This article puts forward the idea that in order to sufficiently meet the needs of very young children and thereby develop quality provision, early years practitioners must develop a professional approach that combines personal awareness with theoretical knowledge. It argues that the development of such abilities is enabled in process-oriented training over an extended period of time and describes the ‘Key Times' Project (London Metropolitan University with the London Borough of Camden, 2000–2005) as illustration of a process that impacted positively on practitioners' professional self-worth through valuing self-awareness in relation to the physical and emotional dimensions of practice.
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