A day in the life

Before infants reach the age of 18 months they achieve so many milestones.

They begin to crawl and walk, pick up and manipulate objects, make their first sounds and words, play with objects and toys, explore the environment, search for objects and start to complete simple puzzles. It is a very busy and important time in the child’s life, and to achieve all of these skills they need security, stability, and the support and encouragement of caring people.

In all our rooms we program for each child individually. We do this by observing each child, noting their actions and abilities, their strengths and what challenges they are ready for and then we plan experiences and set goals that are developmentally appropriate for the child to achieve.

Our nursery room environment is set-up to encourage sensory and explorative play experiences for infants and babies with age appropriate toys, books, puzzles, musical instruments, art and craft activities, rockers and play equipment that is set to stimulate and spark learning experiences for our little ones.

The nursery room share a large outdoor play space with our possums, with individual play times set to allow the children ample time to explore their surroundings in an age appropriate environment. This playground consists of a large sand pit, various out door equipment, play mats and sensory items as well as rockers and outdoor learning resources.

Activities and experiences

Our nursery children are a busy bunch! So we’ve set out some of the fun activities we get up to below:

Activities such as push toys, rockers, balance beams and climbing are all planned to stimulate gross motor development.

Sand play, shape sorting, eating independently, painting, play dough and grip toys all increase fine motor and manipulative development.

Social interaction occurs through group play, waving hello and goodbye, separating well from parents, mirror activities and singing songs.

Puzzles, pop ups, hide and seek, art activities and craft also help the child experience different textures and materials and stimulates creative and cognitive development.

These are just some of the experiences your child will have in our babies room.

Communication

Each day we will communicate with parents about what has happened in our room. We will share the highlights of each day by making notes on our weekly program. Writing these daily comments on the program allows Educators to communicate with families about some of the meaningful activities and interactions of the day. These comments will be aligned with the government’s Early Years Learning Framework. Photos of the children illustrating their interaction with the curriculum will also be shared. This will all be shared along with the general important information about the children’s food intake, toileting and rest time.

Each week we will reflect in general about our journey together and this weekly reflection will be posted for parents to view. Regular centre newsletters will also be produced and shared with our Koala parents.

When your child first starts in the room the staff will ask you for a routine that your child follows for the day – when they feed, sleep etc, what comforters they need. This is so that our educators can best Endeavor to follow the routine that you use at home and make the transition as seamless as possible.

Nursery educators know how nerve wracking it can be for families to introduce their children to childcares, so they are dedicated to making this transition easier! Our parents are encouraged to check out the Owna app to follow along and receive pictures and videos of learning experiences from their child’s day.