Welcome to Wingate Training and Research Base –  A Laboratory of Possibilities.

Background

Wingate Community Nursery during its Beacon status has always shared its practice with other schools and settings across the country for example; delivering keynote speeches and workshops at conferences; setting up school development partnerships to support colleagues ‘making change’; hosting visits to observe and discuss practice etc.

When Beacon funding came to an end, the requests for support and the dissemination of our practice did not stop.  Alongside the build for the Children’s Centre, we worked with the architects to include a ‘Training and Research Base’ so that we could continue to host ‘visitor days’ and deliver training on-site.  We also wanted to conduct small-scale research with parents and hold workshops to explore their children’s learning.

Training and Research Base

The Training and Research Base opened September 2006, providing a great space for Early Years workers and families to come together to have a dialogue about children’s learning.

We have an annual training programme advertising courses we deliver throughout the year, in addition to a summer Conference.  The Training and Research Base produces examples of documentation – film, written and images.

We can support schools and settings in County Durham and further a field and can provide training or conference / meeting facilities to support CPD.

Professional Development on offer:

• training courses in care and education 0-5
  designed for a range of target audiences - covering a variety of aspects of the early years agenda. Bespoke courses can be designed to meet your specific needs.
• school development partnerships
  an exclusive opportunity to develop a partnership with the Wingate team which will support you to create an overall climate for young 
children’s learning.
• visit to the Centre
  visit Wingate and explore the excellent working environments for 0-5 year olds.  This will help practitioners to reflect on and develop their understanding of quality provision.
• educational training packages
  an amazing range of professionally made dvds/image cd’s dealing with many key aspects of early years and practice. Inspirational examples of documentation for sale detailing different levels of documenting.
• film commissions and hire of the Sony HVR-Z1
  enter the world of film making and hire our professional camera kit to shoot your own films, or alternatively invest in commissioning us to create a short film about your school/setting.

Featured Training - ‘A day at Wingate’

Very popular professional development/training opportunities are our ‘a day at wingate’ visitor days.  Why not Come and spend a day with the staff and children at Wingate, immersed in the way we work and play. Become part of the practice during the morning, observing the relationships, interactions, experiences, environments – indoors and out, and experience the ‘rhythm of the day.’ Then, after lunch, join Paddy and Becky for an afternoon of dialogue, reflecting on the observations of the morning, exploring in depth how children learn in ‘the Wingate climate’, how we make it work and areas of particular interest to you. The cost of the day is £100 per person to include lunch and refreshments.  Special rates for group bookings.  Ring Glen for more details.

Website: www.wingatenursery.com

Email: wingatetrainingbase@durhamlearning.net

Telephone: 01428 837572