| Name | Kathryn Ivil |
| Job Title and Organisation | Nursery Manager: The Aviary Nursery |
| Introduction/Background (experience, qualifications, current work/research, etc.) | Kathryn is from The Aviary Nursery. This is an inclusive day nursery with children attending from the local community, as well as being placed through a multidisciplinary panel. We strive to individualise play based learning for all children, including those with autism.
Kathryn – As a young person I was always babysitting and knew that this was an area I wanted to work in. Completing my child care course in 1979, I have been working in early years ever since, starting at Southampton University Day Nursery, private nanny, preschool; Portage and now back at a nursery. My interest in special needs grew when my cousin was born with Down Syndrome. This introduced me to the Portage service and gave me an insight to the battles parents face when they have a child who is different which is why I want to be part of ACoRNS. |
| What does the ACoRNS project mean to you? | Our involvement in ACoRNS is driven by the desire to explore ideas developed through research to make a personal difference to every child.
We are interested in the project as a way to work collaboratively with others from a range of backgrounds in order to develop our practice to reflect current research as well as create innovative ways of working that will benefit children. |
| Areas of interest | We are focussed upon finding ways to apply autism research into the early years education of children and of ways to illuminate what children are telling us. |