it out!

 We highlight the value of a soft start to the day, how to conduct skill-based sessions, and the art of managing transitions. We also emphasise the power of repetition and perseverance. But there's more! We'll discuss staff modelling, the use of sign language, and a friendly debate around snack time. Hear our insights on how snack time can be utilised as a tool for building maths skills, especially for children with SEN. We promise you, it's not just about the snacks! As we wrap up, you'll get a sneak peek into our next chapter focused on mindful moments. So, tune in and let's get routine-wise together.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:09

Hello and welcome to the earlier staff meeting podcast with Sarah Keelian Steff, a place where you can listen, learn and laugh with us about all things early years. Hello, hello, you sound very sexy, sarah.

Speaker 2 0:27

I am very sexy this week, everybody, I have had laryngitis and I lost my voice for a while, which is why we haven't recorded for a little bit, and it's come back like a man. So, yes, I sound a bit like a teenage boy. So it might go in and out. Of. It might be a bit squeaky. It might be a bit squeaky, a bit low, but yes, we're just going with it.

Speaker 1 0:52

We are. So today we are going to start with our apologies and then our main agenda today is talking about routines, and we're going to start looking at routines because it's quite a big topic, so it will probably carry on to another episode. We were going to have some staff CPD, but we're going to put that on to the next episode as well. So we're going to finish with a mindful moment today.

Speaker 2 1:20

So we also have an apology, don't we? Because there's just two of us today. We're missing the staff.

Speaker 1 1:26

We are missing the staff.

Speaker 2 1:27

We're missing our Keely.

Speaker 1 1:30

We had a bit of scheduling issues, it's just been mad and it's just been a crazy time and we just couldn't find time for us all three to record together, but we really wanted to get an episode out because we know it hasn't been a few weeks.

Speaker 2 1:46

Yeah, and we've been promising for ages to do routines, so we want to make good on our word.

Speaker 1 1:53

So sorry, keely, we miss you and we look forward to seeing you in the next one, or you and you, in the next one.

Speaker 2 1:59

Yeah, okay, are we ready? Main agenda so today is, like we said, it's all about routines. So let's talk about why. Why do we have routines? Why do we need routines? Why do we not just wing it? Yeah, I mean, I feel like I do wing it.

Speaker 1 2:20

I do as well.

Speaker 2 2:21

The queen of wing sometimes, but there is always a round of routine, yeah.

Speaker 1 2:26

And yeah, absolutely Like. If you have the routine and you have it established, then the children know where they stand, the adults know where they stand Exactly, and it just helps with a range of things within your setting.

Speaker 2 2:47

It helps make everyone feel secure, doesn't it? Yeah, it takes away some of that anxiety and like mental overload as well. Yeah, so you know we've done tidy up time. Something new is going to come next. It might be that we go to lunch or we might have phonics. It's that transitioning. It helps children and adults to feel secure and stop mental overload, which is quite easily done in the early years.

Speaker 1 3:15

I mean talk about mental overload. We've got that end of half term this week, haven't? We Because it's just been. We've just had everything that we've had Parents' evening, we've had appraisals, people progress meetings, we had our subject leader reports or milestones or something Parents coming in and out for visiting?

Speaker 2 3:35

Yes, oh, my goodness.

Speaker 1 3:38

So, yeah, if it wasn't for our routine, I guess you know, from our point of view, it takes away the unknown, doesn't it? Yeah, and so you've got your routines in place and, as an adult, that helps. So for the children, it's taking away the unknown and helping them to just feel safe and secure until they know what's coming next.

Speaker 2 4:00

I think, just as humans, just as that's part of our nature is to have a routine and actually I've known that sometimes I'll say something and the children will finish off my sentences because they say the same thing at the same time every day.

Speaker 1 4:13

I haven't even realised it, but that is just we're creatures of habit we are and anything that throws us from our routine. Yeah, it's really. It does like things like the clock, when the clocks go back, oh, I hate that.

Speaker 2 4:25

Or when you have my children never sleep for ages, or even a bank holiday.

Speaker 1 4:29

What, Even the bank holiday? You think, great, it's a four-day week, but it actually makes it worse because you're out of your usual routine. Yeah, so we are, yeah, and today we've had a day in school, haven't we? That's been out of our routine.

Speaker 2 4:43

Yeah, we've had school photos. That's been amazingly stressful.

Speaker 1 4:46

So fun to be organised in, especially in nursery, where you have children that don't always attend. So you have to invite them in and then you have to match them up with their sibling to make sure they get the sibling photo. Parents asking me to make sure their hair is still nice. I'm like I'll try my absolute best to make sure you know they've got their hair parted in the right place. But yeah, so yeah, today's been a fine example of why it's really important.

Speaker 2 5:15

And stick to routines and it's knowing when we have days like this. I've had to strip things back a little bit and yeah, and not do so much cognitive load on the children and adults, because I didn't think I could take much more today.

Speaker 2 5:29

Yeah, OK, so that is the why. So how? How do we create routines within our settings? And we all do it, and sometimes you have probably created one without even knowing that you have. So we have a big talk about routines, don't we? At the beginning of the year? Yeah, we have sort of a think about what worked well last year. Think about the year group that's coming in. What are their needs? What do we need to put in place for them? And it's just looking at your timetable and thinking when's a good place to have phonics, When's a good place to have snack, When's a good place to open the door to have free flow play. And that is a staff thing you need to have together as a team.

Speaker 1 6:21

Yeah, and it's got to work, hasn't it for? Your setting and also the expectations within your setting. I think we're very fortunate that we are allowed to spend a lot of majority of our day in free flow in our setting, and I know that it's not always the case, having been to other settings, worked in other settings. It's not always the case. It can be a lot more broken up, but then what you're missing out on is that extended play.

Speaker 2 6:53

Yeah, we're quite precious over that and we do sort of put a fence around it all the time. But sometimes things do eat into it, and sometimes they have to for whatever reason, and it's about having a conversation with staff and the children. Actually, today, this is going to be a bit different or we're going to start doing this from now on. So, again, that's about prepping, isn't it?

Routines and Transitions in Early Childhood

Speaker 1 7:16

Yeah, and it's that pre-warning, isn't it? If you know well, tomorrow is going to be a little bit different, because can you just preempt that for the children, so it makes it that little bit easier for them. Yeah, so the way that we've kind of worked, our sort of daily routine, is, when the children come in, not so much in nursery at the moment, but in reception, you'll deliver some sort of input.

Speaker 2 7:48

Yeah, so after they've settled in, which is about getting all that niggling the children coming in, parents having a chat to you at the door yeah, once that's over and everyone's calm, we go into have carpet time, that's what we call it, and that's where we deliver a skills-based 10, 15 minutes where we'll teach them a skill that's linked to something in the provision, or maybe it's a knowledge-based skill that they need, and they're all mapped out, so, yeah, so we know where we are with that. Again, that's part of the routines. Is being organised as well, yeah, and then it's into free flow.

Speaker 1 8:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2 8:28

Because open what's your very beginnings like.

Speaker 1 8:33

Well, at the moment in nursery we have more of a sort of a soft start to the day, so the children just come in and straight away they'll get involved in play.

Speaker 1 8:44

However, I have been experimenting a little bit. We've just stopping them just before we do, because what was happening was we were sort of closing the doors and sometimes the children have already been in the classroom for a little while and it's almost like you just need that reset of you know, this is the school day now and we need to like remember our rules, especially when we're trying so hard to reinforce all those basics in nursery. So we have been I have been experimenting this week, just stopping them for five minutes. They tied you when they come on the carpet for five minutes, just so I can remind them of just all those basics. And then what that eventually will lead to is the same is the skills is, a skills teaching, but at the moment, yeah, it's sort of limited to what we're doing in the carpet. And then we are on to free flow again. So the doors open and the children have free flow of indoors and outdoors and, yeah, we are like that for about.

Speaker 1 9:46

I want to say an hour and 45 minutes maybe two hours I think it is closer to two hours in your cherry, we don't you go in a little bit before us?

Speaker 2 9:55

don't you? Yeah, because we have to fit in phonics. So we go in, for I think it's 15 minutes before you.

Speaker 2 10:01

So it's a like again, an hour and 45. And then we do phonics, for at the minute it's about five, seven minutes, but we build up to about 15, 20 minutes, depends how, I mean on the children's concentration. But and then we do what we call get ready for lunch, and that is a very hectic. I'd say it's probably the worst transition time of the whole day because you've got children on the carpet waiting to go to the toilet to wash their hands, which obviously is incredibly important, but it's, that is. There's about 10, 15 minutes of holding time where you might be doing an activity, you might be singing, you might be reading a story. Sometimes we just put on good old CVs bedtime stories.

Speaker 1 10:49

It depends on the staffing. I think, yeah, it is a tricky time of the day. I was going to say probably home times yeah equally. I've always struggled with the home time routine. I've never nailed it, but yeah, that is a tricky time of the day and the children start to get a little bit hangry at that time as well.

Speaker 2 11:06

They do. They know you're washing your hands for a reason it's food and that's. They get really agitated because they just can't wait. And same with stuff.

Speaker 1 11:17

Yeah, they just wait for their break.

Speaker 2 11:19

They are yeah, so that is a very tricky transition time. And then when they get in the hall it starts off okay, and then the noise levels get a bit louder. Have their lunch, they finish eating after about 15 minutes, they walk it down and then they're back out outside playing and we repeat that whole routine again, except after lunch they come in and do some math skills for 10, 15 minutes Free flow, tidy up, end of day. So yeah, it's very repetitive.

Speaker 1 11:54

And it's safety in that repetitiveness in there for the children. I mean, we're very similar in nursery, the only difference being that we don't go into the hall for our lunch. So we have our lunch, the children bring back lunches in our nursery and it's actually because the staff as I've sort of said before they're really established off. They've been here for years and they just have everything nailed like they have it under control. So it's literally amazing because it's the classroom gets changed into lunch club and the tables get wheeled out, and it's amazing.

Speaker 1 12:28

So for me, that lunchtime routine is actually easier because the children just go and wash their hands and they come and sit down and have their lunch straight away. So there's no sort of waiting around or anything. And yet then we'll go into. Once they finish their lunch they go and play again and the whole thing starts again. But what I'm really struggling with with my nursery children is just that end of the day. I find that really hard because they've got to gather up all their bits and they just find that so hard?

Speaker 2 12:58

Do you have them all on your little carpet?

Speaker 1 13:00

Yeah, most of the children are on the carpet and it is meant to be like a story or singing time, but sometimes we just have to put something on the screen just to hold them, while we can then individually say, right, you need to go and get all your things, because they're still learning that routine of I've got to go and get my coat, I've got to go and get my bag, I've got to go and check my drawer. And it's just repeating that every day and I know by Christmas they'll have nailed it. But it is just that you've got to keep at it. You've got to keep trying, keep persevering, don't give up because it feels like chaos.

Speaker 1 13:37

now there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Speaker 2 13:42

So I think, how we implement those routines because it doesn't always, like you said, there is light at the end of the tunnel it will get better if you persist and are consistent. That is also very key, the consistency. But we do have the good old visual timetables. Yeah, absolutely, and that is. I know that they are wheeled out quite a lot and sometimes they don't always work. But for general routines, to have them on large scale at the front of your class where you mainly sit and gather together, is very important. That children can see those, especially if they have language skills that are not quite developed or their listening attention is not so great. They can just look and they instantly know where we are. And we have them on Velcro, don't we like?

Speaker 1 14:33

you're supposed to. You have to move around and change it as you need to. And yeah, I mean I use that a lot with my nursery children, who are just getting used to separating some of them from their parents. They don't know when it's home time, so it's just showing them look, we've got a little bit more play, Then we'll sit on the carpet.

Speaker 2 14:52

Yeah, and they can sort of count the cards. How many cards?

Speaker 1 14:55

there are until Mummy comes or Daddy comes. Yeah, so it is really important, and something else we've done as a key stage is to be consistent with those symbols. So now every classroom has the same images and they're doing key stage one and beyond as well. We have slightly different ones because our session names are different, but it is important because then, whatever class they go in, especially if they're free flowing.

Speaker 2 15:22

They've got that visual cue. Another thing that I know that you love to do is singing. I do like a little bit of singing. You love a welcome song, don't? You, I do, I won't make you sing it, but we do that and we do a goodbye song as well because it's that welcoming children in, it's the saying goodbye, which some children do find really difficult, those goodbyes, and it's just rounding up that session and saying goodbye yeah, so it's just doing those as long as you remember to do them.

Speaker 2 15:55

But if you do them enough, I get children going you haven't done the goodbye song and I go right ready really quickly three, two, one go.

Speaker 1 16:02

So they, once they learn the routine they sort of keep you on check and it's like in the morning, having that routine of like you know we're going to sing this song and then we're going to do you know the calendar, we're going to look at the calendar and we're going to talk about what the weather is like, and then we're going to look at our visual timetable and then we're going to do, look at our self registration or whatever it is. So you have the same, the same steps every day and it can, you know. It can vary, it can go from a tangent, that's fine, but it's just. It's just that security for the children, like you say, it's just taking away that cognitive overload, because they are, they are used to that so they can actually focus on the content.

Speaker 2 16:44

I think that I've started this year, which I have done it in previous years, but I've made more of. It is a month to view calendar.

Speaker 1 16:51

Yeah.

Speaker 2 16:51

I've seen those and crossing out.

Speaker 2 16:54

the days were not here, so half terms and weekends, and then we've created symbols in class as a group. We've decided, because I have staff coming in and out on different days, am I the student when she's in, when she's not? And so we we've created those as a class and I've drawn those on the calendar so that children know who's in and who's out. Today I had to put a picture of a camera because we had school photos, but they knew that was coming because we've done that a month to view.

Speaker 1 17:24

I think I'm going to do that in nursery. I do think I've seen you, I've seen it up in your classroom and it's also really good for maths. Amazing for math the time and it is yeah.

Speaker 2 17:36

I would say it's. It's actually better than doing my. I do have a calendar that says what day is it today. What day is it? It's kind of meaningless to them. But the symbols are not, because they've created those symbols. So I just have a smiley face with the first letter of someone's name and that's when who's in.

Speaker 1 17:52

And I saw that and I did wonder what it meant.

Speaker 2 17:54

Yeah, the children. It means makes sense, yeah, and that's the main thing. But again, people can ask those questions and that's all about you. Know, I'm definitely going to, you're going to magpie it.

Speaker 1 18:05

I'm going to magpie that.

Speaker 2 18:08

Yeah, so, oh, staff modelling. So this is really important. We, we use a lot of sign language, don't we? Yes, and we use, we make sure that our staff are using sign language and the sign for next is we use that a lot for routine, so children might get really upset and we'll say next, and we'll do the sign this is coming up. And actually that's really because the, the pet, the staff, have modelled it so much. The children are now using it. Yeah, they're now using it. That you know that sign for next is a great deal to those children. It's comforting. They know what's going to come next for our children with SEN. They that is really powerful to them. So I would definitely advise start learning sign language, bsl. Some councils have their own specialised form of sign language that have been created. You can buy schemes, all sorts, macaton, just. I would say that's been quite revolutionary just for many things, not just routines, but yes, Sign language.

Speaker 1 19:16

It's another podcast. It is definitely another podcast. One thing we sort of didn't mention was about snack time, the whole debate Every year snack time.

Speaker 2 19:28

Wow, the amount of I would like to call them arguments professional discussions Snack is very difficult.

Speaker 1 19:39

It's a contentious issue, isn't it? It is, that is a word.

Speaker 2 19:43

And the new guidelines have made it quite clear that children should be sitting down. Children should be within Supervised.

Speaker 2 19:50

Supervised within adults. Ear shots it's yeah, at the moment we do a rolling snack. So what that means is snack is out in a special area in all the classrooms. Children come get their own snack and, hopefully, tidy it away. Mm-hmm, we're still working on that, but yeah, so that is a rolling snack. Now I can remember in the part in the in the distant past we had 10 o'clock of snack time. We had to stop what we were doing down. Tools come together, do like a circle. Time, which was actually, in hindsight, did develop a lot of talk and a lot of speech for children. Yeah, there's definitely pros and cons. There is. It's very difficult.

Speaker 1 20:36

It's having the rolling snack, it still allows for that social side. It does, and it does develop their social skills and their independence and their autonomy of if I'm actually hungry. Do I want my snack now or do I want it at the end of the day, whatever? And I used to have a little bunch of children that every day. That would be the first thing they did last year and it was comforting to say, to know, and it was just lovely because they'd have so much.

Speaker 1 21:05

they'd have a lovely chat at the table, and that was what they did every day. They just thought of coming and had their snack straight away. That's a lovely way to start your day, isn't?

Speaker 2 21:13

it yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 21:15

But it's always a big debate because I think some settings, especially when you have younger children as well, would find the managing of it. So it's supervising the children, but also ensuring that children with allergies and not us, being safely exposed to the right things. I can see why a lot of settings don't go down the rolling sack route, but for us it works.

Speaker 2 21:46

It does. It depends on the cohort. I'd say Sometimes it's been trickier to implement it. It's taken a lot longer to get that routine of snack. It depends on the cohort, but it has always panned out and everyone's always been fed and watered and they've stayed safe.

Speaker 1 22:03

So it has worked. Yeah, and you know it's that you get so many opportunities in the snack time as well for maths again like it's another one of those routines. There's so many routines that are really good for building maths in the classroom.

Speaker 2 22:20

It's like routine within a routine like choosing time and then having snack within. That is another routine.

Speaker 1 22:25

Yeah, it is, it is very metal Okay.

Speaker 2 22:35

So next, so moving on from that next week, we will go into sort of more specific areas of routines. Yeah but moving on, now we will be having, is it?

Speaker 1 22:50

mindful moment. Well, it is because it was meant to be.

Speaker 2 22:53

We were meant to be hearing all about Keely's sound bath, which I just say it flashed up on my phone that Jim Carey went to a sound bath at the weekend and all these people were taking pictures of him because he was like randomly in England doing a sound bath. Oh my god, imagine if it was Keely. I don't think it was. I think she'd done hers previous, but I just thought, oh the celebs are definitely on it.

Speaker 1 23:20

You heard it here first. That was an earlier staff meeting exclusive.

Speaker 2 23:27

Jim Carey loves the sound bath and I still don't know what it is.

Speaker 1 23:31

No but yeah, so we'll just have to wait for that. Yeah, a bit of CPD from Keely next podcast. So we are just going to do the mindful moment today, and today we're going to talk about our guilty pleasures, guilty pleasures.

Speaker 2 23:46

Yeah, I think, as teachers, we all need a guilty pleasure.

Speaker 1 23:50

Yeah, like a relax. I'm thinking like what's your relaxation, guilty pleasure, like what is it you do just to switch off? Yeah, something we need to clarify that about pleasure I mean yeah, we're not making any like judgments about people's nice styles here or preferences, it's just, you know, we're thinking of it on a much more wholesome. What do you do to switch off on a week like this week where you just when you get home and you have nothing left to give?

Speaker 2 24:21

I remember it needs to try and be healthy. So hitting the bottle of wine, as much as that sounds lovely, yeah, think about how many times you're hitting that bottle of wine. Is that being healthy? Is that healthy choices? So do you want to start?

Speaker 1 24:36

Well, I have. I don't know if this is healthy, though it's very unhealthy but I get a little bit addicted to games like on my phone, like silly, or a healthier way of doing it would be to be like doing cross well, like crossword puzzles and things like that. But I get addicted to these silly games and then what happens is I download them, I get addicted to them and then I realise I'm addicted to them, so then I have to delete them. I have to cull them from my life, really. Yeah, so I've got one at the moment that I've downloaded and I know it's on borrowed time because I'm too invested in this game. I keep playing it and I'm just wasting it. You're pretty free, it's like free, but if something's free, you're the, you're the consumer, aren't you.

Speaker 1 25:25

Yeah, you're what's being bought. So it's like they're trying to get you to pay like 99p to get extra lives and things like that.

Speaker 2 25:32

Get the adverts taking off To get an arm to get a life and yeah.

Speaker 1 25:37

So I do realise it's like it's not particularly a healthy guilty pleasure, but I just feel that sometimes it's just completely mind zapping and sometimes that's what you need.

Speaker 2 25:48

It's actually mindfulness, because you're in that moment and you're only thinking about the next go or the next play of that game. You're not thinking about anything else around you. I will call it mindfulness. But it is what it is whether it's healthy or not. It depends how much? Screen time you're having Exactly, and what's your guilty pleasure then I?

Speaker 1 26:08

am actually really embarrassed about this.

Speaker 2 26:11

It's healthy. It's not healthy at all. I, I absolutely love watching the Kardashians and this is a recent thing. So I don't watch Love Island, I don't watch Big Brother. I don't watch any reality TV other than the Kardashians. That's on Disney, yeah yeah. So the newer ones, not any of the old stuff, only this since it started.

Speaker 1 26:37

Not keeping up with the Kardashians.

Speaker 2 26:39

Not keeping up. Just the Kardashians, and I have been absolutely hooked by it. My husband has caught me watching it and has been absolutely shocked at my behavior. But I also have another guilty pleasure is because I absolutely am in love with Travis Barker. Is that the reason you watch it? I think it was the hook, it was the draw into it, because I used to. I still do love Blingwony too, but that was the the draw for me and I've absolutely got. Now you're invested in it. I'm absolutely invested. And it's happening every Thursday. New episode drops Wednesday.

Speaker 1 27:17

Oh, it's a little Thursday tree, so I'm just like so.

Speaker 2 27:19

After parents' evening tomorrow I'll be thinking, oh god, I just need to watch the. Kardashians. I cannot believe it's coming out of my mouth, but it is I know, I mean, it surprises me really Exactly. I know I know I could be doing something really wholesome like crocheting, or. But you do all that anyway, don't?

Speaker 1 27:39

you.

Speaker 2 27:39

I do, but this is my guilty pleasure.

Speaker 1 27:41

Well, we've earned it. We've earned it this half-term, this half-term definitely has been very hard yeah. Always a hard half-term. We've made it, we have.

Speaker 2 27:51

We've made it your first half-term in this week. I know, I know it's amazing. You survived, I have.

Speaker 1 28:01

And yeah, season two of the podcast will see us two.

Speaker 2 28:06

I know we're rolling with it so yeah, so next time we'll be delving in deeper into routines and giving some more advice on certain aspects of routines. But yeah, hopefully we'll have our lovely Keely back. Yeah, hopefully, hopefully, because we missed her. So send in love to your Kiehl's.

Speaker 1 28:27

Yeah, hope you listen. I wonder if she even listens. I wonder if she'll listen. I don't know if she'll listen.

Speaker 2 28:32

She might not. She might not.

Speaker 1 28:33

I'd love to test her.

Speaker 2 28:36

I'd say something All right, then All right, don't forget I didn't say this last time but please, please, please. We're trying to get our you know our algorithm yeah up. So we're trying to get more people to engage with our content. So please, please, please, go to find us on, you know our Instagram page. The earliest staff meeting just type that in, we will be there. We need to get on to doing some more posts.

Speaker 1 29:09

Yeah, I think we are going to start producing a bit more material and ideas and things and, yeah, actually some photos and things about.

Speaker 2 29:18

That would be really helpful for people. Yeah, but yeah, we really I would love to be able to, you know, use your views and say, oh, actually, this person, anonymously has said this yeah, let's talk about that. I'd love to be able to do that.

Speaker 1 29:34

So, please, listeners, please yeah, if you've got anything you want to bring to the staff meeting, yeah, we'd love to be able to do that by 8am on Wednesday, and then we'll be able to include it.

Speaker 2 29:46

We would absolutely love that. So, yeah, please head on down to Instagram and yeah, and also like our podcast, because we've had a lot of listeners recently. We've had quite a few likes, but, yeah, keep it up. That just really helps us.

Speaker 1 29:58

It means the world to me it does mean the world.

Speaker 2 30:01

Yeah, okay, right, we'll see you soon. Yeah, take care, I hope you won't sound so sexy.

Speaker 1 30:07

Well, maybe some people will be back in the next leg.

Speaker 2 30:10

It's a pleasure, all right, see you later. Bye.