We’re dedicated to helping early childhood educators who struggle to create engaging play invitations that spark curiosity and exploration become confident and skilled ambassadors of play.
Empowered Play Connections is a place for early educators to explore and learn how to create inviting play and learning spaces. We strive to offer authentic learning opportunities that are packed with activities and inspiration to spark confidence in early educators. All the good stuff and no fluff!
What makes Empowered Play Connections different? Brandie-Lee Wolbeck is the owner of EPC and the lead teacher at a preschool located in Edmonton AB, Canada. She is dedicated to creating courses and content that are reflective of realistic expectations in an early childhood setting. Brandie-Lee knows the struggle of trying to keep up with the ever evolving best practices in early learning. One peek at social media and it can feel like your doing all the wrong things & at risk of ruining children's development with worksheets or line-ups. Growth and change are made in baby steps. She strives to encourage early educators to grow and implement best practices without guilt or shame.
"Loved the Outdoor Play Course: Exploring Natures Materials. It was full of valuable information & easy to implement play invitations and outdoor play ideas. Money well invested!
-Alana S.
Join Our Community
Join a community of like minded childcare professionals.
Working in Early Childcare can be a challenging task. Our community is a great place to share and learn amongst other childcare professionals.
Invite Ease
It can be intimidating & time consuming to create mindful, fun play invitations every day! Our membership comes with a loaded library of ideas for art, outdoor play, messy play, sensory invitations and so much MORE!
Expand & Overcome
We know the challenges and obstacles such as working within ratio, creating a safe space, meeting families where they are at and more. We’re here to brainstorm with you and offer guidance in overcoming any challenges you face!
Meet Brandie-Lee
Founder of Empowered Play Connections
I have over 20 years of experience working with children and families. Since 2017 I have been teaching in an outdoor focused preschool and I have learned a lot through my experiences. The most important thing I have learned is that I have a talent for engaging young children and I want to share my enthusiasm with you. I want to help you on your journey, whether you teach preschool, work in a daycare, or other early education program.
I have also noticed a trend in early education that is evident on social media in regards to learning theories. There are many different learning theories and sometimes as an early educator I feel like I am always running a race to educate myself on the trends because if we are not practising the on trend learning theory we are doing things wrong.
It's exhausting worrying that an alphabet colouring sheet or organised circle time may ruin our students' childhood. I am exaggerating a bit here....but I trust you get my point. Social media can lend us to believe that there is a very definitive RIGHT and WRONG way to do things.
I believe that we all do our best with the knowledge and resources we have. Do we have room to grow? Absolutely. Are studies ongoing and thus best practices being re-evaluated and changing at what seems like a rapid pace? Yes.
Have I done all the wrong things? Oh you bet. 20 years ago I walked into home visits loaded with worksheets and sticker sheets.
Have I grown, evolved and learned more about child development? Yes.
Do I expect early educators, even myself, to do all the right things all the time? Nope.
No ones perfect. I value showing up authentically and to me that means: do my best in the moment, learning form mistakes & acknowledging that my best a year ago may look different than my best now.