Susan along with our board offer a variety of Personal Development opportunities to all staff each year. I was very fortunate to be given the opportunity to attend the 25th National Early Childhood Conference in Canberra.  I attended a number of workshops during this time, ranging from young gardeners to developing Behavioural Strategies to practicing advocacy and leadership skills, social and emotional well being along with lots of practical environmental/sustainability ideas.  WE finished up with Who Cares for the Carer?  I was totally inspired by one of the keynote speakers (Ferre Laevers, who is director of the research centre for Experiential Education at the University of Leuven—Belgium).  He believes the quality of any educational setting is to focus on the degree of “emotion wellbeing” and the level of involvement” of the children and the level of “involvement “ of the children.  Many thanks for an amazing P.D. experience Susan.  I’ll finish up with a quote from Agus (indigenous 78 year old lady who is currently studying Cert IV in Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation)

"Tomorrow is a mystery and today is a gift which is shy it is  called the present."

Footnote: To top up a very productive and enjoyable conference I won a lap top in one of the competitions (guessing number of coloured stars in a jar—1027) Pays to still think like a child!!!       

   BEV