Overview

Centre Philosophy

At Yarraville Community Kindergarten we would like to begin our philosophy by acknowledging the Wurundjeri people, who are the traditional custodians of the land on which we gather, learn and play on each day, and we pay our respects to their Elders, past and present.

We believe that children learn best through play and being able to engage in purposeful play. Our educational program is an emergent play-based program, that is influenced and created stemming from the children’s interests. The Victorian Early Years Learning and Development Frameworks guides our planning and implementation of our curriculum. With that, we use intentional teaching practices embedded in our program to help grow each child’s curiosity about the world around them, and for them to learn and respect the world in which they live in. Not only do we seek to develop each child, we also know of the importance of professional development of our team and that learning is an ongoing journey. This helps us to provide the best quality educational program we can.

At Yarraville Community Kindergarten we acknowledge each family as their child’s first teachers, and we welcome and encourage families’ ideas and contributions to our program. Through family engagement we are embracing diversity, as well as sharing in celebrations relevant to our community. This introduces each child to new ideas and concepts, or builds upon their existing knowledge. We strive to work in collaboration with families and having shared responsibility for their child’s learning and development, as well as offering support and guidance to families when needed.

Situated within the community we seek to create strong partnerships with local agencies, professionals and businesses. Through these conscious actions the children are then strengthening their knowledge of their local community, and they are then continuing to be the active contributors, as we help support their inclusion within their community.

We promote respect, friendships, care, inclusion, diversity, fairness, empathy and equity. These values are an integral part of our learning environment and role modelled through our educators’ daily actions and interactions with the children. Within our duty of care, we believe in and advocate for the rights of all children to feel safe and be safe, not just in their educational surrounding, but also in their home and community as outlined in the Child Safe Standards. This includes imploring all families to support those children most vulnerable in our community.