Today we set out to the Childcare Expo in Coventry, an annual exhibition in the Early years, child care and nursery sector. It aims to bring together current nursery products and services and provides visitors with advice and information regarding industry changes.

It offered us an opportunity to explore and meet the various experts, childcare professionals and exhibitors all under one roof, as well as the opportunity to attend seminars and workshops on topics such as the EYFS, encouraging children to talk and embracing risk in play.

The exhibitors included software companies offering items such as interactive screens catered to the EYFS curriculum as well as companies with systems and apps to help us with child and staff ratios as well as learning journals which enable parents to be kept up to date on their child’s development on a real time basis throughout each day. It was fascinating to see not only how they could help to run a nursery efficiently and follow the development of children but also in how they enabled them to engage and learn through new age play.

As we walked around, it was interesting to gain an insight and discover new ideas which we could envisage and possibly implement in our new nursery. Vendors were very helpful in giving us information and allowing us to ask questions on how their services would benefit our setting.

It was also great to meet the Community Playthings team again who had exhibited a range of their new furniture and learning equipment. Their outdoor play equipment in particular seemed to catch the eye of every single child that walked past their stall!

Overall a thoroughly exciting day full of new information-small steps towards ensuring we can provide the best possible for all the parents, children and staff in our new nursery.