Children's Research Centre webinar: Empowering children - A framework for observation and reflection

Launching the Empowerment Framework - a tool to assess the impact of empowerment in children's learning and development.

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If you are interested in how you can identify children’s empowering behaviours and how this can support their learning and development then this webinar is for you!

In partnership with Interactive Learning Diary, we are pleased to launch the Empowerment Framework on their digital platform.

'The Empowerment Framework' was created by Dr Natalie Canning, The Open University and was based on her research in Early Childhood contexts. It can be used as the basis for observing children’s play and activities. Using examples of play and analysing them against the framework, this session will support reflective thinking to understand children’s actions and interactions through an empowerment focus.

The Empowerment Framework is important because often play is overlooked as something done between activities. Play affords children opportunities to be themselves, explore and discover, create and be curious. When children have a choice in what they do and how they do it, they demonstrate their interests and how they like to learn and develop. The empowerment framework is a positive way to look for indicators of learning and helps plan and understand children better.

Through this session in partnership with Interactive Learning Diary, Natalie Canning from The Open University will focus on the following questions:

• Why is focusing on empowerment important?

• What impact can empowerment have on children’s learning and development?

• How can practice develop to observe children from an empowerment perspective?

• How can empowering behaviours be recorded?

The speakers

Dr Natalie Canning is Co-Director of the Children’s Research Centre at the Open University, Professional Doctorate lead for Childhood and Youth and a Senior Lecturer in Early Childhood. Her research centres on children’s empowerment, supporting children to explore personal, social and emotional development through play. She has published in the areas of professional development, children’s play and creative spaces and taught across Early Childhood undergraduate and postgraduate programmes.