At Mother Duck Childcare we believe that children maintain the right to experience the joy of childhood as a fundamental principle throughout this year. Learning through purposeful play remains the foundation of pedagogical practice in our centres, to ensure that all children experience learning that is meaningful, relevant, challenging and satisfying.
At Mother Duck we look forward to welcoming children who have been with us in our younger Studios, as well as those who might be joining us from home or another setting. Our kindergarten year specifically focuses on supporting children 4-5 years of age in this exciting phase of learning. We operate a state government funded kindergarten year in all our Mother Duck settings – with university qualified teachers leading the teams.
We see the kindergarten year as the opportunity to support children on their continuum of learning as they bring greater depth to their understanding about the world around them. We look for many possible moments throughout the day to build children’s capacity for responsibility and accountability for their own learning, as together we explore all aspects of our curriculum.
The kindergarten year in Queensland has been designed in direct connection with Australia’s Early Years Learning Framework to ensure that “all children experience learning that is engaging and builds success for life”.
The learning and development continua that Mother Duck uses can be found in the Queensland Kindergarten Learning Guideline (pp.32-33) with a focus on the outcomes, key focus areas and significant learnings expected for all Queensland children attending kindergarten.
At all times, Mother Duck settings work within the QLD Kindergarten Funding Scheme guidelines, and as approved providers, ensures all children have access to our kindergarten teaching teams for a minimum of 600 hours a year (which is 15 hours a week over 40 weeks).
As we operate for 60 hours a week, kindergarten children therefore have an opportunity to access our curriculum for much longer than the minimum hours. This provides us with the potential to support children on long term projects of inquiry in order to empower them as 21st century thinkers and communicators.
We view Kindergarten children as competent, capable, creative learners with an abundance of imagination and curiosity about the world they live in. They approach the kindergarten year with experience, wisdom, hope and enthusiasm in order to make meaning of this transitional and important year.
At Mother Duck we understand and acknowledge that no child learns in isolation – rather they are always in search of relationships and interactions with people, ideas, materials, symbols and spaces. During the kindergarten year, the children make their learning visible to us through words, drawing, numbers, dance, painting, clay, music, movement, loose parts, transformative play and more.
In this way, our kindergarten studios become learning communities where children and teachers collaborate as researchers to co-construct and document significant experiences that originate from our inquiry lenses. In addition, families offer us the potential to bring vitality and richness to the kindergarten year through their own wisdom and life experiences.
Download our Kindergarten Program booklet, or to book a tour at your nearest Mother Duck Childcare Centre.
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