Our vision
To provide quality hands-on activities for children in a safe environment.
Our Philosophy
We believe children learn best by using their senses as it helps to build nerve connections in the brain’s pathways. Our activities are designed to provide children with hands-on learning, to develop new skills, and to explore new activities thus supporting their cognitive growth, motor skills, problem-solving, and language expression and development. In each session, we provide inclusive, positive, and engaging activities for children.
Principles
Secure, respectful, and reciprocal relationships: We provide nurturing relationships with the children and can identify when a child is upset or frustrated and doesn’t want to participate in an activity.
Partnerships: We provide a welcoming, safe and engaging environment for the children to visit, parents who drop off their children during the time of our incursions also comment and participate with their children, enabling a setting transition.
High expectations and equity: Both our creative sensory and our cooking programs create many opportunities to celebrate success and achievements. Particularly in our cooking session, we encourage children to try new foods that they might not normally eat or enjoy. We say, “smell it first”, “lick it”, to encourage a small success.
Respect for diversity: We incorporate and value the importance of cultural backgrounds throughout our activities. We recognise and promote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders by creating Aboriginal dot paintings and playdough colours at certain times of the year, in our creative arts/sensory sessions.
Ongoing learning and reflective practices: We continually stay up to date with the Early childhood, and Primary school curriculums, visit the Australian government website for COVID-19 updates, create risk assessments for any new visits, and reflect on our sessions to ensure a quality program is enabled.
Practices
We continuously review our pedagogical practices to ensure our program concepts are holistic and responsive to children. We take into consideration each child’s individual strengths, skills, and knowledge as we interact with one another. One particular child theorist approach we put into practice is the Maria Montessori approach, where we encourage independence and give children the opportunities for hands-on learning opportunities
One common verbal prompt we say to children is “have a go”, “try it”, “what does it feel like” to encourage the children to take safe risks and experiment. This helps build their self-esteem and self-identity. We see this many times when we provide jelly tubs with small world toys. Children can see it is an edible item with toys in it, but not sure whether to touch it or not? We look forward to providing meaningful and positive interactions to inspire children in our sessions
Sustainability
Sustainability is “environmental education” and at Decorati we are placing more sustainable practices into our systems and activities as much as possible.
We believe early learning of the natural environment and sustainability is important so we strive for a better tomorrow for our children to live in.
Learning about sustainability starts with everyday practice and we will strive to:
- Use recyclable materials where possible; purchase only recycled paper towels
- Send email newsletters
- Reusing materials where possible e.g. boxes for craft
- Using natural resources where possible
- Use a washing line to dry aprons rather than a dryer
Educating children we will strive to:
- Educate children in the natural decomposition cycle through exposure and participation in worm farms and composting food scraps where possible
- Promote awareness of the environment such as healthy eating, gardening, minimizing waste, recycling, and reducing water and energy consumption
- Assist children in developing an understanding and respect for the environment and encourage critical thinking.
Food Safe
Decorati is committed to the development and implementation of a Food Safety Program in all our Healthy Eating and Cooking programs, under Standard 3.2.2 Food Safety Practices and General Requirements.
We follow the Food Standards Australia to ensure:
(a) safe food handling
(b) control any hazards
(c) review the program annually
Child safety is embedded in our organisation. Our organisation’s policies and procedures reflect the Child Safe Standards.
