Early childhood development and the ‘next 1000 days’
Dr Catherine Draper, Associate Professor in the SAMRC Developmental Pathways for Health Research Unit at the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, attended the PEDAL Conference 2025 to present her work on ‘the next 1000 days’ (2-5 years).
Play: The future of learning and thriving
Bo Stjerne Thomsen, Head of Educational Impact at LEGO Education, attended the PEDAL Conference 2025 to discuss how play can be more deeply integrated into education, work, and society.
Delivering on the Plan for Change to give every child the best start in life
Stephen Morgan MP, Minister of Early Education at the Department of Education attended the PEDAL Conference 2025 to speak about the Plan for Change and giving every child the best start in life.
Early Years Library Introductory Workshop
On this page you will find all the resources needed for the Early Years Library Introductory Workshop. Start with the welcome video below, which will give you a brief introduction to the workshop. Then watch the videos in order. Leaders and champions should watch videos 1 to 7. Other members of staff only need to […]
PEDAL’s new report for the Starlight Children’s Foundation
This literature review explores the connection between play and children’s health in healthcare contexts.
Trusting play to be meaningful data: using sand tray as a play-based research method with an adapted interpretative phenomenological analysis
PEDAL PhD student Sydney Conroy explores using play itself as data for the purpose of research.
PEDAL’s new report for The Centre for Emotional Health
Our new report investigates how employers’ can support parents’ emotional health and their parenting.
Fostering the psychological wellbeing of children diagnosed with cancer: Multidisciplinary insights in paediatric oncology
PEDAL PhD student Paulina Perez-Duarte Mendiola contributed to this paper which was published last month in the Psycho-oncology section of Frontiers in Psychology.
It’s a Pandemic in the Playborhood: An International Perspective of Play Therapists on the COVID-19 Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, lockdowns and beyond, impacted many professions and workplaces, including therapists and their therapy rooms.
Supporting Learning Through Play
A Play Commission Submission by Dr Soizic Le Courtois, Manogya Sahay and Qiming Liu
Common elements approaches to support early childhood development
In this PEDAL Conference 2024 recording, Prof Sara Baker, CEI's Dr Stephanie Smith and Emma Cook from Department of Health and Social Care present: Common elements approaches to support early childhood development.
Using young children’s perspectives in research and practice
In this PEDAL Conference 2024 recording, PEDAL staff present research which uses playful methods to elicit the perspectives of young children to better understand their experiences of school and hospital.
Innovative ways to support decision makers to use evidence in national and local systems
In this PEDAL Conference 2024 recording, Sally Hogg presents PEDAL's Mobilise programme and Foundations' Becky Saunders talks about Foundations' work to support local systems to improve services for families with young children.
Innovative approaches to support language development and the home learning environment
In this PEDAL Conference 2024 recording, Prof Jenny Gibson presents her research findings that demonstrate the connections between a high-quality early language and communication environment in the home and children’s later school readiness and literacy outcomes in key stage 2.
Innovative ways to use technology to support parent-child interaction
In this PEDAL Conference 2024 recording, Rob Hughes presents Tandem - a ground-breaking app which uses AI to support active engagement between parents and children, and Eloise Stevens and Nesta's Lauren Liotti and Zhen Rao talk about PEDAL’s Playtime with Books programme.