Our Philosophy

Shine Bright Epsom Kindergarten Philosophy

Each year we review our Statement of Philosophy. This provides the opportunity to stop, reflect, and rethink ‘what we do and why we do it’. Philosophy by its very nature celebrates diversity of thought and opinion. It means negotiating and considering the personal values and beliefs of everyone connected to our service.

Element 7.1.1 of the National Quality Standard is ‘Service philosophy and purpose: A statement of philosophy guides all aspects of the service’s operations’.

We acknowledge that our kindergarten stands on the traditional lands of the Dja Dja Wurrung People and pay our respects to elders, past, present and emerging.

We acknowledge the rights and interests of children and respect for all cultures are paramount in all our dealings with families and children.

We strongly commit to Child Safety and wellbeing.  We are committed to providing all children with environments where they feel heard, safe, supported and empowered to grow in their own individual ways.

We understand our duty of care and prioritise the safety and well-being of all children. In everything we do we seek to protect children.

We believe in forming positive relationships between child, family and educators to enable the child to feel supported and safe at kinder. This will, in turn, provide them with opportunities to grow and flourish so they are ready for their future journey to school and beyond. We value the journey that each child and family undertake, focusing on the quality of the experience. A family-centred practice approach will underpin our program.

We believe in Play-based and inquiry led learning. Play-based learning uses children’s natural motivation to play as a context for learning. During play, students inquire and learn using their imagination to explore, experiment, discover, collaborate, improvise and create. When children are able to pose questions and investigate the answers, they feel in charge of their own learning. Inquiry-based approaches to learning harness this spirit of investigation, creating an interesting, engaging and meaningful curriculum that uses children’s interests and questions as a starting point for effective learning. ‘Active involvement in learning builds children’s understandings of concepts and the creative thinking and inquiry processes that are necessary for lifelong learning’ (EYLF, p. 32).

We believe in supporting children to further develop effective communication skills in teamwork, negotiation and self-expression to assist them in navigating through social situations and experiences.

We believe that children learn best in a safe and nurturing child initiated play based environment that supports self-confidence, trust, creativity and diversity.

We take every opportunity to further our professional knowledge, looking for new ways to stimulate and improve children’s learning and development.

We acknowledge that every child is unique and requires time to explore, investigate, imagine and practice skills at their own pace. We aim to create programs accessible by all which respect the individual diversity displayed by children.

Our role as Early Childhood Professionals is to draw on our knowledge, experience and expertise to design a program which is flexible, encourages process over product, views children as capable and helps them to develop trusting, secure positive relationships.

We respect diversity in our community and encourage families to become part of our kindergarten culture.

We pride ourselves on mutual respect in all relationships.

We value our world, fostering sustainability and care for the land. We minimise waste and believe in reuse, reduce, recycle.

We draw upon the strengths of all team members to promote a dynamic environment that meets the needs of all users. We aim to be life-long learners of pedagogy and offer the children and families we work with, best practise and responsive growth to their needs and educational outcomes.

Child’s Voice – Our children value:

• making new friends
• helping people
• playing with friends
• learning new things
• people being kind and friendly
• playing
• no hurts
• friendships
• Playing games
• Looking for treasure
• Washing hands and eating fruit
• Going to the toilet
• Learning knowledge about things
• Learning
• Doing fun stuff
• Sitting next to someone
• Reading books
• Doing yoga
• Learning for school
• All different things
• Doing paintings
• Doing playdough
• Eating

Our children believe our kinder makes them feel:

• Good because they get to see their friends
• Happy because they get to play with their friends
• Happy because there’s so much stuff
• Happy because they get to see all the teachers

Our Families value:

• Inclusivity
• Kindness, connection and an emergent curriculum
• Child First approach
• Feeling connected with their world and with others to develop a sense of belonging
• Developing independence through problem solving and resilience