Relational practices are at the heart of effective relationships between practitioners and practitioners and parents. Building a culture of partnership depends on everyone involved understanding and committing to authentic relational practice. However, practitioners, organisations, government departments, and communities across Australia are grappling with ‘where to start’ to build collaborative partnerships based on authentic relational practices. 

About the project

What is needed is a clearly defined Relational Practice Framework. A framework to support leaders and practitioners in modelling and exploring the attributes of partnership. A framework that enables everyone to experience a culture of partnership in every interaction, decision made and opportunity to work together.   

At the Centre for Community Child Health we find, synthesise and translate the best international evidence to inform policy, service delivery, professional practice and parenting. We design robust service systems and platforms to create and support innovation and change. This puts us in a unique position to co-design a practice framework in partnership with parents, leading practitioners and researchers in Australia. 

Our aim is to bring together the best available research and evidence, the practice wisdom of early years practitioners and leaders, and the experience and expertise of parents and families to co-design a highly practical ‘how to’ guide of the relational components of engaging and working with parents, and across services, in integrated service settings. 

Literature scan

This paper summarises what we know already about relational practice. This is the first step in the development of the Relational Practice Framework. This summary will serve as a springboard for our future conversations with practitioners and parents, where we aim to more deeply explore the ‘how’ of relational practice.

Read the Literature scan

Get involved

Complete our short online survey to share your experience on what helps and what is challenging in sustaining effective relationships, and your thoughts on the essential components of an early years relational practice framework. We will collate and synthesise the information gathered and come back to you – the co-designers – for further feedback and clarification.

More information

Please contact Deb Sestak deb.sestak@mcri.edu.au to discuss questions you have about the project.