Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / Removing Screens From Childcare [with Anna Russell]

Transcript

Removing Screens From Childcare [with Anna Russell] · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to the Happy Families Podcast. So good
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  Speaker 1: of you to join Today the Doctor's Desk something a
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  Speaker 1: little different. Normally Kylie and I talked about some brand
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  Speaker 1: new science, but this time some educators in Melbourne's Wests
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  Speaker 1: in childcare settings have seen significant benefits from switching off technology,
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  Speaker 1: including better sleep, better speech and better engagement across all
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  Speaker 1: age groups. Today we talk with Anna Russell, pedagogy research
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  Speaker 1: and practice manager, to understand a bit more about this experiment,
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  Speaker 1: this study and why it's not happening more across childcare
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  Speaker 1: settings and schools right around the nation. That's next. Stay
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  Speaker 1: with us today. This is the Happy Families Podcast, a
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  Speaker 1: doctor's Desk episode where we unpack what's going on research
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  Speaker 1: wise and how it affects you, your family, your children.
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  Speaker 1: Today on the podcast, a Conversation with Anna. Anna is
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  Speaker 1: a pedagogy research and practice manager at Best Chance Early
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  Speaker 1: Learning Centers across Victoria. Anna has over twenty years of
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  Speaker 1: experience in early childcare education. Qualified kindergarten teacher, She's dedicated
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  Speaker 1: her career working in early years settings with a strong
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  Speaker 1: focus on supporting children and families in vulnerable communities. Anna
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  Speaker 1: is right at the very core of what this research is,
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  Speaker 1: and she joins me, Now, Anna, thanks for being on
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  Speaker 1: the pod. Tell me where did this research come from
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  Speaker 1: and what did you actually do?
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  Speaker 2: Hi, justin thank you so much for having me on
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  Speaker 2: the podcast today. Where did this research come from? This
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  Speaker 2: research came from a question that we were grappling with
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  Speaker 2: around I'm not sure if you are aware, but we
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  Speaker 2: have the National Model Code that's recently been introduced in
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  Speaker 2: early years, and it is all about being much more
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  Speaker 2: stringent with the use of technology in early years. So
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  Speaker 2: we decided to not just stick to the new regulations,
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  Speaker 2: but to actually use this as a moment to antagonize
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  Speaker 2: our attitudes and our beliefs around the use of technology,
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  Speaker 2: not just in the classroom, but in our teaching practice.
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  Speaker 2: Teaching is an art form and it is becoming more
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  Speaker 2: and more dominated by technology, and we were questioning the
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  Speaker 2: impact of that on teaching and on children.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, so we've got kids under the age of five.
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  Speaker 1: The new framework, let's reduce it. But you're saying, well,
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  Speaker 1: how far can we go? Like, what can we really
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  Speaker 1: do if that's the minimum standard? What else can we do?
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  Speaker 1: So you've done this this study, you have seventeen early
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  Speaker 1: learning centers in Best Chance, Yes, and you run across
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  Speaker 1: the whole.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, So we're right across Victoria. So we're from Warrigal
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  Speaker 2: to Geelong. I'm sitting in Geelong at the moment, and
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  Speaker 2: we have seventeen services. Predominantly those are three and four
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  Speaker 2: year old kindergartens, but we also do long daycare as well,
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  Speaker 2: so birth to six, and all of my career has
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  Speaker 2: been birth to six as well. So what we did
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  Speaker 2: late last year, we took one of our services, which
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  Speaker 2: is one of our long daycare services, and we thought
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  Speaker 2: we would antagonize this thought. So what we did is
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  Speaker 2: what we called it a digital detox. So we took
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  Speaker 2: all digital technology out of the classrooms and we said
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  Speaker 2: we would do it for a period of five days
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  Speaker 2: because there was a world of hesitation. So what I
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  Speaker 2: asked teachers to do was take zero photos. I asked
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  Speaker 2: teachers to only use music that they could produce themselves.
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  Speaker 2: So there was no Spotify, there was no iPads, there
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  Speaker 2: was no cameras, there was no YouTube, there was nothing
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  Speaker 2: for five days because what we wanted to question was
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  Speaker 2: how much of that teaching will be outsourcing to our devices?
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  Speaker 1: And you rolled this out over the course of the week.
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  Speaker 1: What happens?
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  Speaker 2: Oh my goodness. First, I was not a popular person.
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  Speaker 2: I really wasn't because the teachers were scared because they
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  Speaker 2: had also relied on these devices. They had relied on
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  Speaker 2: this technology. A teacher said to me, how are the
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  Speaker 2: babies going to sleep without music? Another teacher said to me,
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  Speaker 2: how are children going to pack up? If I can't
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  Speaker 2: play the pack up song? And I was like, wow,
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  Speaker 2: hang on a minute, are we raising children? Oh? Are
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  Speaker 2: we raising Pavlov's dog? And so we had this conversation
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  Speaker 2: about conditioning and critical thinking, and they started to like
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  Speaker 2: me again. After a couple of days, I started to
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  Speaker 2: get emails from the team going I've never gone home
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  Speaker 2: more tired, but more fulfilled. So at the end of
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  Speaker 2: five days, the best thing happened. Well, they've got a
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  Speaker 2: phone call from the director of the service and said,
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  Speaker 2: are you okay if we do this for another five days?
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  Speaker 2: And I'm like, well, there you go. That's the best
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  Speaker 2: evidence that this research is having an impact. At the
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  Speaker 2: end then of two weeks, the teachers were saying things
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  Speaker 2: like there is far less behavioral support required in the classroom.
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  Speaker 2: There was a lot more babbling from babies, children were
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  Speaker 2: being more experimental. In one of the classrooms, it was
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  Speaker 2: like the teacher said, I'm not sure if it was
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  Speaker 2: a coincidence, but three of the babies got up and
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  Speaker 2: started walking this week and we had to go, well,
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  Speaker 2: I wonder if because our teachers were more engaged, more responsive,
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  Speaker 2: and the children felt greater connected to their caregiver, they
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  Speaker 2: felt more confident, and it was just remarkable. What we
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  Speaker 2: didn't get is a lot of feedback from families, which
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  Speaker 2: is what we were expecting. We were expecting, where are
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  Speaker 2: my photos, Where's this? Where's that? Why hasn't there been
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  Speaker 2: anything on story Park we did our documentation platform. We
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  Speaker 2: didn't hear any of that, and we take that silence
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  Speaker 2: as a real positive that nothing changed for the families.
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  Speaker 1: Listen to you say that, and it feels for me
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  Speaker 1: like it's very confirmatory. It confirms all of the biases
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  Speaker 1: that I have as a result of the research that
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  Speaker 1: I've looked at, but also just that innate desire that
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  Speaker 1: we all have to be human and to have human experiences,
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  Speaker 1: rather than having these digital synthetic experiences day in and
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  Speaker 1: day out and pushing them into our children's lives at
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  Speaker 1: younger and younger ages, having them having photos taken all
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  Speaker 1: day every day, this almost performative aspect of what childcare
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  Speaker 1: has become. I'm thinking through this at a really practical level.
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  Speaker 1: I'm kind of thinking, Okay, so you've done that, You've
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  Speaker 1: run across two weeks. The staff have been really satisfied
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  Speaker 1: with it. The parents have found that it's quite fine.
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  Speaker 1: There's no dramas there. You've had really nice outcomes. The
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  Speaker 1: early learning center feels like it's a more peaceful, more
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  Speaker 1: positive place. People are feeling more meaning and purpose in
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  Speaker 1: the work. It feels like there's just boxes being ticked everywhere.
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  Speaker 1: Were there any negatives at all that came out of
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  Speaker 1: going through this digital detox in that one early learning
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  Speaker 1: service where you ran this experiment.
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  Speaker 2: No, And that's why we're running it again because it
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  Speaker 2: was such a small snippet. So now we're running it
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  Speaker 2: across all seventeen because we want to test that theory.
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  Speaker 2: We really want to see if there are any negatives
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  Speaker 2: that are going to come out of this. And we're
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  Speaker 2: four days into the second round and so far, again
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  Speaker 2: there hasn't been any negatives. Were still and I will say,
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  Speaker 2: we still do use digital technology for compliance right of course,
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  Speaker 2: so all of our safety stuff or anything to do
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  Speaker 2: with child safety, child protection, all of that, we absolutely
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  Speaker 2: still use technology for that, and we are still engaging
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  Speaker 2: in families in an online forum outside of the classroom.
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  Speaker 2: But in the classroom it is all just about connection,
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  Speaker 2: and families are feeling connected because they're not only are
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  Speaker 2: children having more face to face time with their teachers,
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  Speaker 2: but their families are having face to face time with
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  Speaker 2: their teachers. And as you said in the intro, I
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  Speaker 2: work in vulnerable communities, so that connection is absolutely paramount,
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely paramount.
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  Speaker 1: I had a couple of other questions, but I feel
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  Speaker 1: like we've really covered everything that I wanted to ask
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  Speaker 1: with one exception. The last question that I want to
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  Speaker 1: hit you with, Anna today is if I'm living in
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  Speaker 1: South Australia or Sydney or Queensland, no matter where I am,
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  Speaker 1: if I'm listening, I'm thinking, well, hang on, this isn't
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  Speaker 1: happening in my children's early learning center. What options do
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  Speaker 1: parents have if they're not involved with the work that
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  Speaker 1: you're doing. What options to parents have if they really
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  Speaker 1: want to see a reduction in screens and digital intrusion
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  Speaker 1: in their children's educational journey starting from those earliest years.
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  Speaker 1: Where do they go, what do they do? It's sort
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  Speaker 1: of it's a little bit tricky because a lot of
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  Speaker 1: the early learning centers that I spent time in barreling
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  Speaker 1: down this highway at one hundred miles an hour.
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  Speaker 2: I completely agree with you. A lot of the services
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  Speaker 2: are doing that. There's that attitude that more is more.
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  Speaker 2: And what I would say to parents is I would
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  Speaker 2: say to parents to challenge that. I would say to
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  Speaker 2: parents to stay to their to their child's teachers. What
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  Speaker 2: I need is a happy child to come home. I
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  Speaker 2: don't need fourteen photos every day. I don't need to
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  Speaker 2: log on at the end of the day and if
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  Speaker 2: my child's not in the photos, I'm not going to go, oh,
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  Speaker 2: oh my goodness, what was my child doing all day?
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  Speaker 2: What I need from you, be really clear with the teacher.
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  Speaker 2: What I need from you is to send my child home, happy, healthy,
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  Speaker 2: knowing more than what they did when they walked in
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  Speaker 2: this morning.
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  Speaker 1: It's funny, I'm just listening to say that. And my youngest, well,
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  Speaker 1: a couple of my kids were at early learning centers
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  Speaker 1: when the digital stuff was happening, But my youngest is
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  Speaker 1: now twelve, so it's obviously increased in pace since she
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  Speaker 1: left there. But I never looked at the photos. I
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  Speaker 1: never logged into the portals. I didn't care. I just
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  Speaker 1: wanted to drop her off, know that she's having a
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  Speaker 1: good time, and then.
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  Speaker 2: That trust. Just have that trust. And I know it's
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  Speaker 2: really tricky, especially at the moment. The climate is that
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  Speaker 2: early years is a little bit of a devil. Yes,
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  Speaker 2: there has.
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  Speaker 3: Been very rough stories right that, There's been a very
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  Speaker 3: small population of people doing some some things that aren't great,
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  Speaker 3: but that is not the majority, you know.
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  Speaker 2: I think it's about being engaged with your service as well.
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  Speaker 2: Take five minutes just to chat to your teachers. Chat
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  Speaker 2: to those educators, share a little bit of yourself with them.
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  Speaker 2: You know, your children need to see you being comfortable
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  Speaker 2: and connected to the teachers, and then they're going to
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  Speaker 2: be like, well, hang on, my most trusted person, my parent,
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  Speaker 2: my caregiver thinks that my teacher's okay, cool, I'm going
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  Speaker 2: to think that too. Yeah, And I think that that's
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  Speaker 2: really really important. If you've got the confidence, I'd be like,
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  Speaker 2: I don't need photos. I don't need like for me,
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  Speaker 2: one of the big things is you know, having Yoto's
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  Speaker 2: and Tony's, those little music devices the babies and toddlers.
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  Speaker 2: I'm like, I don't want that. I want you to
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  Speaker 2: read to my child. I want you to sing to
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  Speaker 2: my child.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is not rocket science, this is this is
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  Speaker 1: just good I know, and a Russell right. Love that
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  Speaker 1: you did this experiment. Love love hearing about the results.
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  Speaker 1: Not surprised, but absolutely delighted that that's what you found.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks for joining me for this conversation today.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you so much. It's an absolute pleasure. And I'll
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  Speaker 2: keep you updated with what the outcome is atin the
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  Speaker 2: end of this fortnight and yeah, we'll go from there.
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  Speaker 2: Love to know, we'll talk about Yeah, next we'll talk
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  Speaker 2: about how we can deal with families.
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  Speaker 1: It's my life. It's all I ever talk about. Anna
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  Speaker 1: Russell looks after pedogod you'r research and practice at best
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  Speaker 1: Chance with over twenty years of experience in early childhood education.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Roland from
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: Bridge Media, with Mimhammon's providing our admin and other support.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: And if you'd like more info to make your family happier,
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: visit us at happy families dot com dot au