Our Program and Approach
At KU Maidstone Children’s Centre, childhood is celebrated. When they play and explore, children's imagination and curiosity is sparked - they enjoy learning and are inspired to continue learning more.
We are dedicated to providing a high quality education and care service that concentrates on individual children and embraces families as the child’s first educators.
Our play-based program and learning environment intentionally provide opportunities and activities based upon the Victorian Early Years Learning and Development Framework, for your child to learn to socially connect with peers, their environment and their community. We encourage children to laugh, think, question and learn. Their sense of self and confidence grows as they make connections with each other, and build warm, trusting relationships with our team.
We observe and record children’s development, interests and strengths and plan the learning environment based on this knowledge. This approach facilitates in children a lifelong love of learning and curiosity.
Our centre is a welcoming and nurturing space where each child is immersed in a rich tapestry of educationally interactive experiences – a space where children are supported to be their own, unique selves, growing and developing a sense of belonging and empowerment.
Our educational program offers children the opportunity to engage in a wide variety of learning experiences, each specifically designed to promote children’s confidence as capable, active participants in their own learning. Children are presented with a range of experiences including gardening, arts and crafts, music and movement, physical play, block building, sand and water play, science experiments, early numeracy activities such as counting and measurement, and early literacy activities such as reading, drawing and writing.
We greatly value the strong relationships between our staff, children, families and our community, and we look forward to the opportunity of including your family in the life of our centre.
Our Focus Area
In addition to the high quality well-rounded educational programs we offer, all KU centres are encouraged to develop an area of focus.
At KU Maidstone, we have focus on the development of strong, respectful and reciprocal relationships with children and their families.
We build this approach into our program through the implementation of the key educator approach. We feel that the children benefit from this focus because continuity and consistency of care between the family and educators establishes familiarity for children, building a sense of trust and connection with educators and the service. This in turn leads to children’s positive engagement with educators, resources and learning.
The key educator approach assigns one educator to a small group of children within each room. This educator will be the link between home and service. The key educator will meet each individual child’s specific needs while building connection and relationship. Children remain in their room and age group for the calendar year and at the beginning of each new year will transfer with an educator to this next age group. This allows peer groups and educators to remain connected during their time at the service.
Our Quality
Our centre opened on 10 January 2022 and will be independently assessed by the Department of Education and Training Victoria under the National Quality Standards.
However what matters most is what our families think....
“Experienced, patient caring educators. Professional admin staff and nutritious meals. The team at KU are amazing. KU Maidstone is a brand new, spotless and calm environment for children to learn and grow; both my children attend there. We are a very happy KU family and would recommend to other families living in the area. 5 stars.” - KU Maidstone Parent
Our Environment
Each KU centre is unique. The best outcomes for children are created within relationships and interactions between children and staff, and children and their families, not within four walls. We work hard to create beautiful, interesting, homelike learning environments for children - whatever our setting.
Our playground is designed to maximise the use of the natural environment and allow children to play and explore as they would in their own backyard. We offer stimulating activities that arouse children’s curiosity and encourage them to choose from a variety of planned experiences, expanding their learning potential. Our playground includes natural elements such as sand, water, grass, mud, leaves and twigs, and we also offer gross motor experiences such as climbing, jumping and physical play. We foster the holistic development of each child so they feel inspired to create, imagine and play.
Our Practice Statement
We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land on which we meet, work, live, play and learn, the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung and Bunurong Boon Wurrung peoples of the Kulin Nation.
We pay respect to Elders past present and emerging and acknowledge past and ongoing injustices experienced by Australia’s First Peoples.
We honour Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples connection to country, community and culture, and respect their right to take the lead in defining what and how their children’s culture is shared and who teaches them.
We recognise the legitimacy of the impact of bias and injustice on the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Recent history of bias and injustice include (but not limited to):
- Children stolen from families
- Children excluded from accessing education
- Children incarcerated and abused in institutions
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people enslaved in unpaid work
- Exclusion of local languages
- No right to vote
- No access to basic human rights
We commit to working for the self determination of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. We commit to join them in speaking their truths and providing culturally safe environments.
