Fostering Wellbeing

Fostering security, self-worth, autonomy, self-competence, and joy in early childhood

The Fostering Wellbeing program is a series of 5 workshops that support early childhood educators to identify and respond to children’s needs and support children’s wellbeing. 

The program is based on the Phoenix Cups framework, which uses the analogy that we choose behaviours to fill a cup. When our cups are full (or filling), we have a strong sense of wellbeing.  

This program aims to teach educators practical strategies to support children’s wellbeing, increase the sense of fun and playfulness within educators’ programs, and ensure children have their basic human life needs met. The program uses activities, presentations, readings and resources to encourage educators to collaborate and reflect on current practice.

What are the Phoenix Cups?

We are all motivated to choose behaviours to meet our needs. Now imagine those needs as five different sized Cups. We call those Cups your Safety Cup, your Connection Cup, your Mastery Cup, your Freedom Cup, and your Fun Cup. Using this analogy, you could say that every behaviour we choose is to fill a Cup. When our Cups are full (or filling), we have a strong sense of wellbeing. When they are emptying, we are driven to choose behaviours to fill them.

Facilitators

Facilitator Briana Thorne

Briana is a passionate and experienced early years education specialist. Briana has worked across a variety of roles in early years education as an Early Childhood Teacher, Educational Leader, Centre Director, Area Manager, State Manager and General Manager. Briana’s passion for the highest quality education and care led her to work for the Victorian Regulatory Authority supporting and assessing services practices and quality through regulatory and Assessment and Rating procedures. Briana has her Masters in Early Years Education with a specialisation in Curriculum, Pedagogy and Assessment. Briana’s philosophy places the child at the heart of every decision, connection and action across early years settings. Advocating for children’s agency, embracing children’s voices and child-led educational programming and planning has been a long-held practice. As an experienced leader and mentor, Briana enjoys teaching and supporting educators and leaders to build strong, supported teams of professionals with a shared culture of growth, care and to enable teams to flourish together. With a Bachelor of Arts in Literature and Performing Arts, Briana has a dramatic streak and her skills in documentation and the written word support her in providing engaging and high quality training. In her downtime, Briana enjoys filling her giant Connection and Mastery cups by spending quality time with her family, taking on yet another project or challenging herself to learn something new time and again.

Principal Facilitator Sandi Phoenix

Sandi is the founding company director and principal facilitator at Phoenix Support for Educators. Her framework, The Phoenix Cups, have revolutionised how education & care professionals and parents, understand the behaviour of, and proactively plan for, the wellbeing of children and young people. She is highly regarded as an international speaker, coach, mentor, and professional development facilitator.

FAQ

  • How long do I have access to each course?

    You have access to these courses for 4 weeks. We estimate it will take you about 3 hours to complete each individual course, so we have allowed for 1 hour per course per week and an extra week for catch up.

  • How do I get my certificates?

    To receive your certificate, you must click on 'Complete & Continue' on every page. Once you've done this your certificate download button should come up in the top left corner of your course, where the progress bar is.