How Big Are Your Worries Little Bear?

Jayneen Sanders (aka Jay Dale) is an experienced Australian early years educator, children’s book author, and publisher.

She began her teaching career in the 1980s as a primary school teacher in rural Queensland, Australia, before moving to Melbourne, Victoria, to teach at several inner-city schools. In 1985, Jayneen transitioned to a career as an educational editor and publisher.

In the early 90s, Jayneen and her partner lived and worked in Japan for over three and a half years as English teachers, where her first daughter was born.

Upon returning to Australia, Jayneen began working as an educational author and packager, authoring and producing numerous award-winning titles for the educational publishing industry. She is also an accomplished children’s book author, contributing to literacy series such as ZigZags, Totally Kidz, Deadly and Incredible, and a children’s picture book series for Penguin.

Jayneen is currently the lead author of the ‘Engage Literacy’ series, published by Capstone, for which she has written over 150 titles.

A mother of three daughters, Jayneen served as a school councillor at her local school for over seven years. This experience, combined with her time as a teacher and parent, inspired her to question the measures in place to protect children from inappropriate touch in schools. Realizing that little was being done, she utilized her authoring and publishing skills to write ‘Some Secrets Should Never Be Kept,’ aiming to help parents, carers, and teachers address this subject and encourage children to speak up.

Following the positive reception of ‘Some Secrets Should Never Be Kept,’ Jayneen recognized a need to further develop prevention education. She engaged in Protective Behaviours professional development and attended numerous conferences on child safety, empowering herself to provide age-appropriate and empowering body safety and consent education.

Jayneen went on to develop and publish a comprehensive Body Safety and Respectful Relationship Teacher’s Resource Kit and has written many more children’s books focusing on body safety, consent, respect, gender equality, social and emotional intelligence, and diversity and inclusion.

Currently, Jayneen works with her partner, Mark Sanders, running Educate2Empower Publishing. Her passion for child safety and empowerment continues, with new manuscripts and free downloadable resources regularly in development.