Challenges and Objectives

C2DE parents aged 30-44 already know early years matters - the challenge was making them see it as a career worth choosing, not a low-paid, low-status job to settle for. That human problem sat inside a bigger policy one: in 2026 the government is funding 30 hours of free early-years childcare for eligible working parents, and delivering it needs a wave of new staff.

DfE needed content that could reframe the sector entirely - as joyful, purposeful and worth choosing - on a tight, social-first budget. The challenge was to make recruitment visible and culturally fluent; not just advertise a role but create content that would change how people felt about the role itself.

Early years has all the ingredients of great entertainment: surprise, wonder and a room full of children lighting up. The job isn’t a fallback - it’s a stage for one of the biggest roles you can play, for people who can hold a room, spark curiosity and help shape a child’s future.

Idea & Implementation

We took ITV’s most theatrical entertainment format out of the studio and into a real nursery.

‘The Masked Singer: The Magic of Early Years’ was a three-part content series built around the behaviours audiences already love: surprise, performance and real action.

Piranha surprised a nursery, led story-time and joined a craft class, before building to the show’s signature “Take it off!” reveal.

But the real content twist was revealing that it’s the people who do this job every day who are the real stars. The content used entertainment to reframe early years, proving that choosing early years isn’t just a job; it’s doing something big and purposeful.

Targeting Strategy

• Working with Bandicoot - the production company behind The Masked Singer - ITV used its unique access to the format’s costumes and alumni, giving DfE a recognisable primetime world without the primetime price tag.

• The full series was filmed in half a day at Prince Avenue Academy and Nursery in Essex with a small crew: Joel Dommett and Masked Singer winner Danny Jones brought the star power; Piranha joined story time for World Book Day.

• The boldest call was to go largely unscripted - a rarity in branded content, rarer still with children - capturing genuine exchanges between talent, children and practitioners that no polished script could match.

• It worked because DfE and ITV behaved as genuine partners, not client and supplier: DfE brought the policy ambition, audience insight and safeguarding rigour; ITV brought the format, its alumni and the editorial instinct to use them, staying strictly compliant throughout, but never at the expense of the classroom magic.

• The content was then built into a full ecosystem across ITVX, ITV main channel and YouTube, with 16 social cutdowns, a pause ad, sponsorship ident and two ITVX homepage takeovers.

• Each content touchpoint was designed to take the same joyful recruitment message into a different viewing moment.

Client Quote

“ITV gave a serious recruitment challenge a sense of joy. Putting our practitioners centre-stage with The Masked Singer reached exactly the audiences we needed - and made them feel something.”

HELEN HILDITCH-HAYES CAMPAIGN & EVENTS LEAD, EARLY YEARS RECRUITMENT, DEPARTMENT FOR EDUCATION