Practice

How “all about me” show and tell opportunities help preschoolers build positivity

Freya Lucas

Feb 02, 2023

Save

In many early childhood education and care (ECEC) programs around Australia families are asked to complete an ‘All About Me’ template when enrolling their child, which shares information about family structure, interests, temperament, favourite foods and more.

Flinders University Professor of English Kate Douglas says taking this a step further, and having older children complete this task themselves can be a powerful way for them to build a strong sense of positive self-representation in their writing and communications.

Whether it’s through their own emergent literacy or through supported writing attempts, Professor Douglas says that telling personal stories about your life involves decisions and curation regarding what’s shared and what’s not.

“I think these exercises are a great opportunity for parents to support and engage with their children’s learning and development,” she adds, based on her perspective as an expert in life narrative and children’s storytelling.

“These activities can give children vital skills in self-representation that can be carried into their adolescent years when social media becomes central to their lives and self-image.”

The act of collecting and sharing information, including images of themselves and their family, is an activity which encourages children to start thinking about their audience, disclosure, and their own agency, as they develop practical skills in the construction of self, Pressor Douglas explains.

Professor Douglas says ‘About Me’ projects are an important creative tool – as well as a way to build community through sharing stories about the self and everyday life.

She is the author of a new work, Children and Biography: Reading and Writing Life Stories (Bloomsbury, 2022), which is available here.

Don’t miss a thing

Stronger school and OSHC partnerships support children’s safety, inclusion and wellbeing

ACECQA’s new resources help schools and outside school hours care services strengthen communication, clarify responsibilities and support children across their day.

ACECQA campaign helps families make informed early learning choices

A new national campaign from the Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA) is encouraging families to look beyond a service’s location and availability when choosing early childhood education and care.

Vietnamese preschool program prompts more child talk, but English dominates

When a preschool introduces another language, the number of sessions delivered tells only part of the story. Children also need opportunities to participate. A new Australian study offers an unusually close look at who spoke, for how long and in which language during a Vietnamese exposure program.

Making bush kinder learning visible without turning it into a checklist

A child balancing across a log, negotiating a route with a friend or returning to a place after rain may be showing learning that is easy to miss in a conventional assessment record. Bush kinder educators face a familiar challenge: how to document that learning for children and families while preserving the open-ended character of outdoor play.

Why evidence-based ECEC practice needs more than a training session

Finding a promising approach is only the beginning of changing practice in an early childhood service. Staff need time to understand it, decide how it fits their setting, use it with children and revisit what is working. New findings from the Australian Education Research Organisation (AERO) put that process, rather than a one-off professional learning session, at the centre of improvement.

Stronger school and OSHC partnerships support children’s safety, inclusion and wellbeing

ACECQA’s new resources help schools and outside school hours care services strengthen communication, clarify responsibilities and support children across their day.