A life ‘in and with’ nature in the period of earliest childhood'

This chapter reports on a Froebel Trust funded project entitled ‘A life ‘in and with’ nature in the period of earliest childhood: understanding provision for birth to twos in English babyrooms’. It sought to examine the experiences of babies and toddlers outdoors whilst attending formal day care settings. We will set out some of our findings and thoughts here, drawing particularly on certain Froebelian principles as a lens to consider these findings and their implications. Practices with very young children differ internationally, and even within the UK’s four nations, in terms of when children begin attending Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) settings, how long they spend there, how it is funded, and what its purpose is. We discuss here findings from the English context where we carried out our research, but we also draw on international research since this area of focus (i.e., outdoor ECEC practice for children aged from birth to two) is underdeveloped (Bilton, Bento and Dias, 2017).