Thank you so much for visiting my website. My name is Michelle and I am the creator and owner of Little Wise Toys. I live in Greater London with my 14 year old daughter.
Going back a good few years now (leaving back in 2011), I spent ten years working on a range of children and young people focused policy areas across two central Government Departments – the Department of Health and Social Care and the Department for Education. While here, I project managed the development of some high profile programmes (e.g. the Healthy Child Programme for 5-19 year olds). My undergraduate and postgraduate degrees were also focused on policy development and research. My educational and work experience in both research and in creating policy frameworks and practical ways of supporting children and young people has offered invaluable insights over the years (please also see further details further down this page about my continuous professional development in the area of mental health and wellbeing).
When my daughter was small, I was keen to look for a more flexible way of working to allow me to combine my working life with being a mum. A combination of this change in direction; my skill-set and experience; a passion for engaging learning and supporting children and young people with developing important key life skills (with a particularly strong interest in supporting mental health and wellbeing); and a love for all things creative naturally led me to the creation of a concept that has now evolved into my small business.
Little Wise Toys offers a range of award winning travel friendly and educational toolkits for children and young people. The original educational toys in the 3-6 age range cover areas such as phonics, emotions, maths and dinosaurs. Following on from this, the Reframing Your Thoughts Toolkit for 6-12 year olds and the Reframing Your Thoughts Toolkit for teens were launched. These toolkits provide children and young people with the knowledge, skills and tools to help them to understand and manage their thoughts, emotions and feelings; and approach things in life in a way that promotes their confidence, happiness and resilience. I’m so pleased that the range grew further at the end of 2024. I now also offer a resource focused on helping children and young people navigate friendships (this is a digital product) and I have launched three further physical toolkits (for all ages) focused on anxiety, anger and grief and loss.
As well as all of the product range being used by parents at home, the kits also work well in 1:1 or group activities in a range of settings such as schools and counselling services.
Extensive research has gone into developing all resources and they have also been shared with a range of children and young people focused specialists such as teachers, a Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator (who is also a secondary school psychology teacher) a Child Psychotherapist, parents and children as part of the consultation process.
Care has also been taken to ensure that the products have a number of good environmentally friendly credentials – such as all paper and card materials being either recycled or from sustainable sources; and using magnetic material for the boards from an award winning environmentally friendly supplier that operates a zero-landfill policy.
All products also comply with relevant Safety standards.
You can find out more about the values behind Little Wise Toys here.
You can subscribe to Little Wise Toys via the subscription form.
I am also always looking for opportunities to continue to develop my own knowledge base and expertise. With this in mind, I have also undertaken a structured programme of both regulated and continuous professional development (CPD) to formalise my learning and underpin the wellbeing and mindset work that will be delivered through Inspired Path CIC. This includes the following regulated qualifications – NCFE CACHE Level 3 Diploma in Counselling Skills (RQF, Ofqual-recognised), TQUK Level 2 Certificate in Understanding Children and Young People’s Mental Health (RQF, Ofqual-recognised) and I am in the process of undertaking the AIM Level 3 Certificate in Special Educational Needs (Ofqual-recognised). Alongside this, I have completed a range of CPD-accredited training in child psychology, trauma informed practice, and life coaching in the areas of CBT cognitive behavioural coaching, neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), mindfulness, teenagers and neurodiversity. My training also encompasses safeguarding children and adults at Level 3. In addition, I am in the process of undergoing additional professional development, which I look forward to sharing more about soon.
In addition, I am delighted that I have recently become an accredited member of ACCPH (Accredited Counsellors, Coaches, Psychotherapists and Hypnotherapists).
I have also set up a new social enterprise called Inspired Path CIC, where I will be looking to share the learning I have gathered over the years about supporting mental health and wellbeing via additional channels, such as talks and workshops. You can find out more about the new CIC here.
Thank you so much for visiting.
Michelle
