Help for new lead educator

[BlueBird3]

I’m a new lead educator and the previous leader left. I have other staff in my room, they’re a mixture of Diplomas, studying Diploma and Cert III. Can the learning stories and observations shared amongst the team or does the lead Ed take on everything: programming, planning activities, learning stories?

[Lorina]

Well first off al congratulations on your new position!

In regards to documentation, programming and planning delegate and share the load! You will be pulling your hair out if you have to do it all by yourself and it's not necessary to take on such a massive amount of responsibility by doing everything yourself.

Break up the children amongst your team, so everyone gets an even amount and they are responsible for those children. So, for example Jessica is responsible for group a consisting of Ben, Laura, Chad and Mary etc. The amount of children each educator gets depends on the overall amount of children and then you divide them up. So, Educator Jessica will be responsible for her group a children for the month where she will need to do observations, learning stories, follow ups etc.

Now as lead educator you are still responsible so you will need to oversee the documentation created by the other Educators in the room. It's always good to know what's being observed by other Educators etc. So, once they complete you read over them and then you need to add the follow up experience onto the program of when it will take place.

When I was lead educator I also use to have a blank program for the next week available where I will directly fill in follow up experiences from observations, or from daily reflections or any interests that emerge that couldn't be carried out that week itself. So, by Friday, my program for the following week was already full.

It's also good to have a quick chat with the team about the days experiences or any reminders notes etc that you need to pass on. I would recommend getting a diary or communication book to write messages to one another. During the day it gets so busy, it's easy to forget so if it's written down you could always reread what needs to be done.

Get the team involved in the programming, ask them about any interests they have observed, experiences they want to implement, or any intentional teaching they want to engage the children in such as teaching children a song in a different language for example, or doing afternoon yoga with the children.

Even though you are the lead educator it's important to get the Educators involved in the overall running of the room and give them an opportunity in what they want to do.

Also if you don't already have a cleaning roster for the room and change it weekly.

Well hopefully this gives you some tips!

Let me know if you need anything I'm here to support you!

,
Lorina

[BlueBird3]

Hi Lorena,

Apologies for the really late reply thank you for getting back to me, I did have a chat to the staff and also my manager and they’re on board with it. learning stories, Obs, and programming.

[Lorina]

Oh that's fantastic! That will really help you in managing all your documentation.

,
Lorina

[Neetasha]

Hi Lorima,

Can you prove this article? I just been nominated as an eduactional leader in a new centre and i ask that all eduactors be invloved in having their group of children but after month of practice my boss want only room leader to do the learning stories

[Lorina]

Hi Lorima,

Can you prove this article? I just been nominated as an eduactional leader in a new centre and i ask that all eduactors be invloved in having their group of children but after month of practice my boss want only room leader to do the learning stories

In the NQS when talking about documentation and planning, it mentions only Educators, it doesn't specify Assistants or Room leaders, however as a Room Leader it is your responsibility to complete documentation. However, I am a firm believer that all Educators (assistants included) should contribute to children's documentation. This is because what you observe and interpret from a child will be completely different from what another Educator may observe which provides a holistic approach in observing children and further their learning.


The best way to approach this is to explain to your Director the benefits of having all educators complete learning stories such as an opportunity to collaborate with other Educators to complete documentation, Educators will understand the aspects of learning for individual children and group of children, all educators can make decisions based on the best learning outcomes for children while working together.

Is there a reason why your Director has decided that only room leaders are to complete learning stories?

What was the reason? You need to understand why your director came up with this decision and come up with a solution for it.

Let me know.

,
Lorina