Latest / ChildCare Conversations / 372: You Can’t Have a Yes Without a Why With Carla Ward

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372: You Can’t Have a Yes Without a Why With Carla Ward · ChildCare Conversations

• 0:00
  Childcare Conversations: Welcome to Childcare Conversations, the podcast where early childhood leaders like you get real-world strategies, honest talk, and a whole lot of support.
• 0:10
  Childcare Conversations: Whether you're running one center or many, we're here to help you lead with confidence and clarity.
• 0:17
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• 0:25
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• 0:37
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• 0:41
  Childcare Conversations: Now, let's get into today's conversation.
• 0:44
  Childcare Conversations: One we think you're really going to love.
• 0:48
  Kate Woodward Young: Welcome back to today's conversation, and I am so excited because today's co-host is Carla Ward, all the way from Ontario, Canada.
• 0:57
  Kate Woodward Young: Um, and that's kind of like the roundabout how she got here.
• 1:00
  Kate Woodward Young: Uh, definitely not a straight shot.
• 1:03
  Kate Woodward Young: So as a let's see, what am I?
• 1:07
  Kate Woodward Young: I'm a Canadian now by parent birth.
• 1:10
  Kate Woodward Young: I don't know.
• 1:11
  Kate Woodward Young: I was not born in Canada, but my father was, and he was still Canadian when I was born.
• 1:15
  Kate Woodward Young: So I was teasing Carla that the next time I come to see her, I'm actually going to travel on my Canadian passport because I can.
• 1:21
  Kate Woodward Young: And so with that, Carla's coming all the way to your podcast player of choice, uh, born in South Africa until middle school, really, right?
• 1:35
  Kate Woodward Young: So until uh secondary school, and moved to Canada and now has her own ECE podcast and all kinds of ECE businesses, uh, loves to support that industry.
• 1:46
  Kate Woodward Young: So today, Carla, tell everybody how you found yourself in early childhood, why you've stayed in early childhood, and why you are so passionate about supporting educators in any role they want to take in early childhood.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, Kate, thank you so much.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, thanks for having me on today.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: I like to joke that I live, breathe, and bleed early childhood education.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_01: I literally, other than being a Starbucks barista, I don't know what else I would do.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: And the only reason I'd be a Starbucks barista is because they get to drink coffee.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: And if I can make a living out of that, why not?
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I found early childhood, I mean, like I said, it was the only thing I was meant to do.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: I started teaching Sunday school in the ninth grade every Sunday.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: I started working with the littles two-year-olds, did that all through high school.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: Then I taught brownies, then I taught girl guides, then I taught youth group.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so when the time came to choose a path for post-secondary, EC was the only option, or being a minister according to my grade 10, like high school guide thing, um, where we took a quiz.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, ministry was not my path of choice.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: So early childhood education, it is.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: I left, I started at 17, went to college, graduated at 19, got a job right out of college as a before and after school teacher.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I've been an early childhood ever since.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: And now what I do is straw strat, let's try that again.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: I now straddle two worlds of early childhood is one working with educators in the classroom, and one working with educators who want to become entrepreneurs but staying in early childhood and want to give back into the field.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: So that is what I do.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: My podcast is the Everything EC podcast, and coming soon will be the ECE to the ECE to CEO podcast.
• 3:32
  Kate Woodward Young: And that was me in a nutshell.
• 3:35
  Kate Woodward Young: I love that.
• 3:36
  Kate Woodward Young: And every time we have a conversation, I'm like, boy, can our lives parallel every ever anymore?
• 3:42
  Kate Woodward Young: And I say that even when I hear you, like I'll see things on your socials, which by the way, all of Carla's contact information and socials are all in today's show notes.
• 3:50
  Kate Woodward Young: So please go connect with Carla.
• 3:53
  Kate Woodward Young: Go follow her podcast.
• 3:54
  Kate Woodward Young: Um, she's had some great guests.
• 3:56
  Kate Woodward Young: Like, chances are, if you've heard them on mine, you've probably heard them or can go hear more of them on Carla's.
• 4:03
  Kate Woodward Young: And so that's always very, very exciting for me.
• 4:06
  Kate Woodward Young: And, you know, knowing, because you know, um my grandmother was a 1913 girl guide.
• 4:14
  Kate Woodward Young: And so um Canadian girl guide.
• 4:17
  Kate Woodward Young: And so, you know, gotta gotta throw in that little the little blue Canadian girl guide uniform because mine was never blue.
• 4:24
  Kate Woodward Young: All kinds of shades of green, all kinds of shades of green.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: Mine was blue.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: That's so funny.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: Mine was blue in South Africa, and it was blue when I got to Canada.
• 4:33
  Kate Woodward Young: Yeah, so most girl guide uniforms are.
• 4:35
  Kate Woodward Young: So the girl guides I knew from Kenya, from Iceland, um, and from other parts of the globe.
• 4:40
  Kate Woodward Young: The Girl Guide uniforms are traditionally blue.
• 4:43
  Kate Woodward Young: Uh, Girl Scouts for whatever Girl Scouts of the USA, we've always had some obnoxious shade of green um in most of our uniform colors.
• 4:52
  Kate Woodward Young: Brownies were brown.
• 4:54
  Kate Woodward Young: Yeah.
• 4:54
  Kate Woodward Young: And that's pretty universal across the globe.
• 4:56
  Kate Woodward Young: Um, I don't know why the rest of it can't be universal.
• 5:00
  Kate Woodward Young: Um, our Mariner Scouts would be blue, and um, any of the flight aviation troops were usually blue.
• 5:07
  Kate Woodward Young: But if you were a traditional Girl Scout, you were in some, and again, that green has changed so many times, and it's usually some obnoxious color.
• 5:17
  Kate Woodward Young: So, anyway, totally a roundabout conversation, so not on today's agenda.
• 5:23
  Kate Woodward Young: But with that, one of the things that I love is that all of the directors and owners who are listening to today's podcast, you all have one thing in common, and that is that you have staff probably who are passionate about the industry, and we have an expert guest to help you today kind of figure out how to talk to your your teachers on how to continue to be their best.
• 5:51
  Kate Woodward Young: Is that a good way to kind of summarize our today's topic?
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna go with yes because that is my favorite word is yes.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: I always like to joke that yes is such a powerful word, and partially because if you think about, you know, books like Getting to Yes, Yes Man, like the entire premise or yes day uh with Jennifer Gardner, like those entire movies are basically mocks of just saying yes all the time because we say no so much.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: So we're gonna talk about yes spaces, but before we do that, I want to talk about why.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: And partially because it's something I discovered when I was director and supervisor of a center was we were trying to control the children so much that we were getting unnecessary behaviors.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: And part of it was it wasn't even necessarily trying to control the human beings themselves.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: We were trying to control how they played within their environment.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: So one of the first things I did when I started out as director was, and my staff lost their minds, but bless them, they trusted me, was I went and took all pre-designed materials out of their classrooms.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: So plastic farmhouses came out, plastic castles came out.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: And my rule of thumb is two weeks.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_01: If we're gonna try something, we have to try it for two weeks because it goes two ways.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: Either one, it goes beautifully week one because it's new and it's fancy, and then it absolutely falls apart the second week, or it's an absolute nightmare the first week, and you want to throw in the towel really easily, but then the second week it works out really well.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: And then the third option is, you know, it's beautiful and it all works out tickety-boo.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: So the rule of thumb was we're gonna take all the pre-designed um things out of our programs and we're gonna put in blocks.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna put in, you know, Amazon boxes, we're gonna put in blocks, we're gonna do all of that, and we're just gonna let children play.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: Those pre-designed things never made it back into their classrooms.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: And they and they were welcome to after two weeks, if they could give me a good reason as to why.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so we I started really learn leaning into this idea of giving children autonomy and agency within their programs.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: So what happened after I was director was our kindergarten teacher needed to leave for Matt Leave.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: And we had a unique class of children, we will say.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I adored these kids.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: Their teacher absolutely adored them.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: But her and I were very concerned that if we put another new staff member in there, they were gonna quit.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: We were worried that we were gonna land up with a revolving door of educators.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: We all know that game well.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so I made the decision that it was actually easier to replace me as director and put me back in kindergarten.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: So I went back into kindergarten and it was it was a nightmare.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: But it was only in 1990.
• 8:36
  Kate Woodward Young: You know that book, Everything I Ever Wanted to Know I Learned in Kindergarten?
• 8:39
  Kate Woodward Young: Yeah.
• 8:39
  Kate Woodward Young: Yeah.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still in, I'm still in a little bit of that happening.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: 100%.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so, because really quickly, I went in and I was trying to run the room like their teacher was running it because I was like, oh, but they need consistency.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I wasn't her and she wasn't me.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: So I always tell the story that I had my quitting letter in my car, and I was like, one day I'm just gonna walk out, I'm gonna fill in the date at the top of the letter, I'm gonna hand it in and I'm out.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then I went back to, you know, essentially what I was teaching my staff when I was director was stop trying to control other people.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_01: You can control two things, the environment and yourself.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_01: And so what I did was I leaned into saying yes.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: And if I couldn't say yes, I had to reflect on why.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: And is it a what I call a YP or an MP, a your problem or a my problem?
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: So if like if a child was climbing a shelf, obviously that's not safe.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a safety concern.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: So the question is that's a my problem, but why are they climbing the shelf?
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: What are they trying to tell me?
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: And how do I turn that no, which is a safety concern, into a yes?
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: So bringing in balance beams, bringing in gross motor activities, extending our outdoor play to meet that need.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: And when I can when I tell you best two teaching years of my entire life, because I leaned into yes and started giving children more autonomy and agency, and relinquished this need to control the children in my classroom and started paying more attention to my behavior, my role, and the environment that we were coexisting in.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: You know what?
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: I just double.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_01: I think that like that's all everybody needs.
• 10:27
  Kate Woodward Young: I'm just saying, put this on a rewind, on a loop.
• 10:31
  Kate Woodward Young: Like, I mean, I think that Carla just gave every director an owner who's listening, who has said this phrase at all in the last three years.
• 10:42
  Kate Woodward Young: The behavior of the kids is so different than it used to be.
• 10:46
  Kate Woodward Young: And we all come up with our reasons.
• 10:49
  Kate Woodward Young: Screen time, parents are disconnected, parents are hovering, parents aren't engaged, la la la la la la la la la.
• 10:56
  Kate Woodward Young: I I don't really care what your reason is, but I think that Carla just hit the real reason absolutely square on the head, as you know, as if we didn't know it, but sometimes we do.
• 11:09
  Kate Woodward Young: We need that mirror reflection, we need that aha moment of, oh, yeah.
• 11:13
  Kate Woodward Young: Kind of like you did, right?
• 11:15
  Kate Woodward Young: Like as a director, it's really easy to say this is what we need to do.
• 11:19
  Kate Woodward Young: But then when's the last time you were in the classroom?
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yes.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: It was it was eye-opening because I was, you know, I was two years as a director going in saying this is what we're gonna do.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_01: And then I found myself back in the classroom and I was like, oh no.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I actually forgot.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like you do, you do forget, right?
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: And listen, it can all be true.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_01: Parents can change, AI enters the picture, tech enters the picture, but at the end of the day, the children haven't changed as much as we actually think they have.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: Their environment has.
• 11:54
  Kate Woodward Young: But they haven't some parents have chosen for the environment to change, and some schools have chosen for those environments to change.
• 12:04
  Kate Woodward Young: But it hasn't been that it had to.
• 12:06
  Kate Woodward Young: And you know, it's so funny because you were saying about, you know, um, and you know, having been in the industry for multiple decades now, I remember this statement being a statement in the 80s, a statement in the 90s, 20, 20, 10, like all the like every 10 years, I hear something about, oh, the parents these days, the kids these days.
• 12:27
  Kate Woodward Young: My favorite are the staff these days.
• 12:30
  Kate Woodward Young: And I'm like going, okay, so now I've heard that every year for the last 40 years, or you know, every 10 years for the last 40.
• 12:37
  Kate Woodward Young: How can this continue to be?
• 12:39
  Kate Woodward Young: So it's because we also change, right?
• 12:42
  Kate Woodward Young: So if you think about what were you like when you were 19 in a classroom, what worked for you at 19 in a classroom isn't gonna work for you at 29 in a classroom.
• 12:52
  Kate Woodward Young: It's not gonna work for you 39 in a classroom.
• 12:55
  Kate Woodward Young: That isn't going to work for you now as an administrator, telling the 19-year-old what they should be doing in the classroom because well, some things have changed.
• 13:04
  Kate Woodward Young: Sometimes it's a more popular educational philosophy.
• 13:11
  Kate Woodward Young: Maybe it's an actual change in your own personal education philosophy.
• 13:15
  Kate Woodward Young: Do you have one?
• 13:17
  Kate Woodward Young: I mean, I know Carla does, and I know Carla has changed, right?
• 13:21
  Kate Woodward Young: Carla.
• 13:23
  Kate Woodward Young: Carla's educational philosophy at 19 has changed to what it is today.
• 13:28
  Kate Woodward Young: I know mine has.
• 13:29
  Kate Woodward Young: You know, and and some levels.
• 13:31
  Kate Woodward Young: I mean, I was a school age STEM instructor.
• 13:34
  Kate Woodward Young: Like that's where I started when I wasn't before after I had a home-based program.
• 13:39
  Kate Woodward Young: So I went from a home-based program to a multi-site school age STEM.
• 13:44
  Kate Woodward Young: Anyway.
• 13:45
  Kate Woodward Young: So, you know, so yes, technology has always been a thing in my world.
• 13:50
  Kate Woodward Young: And so it's been a thing in my world, ooh, over 26 years.
• 13:53
  Kate Woodward Young: I looked at the cat, I looked at the date and I went, oh, yeah.
• 13:55
  Kate Woodward Young: So 90, 98.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: But I will push back though, because yes, we've changed, but I also think one of the most dangerous things a director can say, a co-teacher can say, is, well, that's how we've always done it.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because listen, if it's working, truly working, then fine.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: But you have to actually be willing to hold up the mirror and ask yourself if it's truly working.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: Because nine times out of 10, it's not actually working.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's just working for you.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's not working for the children in your program, and it's not working for the new staff member who just went to college and learned all of this new information that will actually benefit you as a program.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: Now, I'm not saying that we as veterans don't have a lot to teach the new grad, but we mustn't underestimate how much the new grad has to teach us too.
• 14:46
  Kate Woodward Young: Well, and again, sometimes it's a whole different set of eyes.
• 14:49
  Kate Woodward Young: Like you and I can have a conversation probably about the same topic.
• 14:53
  Kate Woodward Young: And just because of, I don't know, the different countries we were raised in, the different times, we have just enough generational difference that there's probably even some of that that will impact my viewpoint of what your philosophy is versus, you know, your impact on you know, your take on mine.
• 15:11
  Kate Woodward Young: And my pill, the children I've interacted with, the children you've interacted with, the parents I've interacted with, the parents you've interacted with, and of course, all those educators that you and I have interacted with all impact our point of view.
• 15:25
  Kate Woodward Young: So we can never, we should never, can't say can't ever, because you know people do, but we should never just always assume that we're always right.
• 15:34
  Kate Woodward Young: Or it should always be.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a Capricorn, it's hard.
• 15:38
  Kate Woodward Young: Yeah, no, you know, as a Sagittarius, I I I'm a bit opinionated.
• 15:42
  Kate Woodward Young: Um, I'll just go say I'm just a bit bit opinionated.
• 15:45
  Kate Woodward Young: I don't really care why or how you want to say that I am that opinionated, it just happens.
• 15:49
  Kate Woodward Young: And sometimes my face doesn't always keep up with the words that are coming out of my mouth.
• 15:53
  Kate Woodward Young: Um, I have subtitles, they're kind of built in.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: My RBF is very much alive and well.
• 16:00
  Kate Woodward Young: Absolutely.
• 16:01
  Kate Woodward Young: So if you know as a as a as a leader in your program, so whether you're a director, you're an owner, you're an administrator and or manager, whatever your program calls that person who's not a classroom teacher, and you're like, huh, things don't seem to be going the way they should in that classroom.
• 16:19
  Kate Woodward Young: I think some of the first things is exactly what Carla said before, right?
• 16:23
  Kate Woodward Young: Don't change anything for anything less than two weeks.
• 16:26
  Kate Woodward Young: And I always like to ask questions.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I was gonna say too.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Is that why?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Like, why do you have a poster with words of the week on it with two-year-olds who can't read?
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: Why do you have this beautiful motivational poster that says you're a star in an infant room where they can't read?
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's the like honestly, it always blows my mind and it's so sweet, and the intention is always good, and I know that, but you know what I'd rather see instead of you're a star, I'd rather see a child's family photo.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'd rather see a child's artwork, I'd rather see mirrors, I'd rather see lights, change the environment to meet the needs of the children.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I can tell you, if your teachers are struggling and you start there, they'll fall back in love with teaching very quickly.
• 17:12
  Kate Woodward Young: Uh you know, and it is, it's so interesting to get caught up in the catalog version of what a classroom is supposed to look like, or the television version of what we think, or somehow it's just whatever it is that all of a sudden we think these classrooms are supposed to look like, but have never looked like um in real functioning classrooms.
• 17:32
  Kate Woodward Young: I mean, my least favorite thing, and this is one of those, I'm gonna call it a shameful plug on some levels, but you know, one of our partners, North Star School Supply, I mean, on some levels, I really like the fact that they don't really have a catalog.
• 17:46
  Kate Woodward Young: Because yes, you can go onto their website and you can buy all of the traditional school supplies, but they don't have a catalog, so they're not showing you how it's supposed to look.
• 17:57
  Kate Woodward Young: Like they show you the picture of the bookshelf, not where it's supposed to go.
• 18:01
  Kate Woodward Young: And, you know, if you look at the the the top two school supply vendors in the in the in the continent, I I won't say globe because I don't really know the European market as well as I should, but at least in Canada and in the United States and in Mexico, there are two manufacturers who pretty much have kind of the monopoly on it, and they they have catalogs and catalogs and catalogs and digital and print, and and so they show you pictures.
• 18:31
  Kate Woodward Young: And I have walked into that Pinterest perfect, the catalog perfect classroom, and the kids are in chaos.
• 18:40
  Kate Woodward Young: Like whoever's designing those pictures has never actually set foot in a classroom.
• 18:44
  Kate Woodward Young: And I think that's just a real shame for the educator, for the owner and director who have somehow been brainwashed into thinking that that's what classrooms, you know, like there are some things that should not be allowed to be sold to somebody who doesn't have at least a third-grade classroom.
• 19:04
  Kate Woodward Young: I mean, if you walk into a school supply store and you're picking up the alphabet strip letters, you better not have anybody in that classroom who's under the age of five.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then I have to still ask you why.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: And you know what?
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: Why is your why is such a magical word?
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: Because someone and what does yes start with?
• 19:23
  Kate Woodward Young: Why?
• 19:24
  Kate Woodward Young: Yes.
• 19:25
  Kate Woodward Young: I love it.
• 19:27
  Kate Woodward Young: So if you see a book magically appear, I, you know, I'm just gonna say I own it.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: No, there you go.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there is a course coming, and there is a book coming eventually, but there is a course coming out this August all about yes spaces and designing yes spaces, but really it's about making it work for your own program because what works in my program is not gonna work in your program, which is why it's not a catalog, because I can't say, hey, make sure your sink is near the door.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: Make sure that this table is in the center of your classroom.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: Because I don't know your classroom, I don't know your financial situation, I don't know your students, I don't know your ratios because you could be listening from anywhere in the world, and we all have different ratios, different children, different family situations.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: And you could be a solo teacher or you could be in a class of three teachers, and that makes a huge difference.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: Let's move the cat.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: But yes, it's so there's a course coming.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: That's my little pleasure.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 20:20
  Kate Woodward Young: And that'll also be in the show notes.
• 20:22
  Kate Woodward Young: So tell us a little bit about more.
• 20:23
  Kate Woodward Young: If you're a director or owner and some of this is resonating, what I love about your class is that your class that you're teaching is actually for the educator.
• 20:32
  Kate Woodward Young: So this is not a as a director, you might want to jump in.
• 20:37
  Kate Woodward Young: I'm just saying, we can all learn a little, a little more yes empowerment, right?
• 20:42
  Kate Woodward Young: And so probably wouldn't hurt you any, but don't come, don't come take the class so that you can teach your teachers.
• 20:48
  Kate Woodward Young: No, that's tacky.
• 20:50
  Kate Woodward Young: Come to the class so that you're hearing what your teachers are learning and get your teachers in this class.
• 20:55
  Kate Woodward Young: I think this is just like this should just be on everybody's top 10 um in your professional development plan for 2026, 2027.
• 21:05
  Kate Woodward Young: Get this class on your your staffs to do.
• 21:08
  Kate Woodward Young: And so tell us a little bit more.
• 21:10
  Kate Woodward Young: I know, but tell everybody else why they need to.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Because the children haven't changed, but we are in a very different world.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: And we have to acknowledge, this is my big one, we have to acknowledge that AI has entered the picture.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: There is not a single child under five that knows a world without AI.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: They might not be using it, but it they exist in the world with AI, whether we allow them to use it.
• 21:34
  Kate Woodward Young: They're probably watching it, they're being impacted by it because we've got teachers who are using AI to write curriculum.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: So they exist in this world.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so the purpose of yes spaces is to build an environment, not even necessarily in the physical sense, but build an environment where children have autonomy and agency.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know why all of a sudden my cat has decided to enter the picture.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: She wants to say yes here, and I'm saying no.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: So if we want to, we want to provide a world where children have autonomy and agency, they have a voice, they know what they that they're valued, because if we don't give them a voice and uh give them an opportunity to figure out who they are, AI is gonna tell them who they are.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: And that is a very dangerous game for us to be setting, sending children out into our world like that.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: They have to know their strengths, their weaknesses, their capabilities.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: They need to believe that they're competent and capable.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: And designing an environment that says yes is really important.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I also like to preface because sometimes people's faces, when I talk about yes in a classroom, people get really nervous.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: This does not mean turning your program into a giant thing of Lord of the Flies.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like, believe it or not, the more autonomy and agency you give children, the calmer your classroom becomes.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: It is not chaotic.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: I promise you, it is not chaotic.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: If it is, then you have to step back and ask why.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: Because anytime I've introduced yes spaces, the classroom has become calmer, not more chaotic.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I always say, just come in with an open mind and say yes.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: Trust the process, say yes.
• 23:11
  Kate Woodward Young: And I think what's great is that you can pull this yes experience into your personal life.
• 23:17
  Kate Woodward Young: The more you do it, the better you're going to be at it.
• 23:20
  Kate Woodward Young: If we only ever learned how to walk in a classroom and we never practiced anywhere else, we would only ever be able to make get someplace at, you know, 20 feet at a time.
• 23:34
  Kate Woodward Young: Because then we'd have to sit down because apparently that's all I can walk.
• 23:37
  Kate Woodward Young: You know, and so here's an opportunity to practice those, that that yes with reflection.
• 23:43
  Kate Woodward Young: Because I think that that was the key point of our conversation was, you know, not only the yes, but is it um is or the the no?
• 23:53
  Kate Woodward Young: I guess it's really a sess and the no, right?
• 23:55
  Kate Woodward Young: Is that a is that a me no or a you know, or is it a safety no?
• 23:58
  Kate Woodward Young: Like what is the root cause of that no?
• 24:01
  Kate Woodward Young: And what can we do to make it a yes?
• 24:03
  Kate Woodward Young: And I just love that.
• 24:04
  Kate Woodward Young: And I think that your playground example, climbing the walls literally, is is so perfect because every one of us who are listening can go, oh yeah, that was Johnny last week, or that was Susan and the other program, or you know, we've all had that one kid who is not a two-year-old climbing the walls.
• 24:22
  Kate Woodward Young: Because, you know, that's no, we get that, right?
• 24:24
  Kate Woodward Young: Like that falls into developmental, you know, whatever.
• 24:28
  Kate Woodward Young: But you know, when you got the five-year-old doing it, you gotta go, huh?
• 24:32
  Kate Woodward Young: There's something up here.
• 24:33
  Kate Woodward Young: We gotta, we gotta do something.
• 24:34
  Kate Woodward Young: And I loved that whole pause and reflect and ask those whys that are part of yes.
• 24:42
  Kate Woodward Young: And I just think that that is an absolute, you're gonna have to have to use that.
• 24:46
  Kate Woodward Young: So um, you can't have a yes without a why.
• 24:48
  Kate Woodward Young: And with that, we'll make that today's episode title.
• 24:52
  Kate Woodward Young: So I love that actually.
• 24:55
  Kate Woodward Young: I love that so much.
• 24:57
  Kate Woodward Young: Can't have a yes without a why.
• 24:59
  Kate Woodward Young: And we are so glad, Carla, that you have joined us today.
• 25:02
  Kate Woodward Young: And again, if you are interested in more about Carla's class, what Carla does, all of her information's in the show notes.
• 25:08
  Kate Woodward Young: We are so glad that you joined us for today's conversation.
• 25:11
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• 25:19
  Kate Woodward Young: We drop two episodes a week, so join us in a few days.
• 25:23
  Kate Woodward Young: And don't forget, yes requires a why.
• 25:28
  Childcare Conversations: Thank you.
• 25:29
  Childcare Conversations: Thanks for tuning in.
• 25:31
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• 25:36
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• 25:42
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• 25:49
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• 25:55
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• 26:00
  Childcare Conversations: We'll see you next time on Childcare Conversations.