‘Collaborative Partnerships with Families and Communities’ is the 6th Quality Area (QA) of the National Quality Framework (NQF). QA6 aims to recognise that collaborative relationships with families are fundamental to achieving quality outcomes for children, and that community partnerships that are based on active communication, consultation and collaboration are also essential.
Based on this principal, we have planned and organised a variety of learning experiences, where we have invited, involved and partnered with our families and the community in our learning environments.
Easter Activities: During our Easter celebrations, we hosted our annual Hatching Eggs program. We also invited our families to make Easter Hats with their children, which later they presented to their families at our Easter Hat Parade.
Eid Celebrations: Celebrating Eid with sweets, we organised a ‘Guess How Many’ lolly jar for our families. Congratulations to our winning family!
Responsible Pet Education – Living Safely with Dogs: This program was one of the biggest hits so far! Tanna, the German Shephard who visited us for this special event, was a super-clever and friendly dog who stole our hearts! The program presentation was delivered via chats, role plays, stories and songs. With this program, our children and families gained the understanding that the child-pet relationship is not only physically and emotionally rewarding, but also a safe one.
Mother’s Day Celebrations: This year we celebrated our mothers with an elegant high tea followed by a fun-filled disco.
National Road Safety Week Experiences: National Road Safety Week was a week full of safety experiences. We started the week with a pledge to drive so others survive, then continued with a variety of educational and fun activities. One of the biggest highlights from this week was our bike week, where the children were invited to bring their bikes, scooters and helmets to practice safe riding in our car park. Children received their ‘L’ & ‘P’ licenses at the end of their learning. During our many planned activities throughout the week, we learnt and practiced slow and fast, go and stop, safe and unsafe/dangerous, red-yellow-green, first and last, and the importance of following road safety rules, car park safety rules, holding hands on the road, and being focused when on the road and outdoors.
WOW Day: Wear Orange Wednesday (WOW) day was all about showing our appreciation for our local SES volunteers. Children prepared an appreciation card with wonderful drawings and thank you messages for our local SES unit, which our Educators then visited them to present the card and thank them in person on behalf of our Grow children, families and educators.
We gained more understanding of the importance and the need of working collaboratively with our community members and how this benefits everyone in many ways. As stated in one of my previous posts… “We are stronger together than we are alone!”
Kind regards,
Miss Mel
Centre Director
Grow ELC Blacktown
