Teaching Early Years: Theory and Practice

Dr. Amanda Thomas is a Senior Lecturer in Early Years education at USW and teaches on the Early Years Education degree and the Working with Children and Families degree. She has taught in both Primary and Further Education before taking up her role in higher Education in 2011. Amanda currently teaches on a range of education modules including play, child development, pedagogy, and leading and managing others. She competed her PhD in 2018 exploring children’s schemas in the Foundation Phase. She has had books and research published on Early Years education, Schemas and Transitions within education. Amanda has just completed a suite of materials for the Welsh Government on schemas. In her spare time, Amanda is a trustee of a charity trying to restore the former miners’ institute in her local village.

Karen McInnes has recently moved to Norland College as Research Fellow Previously she was Programme Leader: Postgraduate and International in the Institute for Education at Bath Spa University. She has been an Award Leader for the MSc Play Therapy and MSc Play and Therapeutic Play at the University of South Wales and completed her PhD in play and learning in the early years and qualified as a play therapist whilst there. She has also been a Senior Researcher with Barnardo’s UK Policy and Research Team researching various issues affecting children and their families and making policy recommendations based on her research. Karen has extensive experience working with young children as a play therapist, speech therapist and teacher. She has published on various aspects of early years education and play and is the co-author of The Essence of Play (Routledge, 2013).