The Voice of Early Childhood Conference 2025

A grey morning couldn’t darken our spirits as we set off bound for Nottingham, ready to photograph the many beautiful faces of practitioners and academics at The Voice of Early Childhood Conference 2025.

Angelica Celinska - Content and Partnerships Director at The Voice of Early Childhood

As fairly new listeners to TVOEC podcast, we were keen to meet people in the Early Years community but weren’t sure what the day had in store for us. But from the moment Matt Bawler (Head of Early Years and Wellbeing), began his inspiring opening Key Note speech on ‘Proactively supporting children’s mental health’, we knew we had found our tribe.

The last two weeks have given the CO Kids team an opportunity to digest and reflect on the incredibly valuable insights offered by the speakers, and fellow delegates. And to put it in simple terms, we have not stopped thinking about TVOEC!

Matt’s presentation resonated so deeply, that we scrambled to capture as much of it as we could in notepads and of course with a camera. We just had to feedback this gold to the rest of our team.

Matt Bawler - Head of Early Years and Wellbeing

Listening intently, we couldn’t help but think about how relationships with cameras and photography in early years will have an impact on how children will view themselves. Photography that integrates the child into its production, gives them a sense of belonging. At CO Kids, we aim always, to capture children relaxed and at play in their nursery or preschool. In a photograph like this, the specific Early Years setting, the building or garden and the toys and furniture within can be as important to the child as seeing their face in a picture.

We leant from Matt about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs – Seeing points that intersect with our ethos. For example:

·      Esteem: how photography and so importantly, the way we photograph can help a child’s esteem. We strive for our photo sessions to be child led as much as possible.

·      Love and belonging: how children see pictures of themselves on the wall of their homes making them feel like the belong and that they are an essential part of their family.

We were keen to hear Matt talk about the Growth Mindset, a concept which we hold very dear at CO Kids. It runs through our approach to everything we do as a business. We constantly consider how we can learn, how we grow, and how we can empower our wonderful team of photographers.

We felt grateful to be part of this very special event, we felt incredibly inspired, and it was only 10:30 in the morning!

Yinka Ogunnusi - University Lecturer, Critical Early Education Advocate & Consultant

Next on the agenda were a plethora of workshops all of which we would have loved to attend. We were grateful to be able to see snippets of a few, However as we were there in an official capacity to photograph the delegates, we were privy to the excited chatter that poured out of the workshop rooms at the end of each session. Whilst delegates waited patiently to be photographed, they animatedly chatted about what they had just taken part in. Many marvelled at the insightful and thought-provoking discussions. Such as Yinka Ogunnusi ‘s workshop entitled ‘Cultivating a critical approach: Targeting social justice and anti-racism’

Whilst others delighted in the joyous experience of taking part in workshops such as ‘Using stories to build confidence & improve oracy’  by Olivia Corbin-Philip.

After lunch, the workshops and networking continued.  Our big takeaway’s? Almost too many to mention but ideas that really spoke to us included:

In our approach to Early Years:

• We need to be proactive, not reactive.

• We should foster a sense of belonging rather than including, in a family you are not included, you belong. - Let’s get families those images to hang on their walls and reinforce that belonging!

• Bill Gates said, "The first 5 years of a child's life have so much to do with how the next 80 turn out". We only have a small window of time with the children we photograph in Early Years settings, but it can have an impact on how they feel about themselves being photographed for years to come. It matters that we bring our A game!

As the day flew by, we were excited to listen to Ben Kingston-Hughes (author & managing director at Inspired Children) deliver the closing Key Note Speech entitled: ‘The essential neuroscience of humour & laughter’. We had already met Ben earlier in the day as he waited patiently to have his photograph taken, and we knew it was going to be something special. We weren’t disappointed

Ben Kingston-Hughes - Author & Managing Director at Inspired Children

We listened intently to Ben’s talk about the importance of joy and in particular laughter in early years settings. He told anecdotes that made us both laugh out loud and brought us close to tears.

He spoke about how shared laughter improves mental health and urged everyone present to think about how they can use laughter every day. Early years setting can be stressful places to work, laughter is a great tool to have to hand. It enables you to be the best possible you with the children you work with.

We couldn’t help but think about our own interactions with children and practitioners in early years settings. Photography day can seem overwhelming to all involved, but we are passionate about changing that. We want the children we photograph to have a positive interaction with our photographers and enjoy the photo sessions. We want to capture genuine smiles and play in our images (we are not about awkward, unnatural grins). And we want our team of photographers to enjoy what they do, to come away from the nursery at the end of the day in a positive headspace. Laughter is the key and, brilliantly, the more you laugh the longer you live!

What a day. We felt so incredibly privileged to take part in it. It isn’t every day that you get to hear from pioneering and well-respected early childhood specialists and researchers, experienced educators and influential leaders.

 Since the conference we have had time to reflect on what we heard and have used this knowledge to spark discussion with our team of photographers at our Spring 2025 pre season briefing. We have bought and are working our way through books by the speakers, we want to keep learning.

 Thank you to everyone who took part in The Voice of Early Childhood 2025 conference.