Our Childcare and Kindergarten Curriculum
The Foundation of our Curriculum
At our child care and kindergarten we use research and data to shape how we plan for the children who attend our service. Whilst there are facets of many theorists, some are more predominant that others.
We believe that that children are born with an innate need to form attachment consistent with Bowlby’s attachment theory. Our team make it a priority to form relationships with children and their families to offer them the best opportunity to thrive whilst at our service.
Our curriculum is based on Piaget’s cognitive, child development theory, observing and recording children at each stage of their development. Observations then form the foundations for our programs in each room, working on a rotational basis to ensure all children are challenged and planned for each month.
The Stages of Learning
In the sensorimortor stage, birth to two years, babies start to build their understanding of the world through their senses, touching, grasping, watching and listening. They also begin to develop a sense of object permanence, meaning they understand that object exist even when they can not see them.
In the preoperational stage, two to seven years, children develop language and abstract thought. This means, they can think about concepts and ideas that are not physical. They also begin to engage in symbolic play “pretend play” drawing pictures and talking about things that happened in the past.
Our well-resourced learning environments are based on Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory, encouraging children to learn through hands on experiences, with our qualified team supporting them to progressively learn and increase their skills and understanding of the world they live in.
A Sense of Belonging
A sense of belonging is what we want for each child, therefore, we provide some permanent play spaces in each room to create consistency and predictability. We believe that the learning environments should reflect the learning and display for the children and their families to see. This provides the vibrant colour to each environment.
Child care and Kindergarten Qualifications
Each learning environment has a Diploma Qualified educator leading the team and permanent qualified Assistant Educators. We believe that there are multiple teacher’s in each environment and our planning structure reflects this. Planning time is allocated to each team, each week and they decide how this will be shared out.
It is a requirement that all educators working with children have obtained either their Certificate 3 in Children’s services, their Diploma of Children’s services or they are a trainee working towards their qualifications. All trainees are paired with a mentor in our team to help guide them whilst they are studying.
How old does my child need to be to start at Meraki Early Learning Centre?
Meraki Early Learning Centre offers child care, kindergarten and educational programs to children aged six weeks to six years old. Our stimulating environments and qualified educators cater for the most curious of minds, adapting our child led programs to each stage of their individual development.