It’s going to be very exciting year for early childhood educators everywhere as UK PLAY expert Marc Armitage gears up for his Three Tour Series of Australia!

Details for all of Marc’s Public workshops in TOUR ONE are now available and ticket sales are already well under way. As numbers are limited for each gig you will need to get sorted quickly so as not to miss out.

Tour one begins on May 7th in Queensland this year, followed by a visit to New South Wales, the Australian Capital Territory and Victoria.

 May 7th – 25th

All information, including registration forms are available below

or through the Inspired EC website

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Tuesday 7th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

CAIRNS

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_cairns.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Wednesday 8th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

TOWNSVILLE

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_townsville.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Thursday 9th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

MACKAY

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_mackay.pdf

 

 ‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Friday 10th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

Central Queensland Institute of TAFE

Canning Street,

QLD Rooms C1.O1

ROCKHAMPTON

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_rockhampton.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Saturday 11th May 2013 (9.30am – 3.30pm)

BRISBANE

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_brisbane.pdf

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Monday 13th May 2013 (9.30am – 3.30pm)

COFFS HARBOUR

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_coffs_harbour.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Tuesday 14th May 2013 (9.30am – 3.30pm)

PORT MAQUARIE

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_port_macquarie.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Wednesday 15th May 2013 (9.30am – 3.30pm)

NORTH SYDNEY

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_north_sydney.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Friday 17th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

CANBERRA

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_canberra.pdf

 ‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Monday 20th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

MELBOURNE

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_melbourne.pdf

 

‘The Role of the Adult in Children’s Play’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Monday 20th May 2013 (time 7.30pm – 9.00pm)

Baxter Pre School

26 Olstead Drive

 BAXTER

Bookings are being taken by Gillian directly through Baxter Pre school (03) 5971-1868 … http://www.baxterpreschool.websyte.com.au/site.cfm?/baxterpreschool/contact/

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Wednesday 22nd May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

GEELONG

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_swan_hill_vic.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Thursday 23rd May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

SWAN HILL

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_swan_hill.pdf

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Friday 24th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

BALLARAT

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_-_ballarat.pdf 

 

‘The DO Approach’

Presenter: Marc Armitage

Saturday 25th May 2013 (time 9.30am – 3.30pm)

WODONGA/ALBURY

http://www.inspiredec.com/uploads/9/9/0/4/9904716/marc_armitage_wodonga.albury.pdf

Baxter Preschool has booked Marc for an additional 2 x 90 minute presentations. Please check out the link below for details.

Marc Armitage at PLAY at Baxter Preschool 2013

TOUR 2 – JULY 2013

TOUR 3 – OCTOBER 2013

For further details regarding Tour’s 2 and 3 including booking Marc for a Workshop, Keynote talk or Twilight Presentation for your organisation or to obtain details about public gigs please email Tash from Inspired EC  … info@inspiredec.com. You can also check out lots more information about Marc Armitage right here!

Of course Marc will also be visiting the East Coast of the USA in March 2013, sponsored by the Pop-Up Adventure Play team. For all information visit their website.

We embrace change and we love a challenge – who doesn’t in early childhood? As you may know, we stopped teaching together at our beautiful kindergarten in the outer suburbs of Melbourne at the end of 2010 to concentrate on other aspects of our business such as teacher PD. We have thoroughly enjoyed this fun side of our business and thank you so much to everyone who has supported us.

We have decided this year that we will once again head in another direction. We have a dream of writing a book together with our friend Marc Armitage. A book about children and how through PLAY they are all universally connected. A photographic exploration of children doing what children do best P-L-A-Y.  We’ve nicknamed it ‘Project Dreamer’ but we want it to be much more than a dream. Our intention is to work really hard this year in order to make this dream come true! Before that can happen however, Donna has a full year tour managing Marc Armitage who is coming to Australia at least three times in 2013 to run workshops and attend conference circuits and Sherry, who has recently completed a Certificate IV in Training and Assessment, will become much more involved in tertiary training.

We are also interested in helping to organise other fabulous early childhood experts to bring the latest and greatest information to our preschool, long day care, OSHC, family day and primary school educators.

Our blog will remain, all of the great ideas for teaching in early education are still there, so please explore. From time to time we will put up a new post, but it won’t be as regular as it has been in the past. It is very difficult when we are not teaching and planning together to have new posts about activities/ideas etc… Our Facebook page will also remain and continue to be the fabulous resource that it has become.

2013 has started off very well for us as we hope it has for all of you!

 Cheers … Sherry and Donna

To our Irresistible friends. As 2012 draws to a close, we want to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your continued support of ‘Irresistible Ideas’.

This year has seen many changes for us both as Sherry took on a maternity leave position teaching a pre-kinder aged group, Donna threw herself into organizing the Marc Armitage – Australia Downunder tour in August and we both took up the opportunity to take on some relief work in both long day care and kindergarten. Not to mention of course our conference and workshop training as well as launching ‘Another Irresistible Idea’ our latest passion; creating inviting play opportunities for children by up-cycling furniture and ‘bits and bobs’ sourced from local road side pickups and Op’ shops.

Without your support this year could not have ended as strongly as it did. It’s been a pleasure to assist you all in our PLEASE HELP! forum on our IIFPBL Facebook page too. The help, advice and assistance our followers out there offer to each other is really amazing! … We think we’ve created something pretty special over there and are really pleased that people are so willing to share their passion, ideas, inspiration and advice. We’ve now answered around 1,000 requests for HELP, recorded in 9 albums, so please take some time over the holidays to kick back with a coffee or a long cool drink and take a look through them all. There is some quite invaluable advice in there for everyone, regardless of where you live in the world!

Christmas in Australia can be a very different experience from that of our northern hemisphere neighbours. While for some, Christmas may not be an important religious celebration, like all good things in life some traditions never alter. Like spending time with family and friends, early mornings, hot afternoons, picnics in the park, BBQ’s in the back yard, visits to the beach, family cricket matches, sharing delicious food and a bundle of laughs and just ‘being’ together for that once a year get together … usually followed by a snooze in the shade after lunch!

Yes … we’ll both go away for a while, but we won’t ever be too far away. Facebook will continue to flourish and we’ll continue to share some of our favourite blog posts which you may have missed and of course with three more tours to organize for UK PLAY guru Marc Armitage in May, July and August next year… HEY? … Did we say we were taking a holiday!?!? Okay we deserve a little bit of a break but don’t worry we will be back just as soon as Sherry gets back from her adventures in Italy and London and Donna returns from spending time in the Victorian High Country at her Lake House and Vineyard she loves so much!

We hope however you choose to spend the holiday season, for all of you it is a safe and happy time – no matter how you choose (or not) to celebrate Christmas.

See you for a Happy New Year in 2013~ Cheers from Shez and Don ☺ ☺