0.1 – Welcome
This is certainly a huge step in your professional and also personal life. Managing your business by doing what you love will bring you countless rewards and an extraordinary career growth.
Before anything, I would like to clarify that I will share my knowledge that is based only on the experience I have gained during these years managing my own Family Day Care (and supporting other Educators on the same journey). Therefore, information related to regulations, laws, rules, policies, procedures, and other bureaucratic issues should be checked with the responsible departments.
For me, working with children is a pleasure, I am passionate about this profession and I cannot imagine my days without being involved with it. When I’m not working, I like to read and learn more about children’s development, especially in the emotional and behavioural areas.
I'm Natalia, an Early Childhood Educator
I am Brazilian, and I have been living in Australia since 2013 with my husband, also Brazilian. We came in search of new knowledge and opportunities. Although the initial plan was just to study English for a few months and return to Brazil, things were happening for us to stay here, and so we did. We recently acquired our Australian citizenship, which was a dream coming true. Today we call Australia home, and it is where we plan to live and grow our family.
I have always been very affectionate with children and I enjoy taking care of the people around me. In Brazil, since I was very young, I helped my mother with my two little brothers, which was something I did with so much love. I also could not wait to travel with my family at the end of the year, so that I could play and help to take care of my cousins, who were also very little.
However, in Brazil, I would not be able to work in the field of Early Childhood Education, as it is a very undervalued profession. So, I graduated in Advertising and worked for some years for different companies in the Marketing sector – which didn’t satisfy me.
When we arrived in Australia, after all the adaptation period in the new country, the process of learning the English language, and many other professional experiences in different fields, I decided that I would follow my intuition and do what I knew I was meant to do – work with children.
So I had to dedicate myself to studies again, and graduated with a Diploma of Early Childhood Education and Care. I had been working in the field since 2015, where I was able to put into practice everything I was learning during the course.
“Lala” is a lovely nickname that I earned from the children I cared for between 2015 and 2017 as Natalia was a little difficult for them to pronounce. Since then, children, families and even some friends have called me Lala – which makes me feel very special!
As soon as I finished my Diploma, I felt it was time to explore new possibilities and do what I was already doing very well, but this time, for me, and, in my own way. That’s when the idea of opening Lala’s Family Day Care came up.
When I decided to open my own Family Day Care, although I already had a few years of experience in the field, and thought that I would be prepared to start my business, I had no idea of the huge challenges that would lie ahead.
In my many kinds of research, I was unable to find any guidelines that would give me the direction and especially the step by step to open a Family Day Care. So, now, after all these years managing my own business and with the knowledge I gained from this big adventure, I decided to develop this course, in which I will be able to help other Early Childhood Educators who share the same dream and are looking for detailed information in a clear and easy way to understand so that you don’t have to “rack the brain” as I needed to.
I learned and continue to learn every day on this journey that involves a lot of dedication, determination, and constant work.