Biggles Philosophy
Children at Biggles childcare are our taonga and we believe they should be treated with care, respect, and kindness. We create a caring learning environment based on respect, patience, presence, love, empathy and understanding. We provide a supportive environment where children are encouraged to explore and learn gaining a sense of security and belonging in the world around them. We strongly believe in empowering children to be competent, capable, confident and independent learners.
Teachers work collaboratively to provide a nurturing, social and respectful environment for all akonga, where the concept of Ako is valued. Teachers encourage children to be able to express their feelings, thoughts and ideas freely in a supportive environment. Te Whāriki is the foundation that leads and guides our teaching practices along with upholding the principles of Te Tiriti O Waitangi. Through this we strive to imbed strong foundations and lifelong learning dispositions.
We encourage children to be ‘who they are’ respecting and valuing their cultural roots, and beliefs whilst honouring parent/whānau aspirations for their children. Biggles Team develop and maintain positive, respectful, trusting, engaging and reciprocal relationships with parents, whānau and the wider community.
We provide a natural outdoor environment which supports the children’s physical development, exploration, learning about nature, group social play while offering quiet spaces. Therefore the environment is considered the 3rd teacher (Fraser & Gestwickis, 2002).
“Play is the highest expression of human development in childhood, for it alone is the free expression of what is in a child’s soul”.
Fredrich Froebel
Our Curriculum
Our learning programme at Biggles is based on TeWhāriki, the Ministry of Education’s Early Childhood Curriculum, and our learning environment is influenced by the philosophy of Reggio Emilia, which emphasizes multi-sensory learning, self-direction, and expression, and relationships with other children.
By the time our children transition to school, they have a firm grasp of the social and self-management skills they will need to enjoy a confident and positive start to their primary schooling. They also have core early literacy and numeracy skills and have been introduced to some fundamental elements of the other components of the primary school curriculum – science, technology, social science, art and health and physical education.
