Category Archives: Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Achieving Exceeding Through the Munch & Move Program

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

In early childhood education, every shared meal, outdoor game, and joyful movement holds the power to shape lifelong habits. The Munch & Move program reminds us that when we nurture healthy bodies, we also nurture healthy minds and confident learners.

For services in Western Australia striving to demonstrate excellence under the National Quality Standard (NQS), Munch & Move provides far more than a set of health messages — it offers a whole-of-service approach to wellbeing, family connection, and reflective practice. It is a gentle yet powerful reminder that quality care extends beyond education — it lives in the everyday choices we make to help children eat well, move often, and feel good in their bodies.

Originally developed by the NSW Ministry of Health, Munch & Move is a free, evidence-based initiative designed to build children’s healthy eating habits, physical literacy, and fundamental movement skills. While it is not formally accredited outside New South Wales, it has become a nationally recognised best-practice model — one that WA services can confidently adopt, adapt, and celebrate as part of their journey toward Exceeding practice.

When educators, leaders, and families unite around these principles, the result is more than compliance — it’s culture. Munch & Move becomes a living reflection of what “Exceeding” truly means: a service where children thrive, families feel empowered, and educators lead with purpose and pride.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Sing, Play, Connect: Earning Exceeding Through Nursery Rhymes

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

World Nursery Rhyme Week is a global celebration of the joy, rhythm, and connection that rhymes bring to early childhood education. Each year, thousands of early learning settings worldwide participate by exploring five official rhymes that promote language development, cultural belonging, and joyful expression.

In 2025, the five official rhymes are:
Sing a Song of Sixpence
Humpty Dumpty
When I Was One (I Played the Drum)
I Hear Thunder
Two Little Dickie Birds

Nursery rhymes are more than melodies — they are gateways to literacy, numeracy, social connection, and cultural identity. Embedding rhyme and song throughout your educational program builds a strong foundation for communication, belonging, and wellbeing — and when reflected upon intentionally, these practices contribute to Exceeding-level evidence across all 7 Quality Areas.

Early childhood professionals can register for free as official ambassadors and access downloadable packs, lyric posters, and activity ideas at www.worldnurseryrhymeweek.com.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Embedding a Recycling Ethos to Achieve Exceeding

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

In today’s context of increasing environmental awareness and global resource constraints, embedding a strong recycling culture within your early childhood service is not just socially responsible — it supports children’s sense of agency, belonging, and stewardship of the world they inhabit. The campaign National Recycling Week (10–16 November 2025) run by Planet Ark Environmental Foundation highlights the “reduce – reuse – recycle” hierarchy and the circular economy as critical to sustaining resources. 

Incorporating recycling into your everyday program supports children to investigate, question, problem‐solve, collaborate and make meaningful change; it aligns very strongly with the Exceeding themes of Embedded Practice, Critical Reflection and Meaningful Engagement. Embedding recycling means more than a one-off activity — it becomes part of your service’s identity, routines, environment and learning culture.

Below are practical educational programming ideas followed by a QIP (Quality Improvement Plan) style write-up for each of the 7 Quality Areas (QA) under the National Quality Standard (NQS), each weaving in the three Exceeding themes.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Earning Exceeding Through Kindness and Tolerance: Embedding Empathy, Respect, and Inclusion in Everyday Practice

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

In early childhood education, every gentle word, every shared smile, and every act of inclusion builds the foundation for a kinder, more tolerant world.
World Kindness Day (13 November) and the International Day for Tolerance (16 November) remind us that even the smallest gestures—helping a friend, saying thank you, inviting someone new to play—can grow into powerful lessons about empathy, respect, and belonging.
Children learn kindness not from words alone, but from the everyday examples set by the adults who care for them. When we model compassion, fairness, and open-mindedness, we teach children that everyone deserves to feel safe, valued, and heard.
By embracing the principles of Be You, which promotes wellbeing, resilience, and positive relationships, and drawing on the Building Belonging Toolkit from the Australian Human Rights Commission, services can intentionally create environments where diversity is celebrated and inclusion is lived every day.
Together, these frameworks guide educators to nurture children’s hearts as well as their minds—helping them grow into empathetic, confident individuals who understand that kindness and tolerance are not just special events, but lifelong ways of being.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Honouring Directors’ Day in Early Childhood Education

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

Every thriving early childhood service has one thing in common — a leader who holds it all together. Someone who answers every question, signs every form, comforts every child, supports every educator, and somehow keeps the service running with calm, compassion, and courage.

On November 10, 2025, we celebrate those remarkable people — our ECEC Directors — the heart and backbone of early childhood education and care in Australia. Directors’ Day is a special moment to pause, reflect, and say thank you to the leaders who do so much more than manage: they nurture, guide, and inspire everyone around them.

This day is separate from Early Childhood Educators’ Day, because leadership in ECEC deserves its own light — a day to honour the people who lift others up, navigate the complex world of regulations and relationships, and still find time to connect with every child, family, and educator in their community.

Today, and every day, we recognise the directors who lead with both heart and skill — who carry the weight of responsibility quietly, and whose dedication shapes not only services, but futures.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips, Uncategorized

Promoting Physical Literacy to Earn an Exceeding Rating

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

This November, two national initiatives unite around a single powerful idea — children learn best when they move, play, and connect with the world around them. Physical Literacy Week and Outdoor Classroom Day invite early childhood services to step outside and celebrate movement as learning — nurturing confidence, wellbeing, curiosity, and belonging through outdoor play and exploration. By embracing these events together, services can demonstrate Exceeding practice across all seven Quality Areas, embedding physical literacy, outdoor learning, and community connection into daily routines.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Dressing Up Day: A Child-Friendly Way to Celebrate Halloween in Early Childhood

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

For children under five, dressing up is more than a costume — it’s a window into imagination, identity, and belonging. Instead of traditional Halloween celebrations that can feel too scary or commercial, early childhood services can reframe this day as a Dressing Up or Imagination Day — a joyful, creative experience that honours curiosity, storytelling, and community. In early childhood settings, this is a wonderful opportunity to explore pretend play, storytelling, and self-expression while respecting families’ cultural perspectives. Instead of focusing on fright, we can focus on fun, friendship, and fantasy — encouraging children to share who they want to be and supporting their emerging sense of identity.

Through simple, non-frightening dress-ups, children explore who they are, who they can be, and how they relate to others. They gain confidence, develop empathy, practise communication, and engage in deep, meaningful play that reflects the principles of the Early Years Learning Framework v2.0 and the National Quality Standard.

This approach also models inclusion and cultural respect — recognising that not all families celebrate Halloween in the same way. By shifting the focus from “scary” to “creative,” services can build shared understanding, strengthen relationships, and create an environment where every child feels safe, seen, and celebrated.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Promoting Children’s Rights to Earn an Exceeding Rating

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

Children’s Week is a celebration of children, their voices, and their rights. In 2025, we focus on Article 24 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child:

“Children have the right to the best health care possible, safe water to drink, nutritious food, a clean and safe environment, and information to help them stay well.”

For children under five, this means exploring health, safety, fairness, and belonging through play, art, and everyday routines — helping them feel confident that their ideas matter and their voices are heard. These experiences are perfect for embedding rights-based practice and demonstrating Exceeding practices.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Promoting Healthy Eating to Earn Exceeding Rating, Grow, Cook, Share — Food Brings Us Together

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

By BEST Childcare Consulting In early childhood education settings, our responsibility goes beyond simply serving nutritious meals — we play a vital role in shaping lifelong healthy habits and embedding healthy eating as a core value. Food is more than nourishment; it weaves culture, connection, and learning into everyday life. This year’s National Nutrition Week theme, Grow, Cook, Share – Food brings us together, invites services to harness the power of food to unite children, families, educators, and communities.

Drawing on the VegKIT Guidelines for Increasing Children’s Vegetable Intake in Long Day Care and aligned with the National Quality Framework, this article offers practical strategies, Quality Improvement Plan (QIP) write-ups, and ways to embed these ideals year-round.

An important tool to support this is HEAS’s free online training module “Promoting Healthy Eating in Long Day Care”, which equips educators and leadership with essential knowledge and skills in under one hour. Healthy Eating Advisory Service+1 We’ll integrate how to use that to strengthen your service’s capacity as you adopt Grow–Cook–Share.

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Exceeding the NQS BEST tips

Including Children’s Voices in Risk Assessment and Management for Safety

Posted on by Jennifer Scafidas

Promoting children’s safety October’s Safe Work Month is the perfect time for early childhood services to move beyond routine hazard checklists and transform safety into a shared learning journey. Using the ACECQA Risk Assessment & Management Tool (RAMT) as a guide, educators can model real-time risk assessment and then invite children to join the process — spotting hazards, discussing what might happen, and brainstorming safer choices. This approach builds children’s agency, strengthens their problem-solving skills, and embeds safety as part of the everyday curriculum.

Empowering educators and children side by side demonstrates that safety is not just a compliance task but a living culture within the service. Staff critically reflect on hazards, update policies and procedures, and use staff meetings to analyse incident data and refine supervision practices. At the same time, children engage in meaningful, hands-on activities such as safety walks, sorting safe/unsafe images, and creating collaborative posters that celebrate their learning.

By involving families and local community partners — sharing photos, home activity ideas, and trusted resources from Kidsafe WA, St John WA, and the Raising Children Network — services can extend learning beyond the classroom and foster a consistent safety culture. This whole-of-service approach provides rich evidence for all three Exceeding themes (Embedded Practice, Critical Reflection, and Meaningful Engagement) across all seven Quality Areas, showcasing a genuine commitment to continuous improvement and children’s wellbeing.

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