For many child care providers, providing the best experience for the children in their care and the families they serve means a devotion to continuous learning.
BrightSpark offers several supports for child care providers to continue learning and growing, and ultimately elevating the quality of their care. In addition to providing individualized coaching and professional development opportunities, BrightSpark also hosts Professional Learning Communities (PLCs).
PLCs are provider-led meetings hosted by BrightSpark that are open to all child care providers enrolled in Early Achievers. The meetings are centered around reflective conversation related to teachers’ best practices and child development, and are meant to foster connection and community for participants in addition to collaborative learning. There are various monthly PLCs available in different languages including Arabic, English, Somali, and Spanish.
PLCs focus on a different topic each month. Past topics covered have included communicating with families, interactions, social-emotional support, curriculum development, and so many more. Each month, the topics are selected by participating providers and the conversations are facilitated by different community providers with a BrightSpark coach’s support.
“We have a template for the new facilitators to help guide them on how to hold the PLC, because it’s different from any other meeting or training,” explained Jamileh Almasoud, an Early Learning Coaching Lead at BrightSpark. “The purpose of it is to provide a space for reflection rather than a guided training where participants just get information.”
“Whether the PLC is held virtually or in-person, the agenda normally makes time at the beginning for them to just network, collaborate, and get to know each other.”
Jamileh hosts the Arabic PLC which meets monthly over Zoom. The group was started in 2020 and has been going strong for the last four years, with around 30 participants joining regularly each month from all across the Puget Sound region.
One of those participants is Maiy Abouzied, the director of Early Beginners Daycare. Maiy has been attending the Arabic PLCs since 2021. “Having PLCs in Arabic has helped me a lot,” Maiy said. “It’s helped me to understand how to better take care of the kids.”
One of the biggest ways PLCS have helped Maiy was giving her more information about how to support children with special needs and better understand children’s emotions.
“I didn’t have kids with special needs before, but now I do, and I wanted to learn more about [how to care for them],” Maiy shared. “I’ve learned a lot about kids’ emotions and I now know how they are feeling. We’ve talked about sharing information and resources with families, so now I know how to do this to help the parents.”
PLCs have also helped Maiy connect with peer providers and she’s invited many to join the meetings with her. “PLCs have helped me [build community] a lot, which I didn’t have before,” Maiy said. “I share all of the information I have with my friends. My husband is a provider too, and all four of my sisters have a daycare. All of my friends, too! I tell all my family and friends about the PLCs and share the Zoom link with them so I have a bigger group to attend with.”
For Maiy and her network of peers, it all comes down to providing the best possible experience for the children she cares for and the families she serves. “We want to learn and grow because we are all with kids. And we want to best care for the kids.”