- Offer warm, loving and consistent care in your interactions with babies and young children, making good eye contact and handling children gently and respectfully.
- Respond sensitively and quickly to babies and young children’s needs, co-regulating by holding and comforting each child as they need.
- Learn from parents regarding caring practices at home so you can establish predictable and familiar patterns within your own interactions allowing the child to feel safe with you.
- Tune in to the meaning of communications such as crying, babbling, pointing or pulling and respond with interest, watching and understanding the cues they offer so they feel acknowledged and known by you.
- Notice and respect babies’ and young children’s signals that indicate they no longer want to play or engage; pause and be quiet when they turn away.
- Spend plenty of time with your key children playing interactive games, finger plays and singing familiar songs that engage you both in mirroring movement and sounds, following the child’s lead.
- Take primary responsibility for your key children’s physical care whenever you are both are present.
- Use care events to build a close relationship through respectful interactions and taking it slowly. Always explain what is going to happen and invite their participation.
- Be physically and emotionally available to babies and young children to provide a secure base for them to feel secure and supported in their play and independent explorations.
- Accept babies’ and young children’s need for security, allowing them to stay close by when feeling insecure or anxious. Caregivers may have to focus on regaining trust by remaining available to them constantly until they feel secure again.
- Get to know each baby’s and young child’s separation rituals and support them by being available when they are separating from and reuniting with their parents/carers.
- Let your key children know where you are going, what you are doing and who they will be with, when leaving the group during the day or planning leave.
- Support a child’s need to hold on to their special comfort object while playing or getting changed.
- Key persons should adopt a process of inviting, suggesting and then engaging with a child in interactions and care events to enable a cooperative relationship to develop.
