Here, at Explore & Develop Narraweena we view our relationships with our children and their families as the foundation for our curriculum. We incorporate their voices into our program as we strive to empower and foster autonomy within the children in our care.
Through ongoing professional development, our educators ensure that their practices and approach to early childhood delivers a high standard of education and care and reflects both theoretical and current perspectives. In conjunction with this, we are guided by The Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) which encompasses the three aspects of belonging, being and becoming.
We adopt a holistic view of children which enables them to grow across all areas of development. We prepare children for a life beyond these walls and foster both curiosity and independence as we aim for our children to leave our service as confident and involved learners. There is a focus on natural environments both indoors and out which promotes our children to develop both a love of and affinity with the natural world.
Our education and care service is owned and operated by Amanda Roberts and Sabrina Bombara, two locally known Early Childhood professionals with over 20 years’ experience in the industry. They lead their team with a hands-on approach.
Our educators are motivated and dedicated to providing the highest quality care and education to children and families in our community.
The learning environments within our space our carefully thought out and created to enable them to be the third teacher. These environments are reflective of the individual children within that space and promote the development of confident and involved learners.
We are fortunate to have a large natural outdoor environment enabling our children to have access to and make connections with the natural world. We encourage our children to extend and challenge their physical skills through careful and considered risk taking.
We view families as the first and most influential people in their children’s lives and therefore strive to collaborate and work in partnership with them.
With an open door policy, we encourage parents to engage in experiences within the service and foster a sense of connection and belonging.
We are situated on the grounds of Narraweena Public School and operate as part of their wider community. Through the community garden, visits to the classroom and participation in school events, our children become familiar with and comfortable in a school environment.
Sabrina Bombara and Amanda Roberts are dedicated, professional and qualified Early Childhood educators who have strong connections to the community. Their commitment to delivering a high quality service is evident as they remain on site daily to offer leadership through their hands on approach. They consider the Rights of the Child in their approach to Early Childhood care, and create a service which is inclusive of all children. They believe that all children have the right to be heard, the right to feel safe and the right to high-quality education and care.
In our 0 – 1 and our 1 – 2-year old environments, we foster a strong sense of connection and belonging as we focus on building secure and trusting relationships with our children. With high educator-to-child ratios, we can provide a flexible routine to cater for the individual and ever-changing needs of the young children in our care.
With a focus on independence and autonomy, we view our children as capable and competent little people. We constantly offer opportunities for children to extend their skills and knowledge, in meaningful context and based on the world in which they live. Connections with nature and sensory experiences, feature in our program on a daily basis to provide children with the opportunity to make meaning using all of their sensory capabilities.
In the toddlers’ room, we acknowledge their very strong sense of autonomy and we endeavour to foster this at every opportunity. As we support independence we not only build their self-help skills, but also enable them to develop a strong sense of self.
With their developing imagination and growing curiosity we seek opportunities to feed their inquisitive minds. In both the indoor and outdoor environments we offer an array of experiences that cater for the many different languages and learning styles of the children within this space.
Our preschool environments offer challenge and promote children to extend their own interests, skills and abilities. Through supportive educators and stimulating environments, children within these rooms engage in hands on exploration and considered risk-taking. We believe that this supports dispositions for learning and will, in turn, create confident and involved learners who are able to resource their own learning.
Our ‘Transition to School’ program begins from birth as we support all areas of development and prepare children not only for school, but for life beyond it. Literacy and numeracy is embedded into everything that we do. This allows it to occur in meaningful contexts, which are more readily absorbed.
We are fortunate to have an abundance of space in our large natural outdoor environments. We call it our ‘Adventure Playground’ as it offers the children the right balance of risk and adventure. It affords the opportunity for children to run, climb, jump, explore and experiment.
We encourage children to develop a love for and affinity towards nature as they engage in the outdoor environments. Children learn best through hands on experiences and this is achieved through the many sensory experiences we offer, including our mud kitchen which features in our outdoor spaces.
We have both a community garden with the school as well as a worm farm and vegetable garden within our own outdoor space. This allows children to develop positive attitudes towards food as they connect to the process from the earth to the table.
Explore & Develop Narraweena
78 McIntosh Rd
Narraweena NSW
2099
Phone: (02) 9972 2535
sabrinab@exploreanddevelop.com.au
amandam@exploreanddevelop.com.au
Monday – Friday
7.00am – 6.00pm
