The Interest Forest offers a unique mentoring program to Australian early childhood educators. Participants are matched with a mentoring teacher from outside their service, who supports them in building skills, solving problems, and exploring new ideas.
Mentoring for early childhood educators
Mentoring is a form of professional development that is highly valued in our sector. Educators learn by intentionally building a supportive relationship with a knowledgeable and experienced peer.
Our program is suitable for educators, teachers and managers who work with children aged between birth and the start of school.
Improve your programming and documentation
Our mentors specialise in the areas of:
- programming, planning and documentation
- integrating the EYLF into daily practice
- writing and communication.
Mentors are qualified early childhood teachers who have extensive experience in designing and delivering early years programs. They are passionate about articulating children's learning through written communication.
Flexible, affordable and personalised
Our mentoring program is incredibly flexible. All communication is online or via telephone, so it doesn't matter where you live. Educators are welcome to come and go from the program according to their needs.
Our rates are competitive. Participants receive personalised attention. Unlike training courses that follow a prescribed format, mentoring allows educators to target the issues that are most important to them.
Individuals and teams
Our mentors can work with individuals, small teams, and large teams. Educators can request a mentor for themselves and organisations can provide mentorship as a benefit to their employees.
How it works
The mentoring cycle
Our mentoring program follows the traditional mentoring cycle, which includes setting goals, taking action, and evaluating the outcome. It's very similar to the planning cycle for children. And like children's learning, mentoring isn't always linear. Educators are free to follow unexpected paths of professional enquiry.
Engaging with your mentor
Our program is structured in weekly blocks, which involves either thirty minutes or sixty minutes of the mentor's time over the duration of each week.
Some educators schedule weekly discussions with their mentors, via telephone or email. Other educators bounce ideas around as they occur in real time, through email and SMS.
Short-term or long-term
Educators are welcome to come and go from the program. Whether you're with us for a few weeks or a few years, it's totally fine.
Many educators pause their mentoring during school holidays or the Christmas period.
The benefits of ECEC mentoring
1. Enhanced educational outcomes for children
We specialise in improving children's educational outcomes by exploring better ways to program and plan.
2. Effective documentation and written communication
Our mentors can teach professional writing skills for documenting children's learning and communicating with stakeholders.
3. Stronger relationships
Through improved programming and communication skills, educators can build stronger relationships with their families, colleagues, and the community.
4. Improved efficiency and wellbeing
We make things easy. Our mentors offer quick and easy ideas, and tools and resources to keep forever.
5. Renewed motivation and confidence
Mentoring can reignite passion, helping educators to define their professional identities and present themselves as knowledgeable and confident practitioners.
Educator experiences
Read some of the experiences educators have had with our mentoring program:
- “The best part is connecting with an early childhood teacher outside my team. I like having a new perspective. The parents say our program is more playful and interesting. I'm motivated and feel supported.” – Michelle, Salisbury Park SA
- "I’ve learned so much about play-based learning. It has not only improved how I set up my space but also helped me communicate the framework to parents in a way that makes more sense.” – Tara, Newton NSW
- “I love childcare but I have ADHD and terrible at organising stuff. My mentor has taken a weight off my shoulders because she made a calendar and sends suggestions for special days. I spend more time with my children without stressing about forgetting little things.” – Yuan, Townsville QLD
- “As a leader, I am too rushed to mentor junior staff. They have a lot of Reggio questions and having an external teacher step in is relieving as she is someone for motivation and bouncing ideas off. Our program is really flourishing so we will continue mentoring next year.” – Alex, Regional NSW
Enrol in ECEC mentoring
Let's get started. Educators and organisations can enrol online and they will be quickly matched with a mentoring teacher.
Mentoring can be short-term or long-term and is provided as a subscription service which can be continued for as long as you like and cancelled at any time.
A: Mentoring for educators (30min weekly)
Educators receive one-on-one mentoring for their own professional development. Most communication is through email, SMS, and or file-sharing programs.
Organisations can sign up multiple employees for individual mentoring.
B: Mentoring for educators (60min weekly)
This option is perfect for leaders or educators who require more time each week to address complex issues and multiple topics.
Our mentors are currently available for phone conversations on Mondays and Wednesdays during school hours (AEST).
Organisations can sign up multiple employees for individual mentoring.
C: Mentoring for small teams (60 min weekly)
This is the best option for a group of educators who work together on the same program, and have similar goals and challenges. Most communication is through email and file-sharing programs to ensure everyone stays in the loop.
Organisations can sign up multiple small teams.
D: Large teams
Organisations wanting to provide mentorship to a larger team can sign up multiple educators or small teams using the options above. However, we can definitely arrange a custom quote and chat with you first.