Learning Centre

CMAS Tutorial: Invitations to Play

An invitation to play can be a simple way to spark children’s curiosity and imagination! They offer children opportunities to explore and direct their own play, follow their interests, learn more about the world around them, express themselves creatively and use their imagination. In this tutorial, you’ll find 10 tips for creating your own Invitations to Play for the children in your CNC program. At the end of the tutorial, you’ll also find resources, references, a Facilitator Guide and Questions for Personal Reflection/Group Discussion so that you can easily facilitate your own team training.


CMAS Tutorial: Capturing Children’s Learning Through Documentation and Meaningful Documentation

Could your team use some new ideas and inspiration when it comes to documentation?
When documentation is done well, it tells a story about what the child did, the process and learning that they engaged in. And it helps parents and caregivers to see what the children are learning and how they’re progressing! In this two-part tutorial series, participants will have the chance to reflect on:

  • what makes good documentation
  • different kinds of documentation
  • how good documentation leads to good programming

Part 1: Capturing Children’s Learning Through Documentation
Part 2: Meaningful Documentation

At the end of the tutorial, you’ll also find resources, references, a Facilitator Guide and Questions for Personal Reflection/Group Discussion so that you can easily facilitate your own team training.


WEBINAR: Culture and Challenging Behaviour

Like the children in our care, every educator is different. We come from different contexts and cultures, and everything we think, say, and do is processed through the filter of our own culture. Culture influences our values, beliefs, gender roles, family structures, language, and even our teaching styles. The ability to understand and celebrate differences is more important now than ever. In this webinar, Barbara Kaiser will talk about the importance of cross-cultural competence, and explore the dynamics of culture in shaping educators’ expectations and children’s behaviour.

CMAS Webinar: Supporting Newcomer Children through Active Play–Teaming up with Active for Life!

Incorporating physical literacy into your daily programming can be easy and inexpensive – and it can bring such a range of benefits for children, ECEs, and families!

When young children engage in physical literacy and active play, they can better cope with stress, build resilience, and start on their path toward a healthy and active life. 

Watch this webinar where Dawne Clark, PhD, Early Years Physical Literacy discusses:

  • What physical literacy (PL) and active play look like in the early years
  • The benefits of PL and active play for children, educators, and families
  • “Infusing” PL into everyday activities 
  • How to get children moving again and active for life after the pandemic
  • The Active for Life website, tools and resources

WEBINAR: Happiness in the “Baby Room”: Supporting the Well-Being of Infant-Toddler Care Professionals

Happiness and well-being can have a huge impact on the adults and children who spend their days in infant rooms. In this webinar, participants will learn an ‘action plan’ of concrete tips for not only supporting play-based learning for the babies, but also ideas for creating a sense of community belonging, safety and security, and professional identity for your CNC team.

CMAS Tutorial: Play Across Cultures

Children are masters of play. It’s how they learn about culture, social norms, and language - and it provides endless opportunities for children to try out different roles, express themselves, and explore the world around them. But you may have noticed that children from different cultures engage in play differently. This makes sense because there are differences in language, context, and social norms in different cultures - and these are all reflected in children’s play! In the this tutorial, participants will have the chance to reflect on how play is different across cultures, and how we can encourage and foster all kinds of play variations in our CNC programs. You’ll also find resources, references, a Facilitator Guide and Questions for Personal Reflection/Group Discussion so that you can easily facilitate your own team training.


CMAS Webinar: Supporting Newcomer Children through Active Play: Teaming up with Active for Life!

Incorporating physical literacy into your daily programming can be easy and inexpensive – and it can bring such a range of benefits for children, ECEs, and families!

When young children engage in physical literacy and active play, they can better cope with stress, build resilience, and start on their path toward a healthy and active life. 

In this exciting new webinar, participants will join special guest, Dawne Clark, PhD, Early Years Physical Literacy, to learn about and discuss:

  • What physical literacy (PL) and active play look like in the early years
  • The benefits of PL and active play for children, educators, and families
  • “Infusing” PL into everyday activities 
  • How to get children moving again and active for life after the pandemic
  • The Active for Life website, tools and resources

We’ll also be announcing some exciting new opportunities for you to participate in!

NOTE: This webinar is for IRCC-funded CNC programs. The webinar recording will be available to the public early next month.


WEBINAR: Culture and Children’s Challenging Behaviour

Like the children in our care, every teacher is different. We come from different contexts and cultures, and everything we think, say, and do is processed through the filter of our own culture. Culture influences our values, beliefs, gender roles, family structures, language, and even our teaching styles. The ability to understand and celebrate differences is more important now than ever. In this webinar, participants will explore the dynamics of culture in shaping teachers’ expectations and children’s behavior.

Webinar: Early Childhood Behaviour Guidance Practices and the Role of Implicit Bias

In this paradigm-shifting webinar, participants will learn about implicit racial bias and its role in behavior management practices and policies in early childhood programs. This training is a great opportunity for us to examine how our own implicit biases may affect how we manage the behavior of young children of color in our programs.

HiMama Helps Webinar: How to teach children to embrace differences

Let's talk about how young children develop their understanding of differences! Most importantly, this webinar provides practical strategies that CNC staff can use to encourage young children to talk about, understand and appreciate differences between people and places.