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The Training For Early Childhood Development (Ecd) Practitioners To Provide High Quality Distance Learning Experiences For Young Children was launched on 17 March in collaboration between UNESCO, the University of the West Indies and CARICOM Secretariat. The training includes 4 sessions of two hours each to equip early childhood development professionals with the necessary skills and resources to provide quality learning experiences for preschool children aged 3-5 years.

The themes for the four sessions are 'The logistics of distance learning', 'Playful planning for distance learning', 'Staying playful while teaching different topics' 'Let's Brainstorm and Wrap Up' (How do we move forward?).

Dr Faryal Khan, Programme Specialist for Education from the UNESCO Cluster Office for the Caribbean, opened the event on 17 March on behalf of UNESCO, recalling the unprecedented challenges of the COVID-19 education disruption that affected early childhood development for a number of reasons. While teachers had to adapt quickly to a new online teaching reality and bridge the gap of connectivity, availability of devices and computer skills, parents were and are under economic and social emotional pressure as they had to share the role of teachers while staying at home with their young children and often also while working from home.

91Â鶹¹ú²ú¾«Æ·×ÔÅÄ recently organized high-level and technical dialogues to advocate ECD as a priority sector for the COVID-19 response and to work on a global partnership strategy for early childhood care and education. This strategy aims to mobilize national and international partnerships to advance the ECD agenda and invest in ECD to leave no child behind.

Dr Laurette Bristol of CARICOM emphasized the need for strong networks in the region to build ECD. She pointed out that the number of registrations for this ECD training far exceeds expectation, which clearly shows that there is a great need for support in ECD from national education authorities in the Caribbean.

Ms Ceceile Minott, Head of the Caribbean Child Development Centre & Director Consortium for Social Development and Research, The University of the West Indies Open Campus also commented on the high registration numbers.

She expressed her pleasure to be part of this incredible collaboration with UWI Open Campus, CARICOM Secretariat and UNESCO.

After the 15-minute virtual launch event, the first training session followed. This session was delivered by Cathrin O Sullivan, Bloom Early Childhood Centre of Excellence, Jamaica, with the support of Nicole Romany, Early Childhood Coordinator at The UWI Open Campus and Programme Leader at Bloom Early Childhood Centre of Excellence, Trinidad and Tobago

The session revolved around the appropriate use of technology with children and questions such as what are appropriate expectations for young children, and how have relationships between children, teachers and parents changed in distance education modality.

40 participants from 15 Caribbean states and territories shared their views on what worked well and what did not work so well. They also shared their favorite moments in distance education, and the support they deem needed by parents.