Felicity Thomas

I am a Froebel trained teacher who has specialised in the Early years.  I have worked in Local Authority nursery classes and schools since 1975.  I retired from Earlham Early years centre in 2013 and have since set up a training and consultancy company with two colleagues. This company is called minds4learning and has been running successful courses for Early Years Practitioners since June 2013. I also teach on the Early Years Childcare and Leadership Foundation degree accredited by Hertford University.  One of my passions is teaching in the outdoors and this is based on my own experiences as a child but also from the clear focus and principles of my Froebelian training.  Froebel being the founder of the Kindergarten (child’s garden) movement.  At Earlham we developed a natural garden based on Froebelian Principles where the children learn through deep involvement in the natural world.  I have also worked with parents supporting them to understand the importance of their children learning about our natural world.