And again, part of the difficulty you play because it’s freedom, the difficult the adult, the adult world has with play is that they haven’t set it up and they haven’t controlled it. So they worry about what’s going to happen. Um, and that’s perfectly natural. Um, and sometimes it can feel, it can seem like you don’t know what’s going on, but the children do because it’s their play. Discover just what it is that children need from education and why it’s so important for Early Years practice to echo upwards throughout their school journey. The food out of the high chair, they wouldn’t know where it goes and they look down, they don’t look up, they look down, they’re learning through their cure. They’re learning about gravity in a very, very simple baby brain. Yeah. That’s what they’re doing. And so, you know, ultimately the question is, is when does it end, you know, my, my son’s now and my daughter’s 18, so she’s finished her, she’s done with the secretary education, but now my son’s 14 and he’s at an amazing school that actually really do encourage them to be curious.

Yeah. But the idea being is if you’re doing that, you’re stopping other children from learning. And it’s about trying to show children that the recognizing their value of their play. Because the adult world often talks about you work and then you play, when they go through school, you have a lesson and then you get your playtime. Educators around the world are discovering just how effective Play Projects can be and when linked with the Message Centre and Drawing Club, they can be extraordinary as a vehicle for skills teaching and play.

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Um, they take away our creativity. I greatly believe that children are born mathematical. And, uh, the system, because it is a system, um, takes that away from us. And I’ve, I’ve said, you know, and I think, you know, if you’ve got your own children, most parents would see that our experiences, our own experiences of school. And if you’ve watched play school TV, you’ll have met some of them along the way. Um, there are certain characters that live on adventure Island. And so it goes from NASA, the children then go on an adventure when they go outside. And there’s a whole host of imaginary characters. It’s a little bit like the bridge to Terabithia if you’ve ever read that or, or watch the film.

Pooky Knightsmith:Isn’t that just kind of hiding, learning in play if there’s numbers along the way. And it’s There’s lots of project work that goes on and it’s not just do dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. And then one of the most, you know, the second top performing school in Devin, out of all of the schools, private and independent, they’re a state school. And they’re led by a head teacher that gets children. It’s cool to be who you are.I thought that’s what was parenting, but ultimately I needed to listen to him. And it’s that idea of listening to children, which then created the play pro this idea of played projects, finding out what they didn’t understand or didn’t understand, and then create the framework to put over the top of play so that children can see the breakdown of it. Um, and that, that they have, um, sort of education system that really values children. And it was a real eye-opener when I went to kind of consult sort of, um, uh, coming sided with the birth of my, my daughter. And, um, I just slowly began to see that children had something about them, that they were magic. Um, and I hope every parent believes that children are magic and I would also hope every educator believes children are magic.

The message centre enables our children to explore the joy of messaging, an approach to sprinkling extra joy over the top of their day, showing them how reading, writing and mathematics can be hidden in and around their room and outdoors too. Our children love hiding and finding – think pass the parcel, birthday presents, egg hunts and hide and seek. There is a buzz to be had, and it is this buzz that the Message Centre approach has at its heart. Pooky Knightsmith:And so am I understanding correctly then that you kind of feel that this is something that we’re born kind of able to do, but we kind of unlearn it over time? And also, you know, the richness of their plays far better. But then I do a bit of not play a bit like coming to a base camp. And saying on the adventure, right? This, this next bit, we’re going to need these skills. And I talk about tight teat. So that’s like a tight teach of not play and then into open play.

They’re the moments where I call them to me to teach them a particular skill that I know that play can’t quite do. As in, if I’m going to teach phonics, for example, I wouldn’t necessarily just stand in the middle of the room showing, you know, 30 children flashcards, cause they, they’re not going to look.

Greg Bottrill:Yeah. But that’s, but that’s it, it’s huge. It’s, it’s, it’s a really big way of it takes, it takes faith in children massively. Discover how to create a culture in which children want to write, where maths is embraced and reading is a natural part of daily life. The Message Centre has huge potential and its magic is waiting for you... Based on the magic of Adventure Island, Happy Talk is an immersion in wonder, make-believe and the joy of words and sounds. It has been created with the support of a wealth of early childhood educators in my Joy Sessions Patreon group, who have trialled ideas and helped me create something that we believe has real joy at its heart. Um, you know, to me, in a reading again, like reading, I mean, what a gift that is to give to children to be, you know, if we looked at your bookcase now and we’d say, Oh, you know, we went to the orange shelf and we opened up the book and we could take something that someone has taken out of their brain and put on a piece of paper, what a gift to give children.Greg Bottrill:Um, yeah, they can be. I mean, I’m just thinking about children and actually my own son. Um, so we’re testing children, generally speaking. Now I recognized, you know, there’s, there was a, I don’t want to be too kind of like judge, but, um, they can find it quite hard to play in terms of imagination. Um, it can be quite limited. I think also it works as a title for adults. Many Early Years educators know the value of play but are constricted by schools in particular, so it could equally be their voice too. Greg Bottrill:w tell me more. So the idea was you create a landscape of the imagination with the children. So three thinking, talking, making, building it’s, it’s all my beliefs to begin with. You just tell the children that adventure Island has popped up outside. Not kind of, if you will, for, can you imagine how exciting it is to know that adventure islands popped up?