St. John's Lutheran Community Kindergarten

Today we had the privilege of completing our mural with Adrian from Wakka Boy. by adding our very own thumbprints. 🎨💛
A beautiful way to finish a meaningful piece of art — with everyone leaving their own little mark and becoming part of the story.

Thank you, Adrian, for sharing your culture, creativity and talent with us. We’re so proud of our mural and the special meaning behind it! 🌿✨

🌿 We’re so excited to welcome Adrian from Wakka Boy back to Kindy tomorrow to complete our beautiful mural! 🎨

This meaningful piece of art provides an opportunity for us to connect our Free to Flourish approach with our core values of being compassionate, purposeful, adventurous and relational.

Through the mural, we continue to explore what it means to connect with Country and land, building a deeper understanding and appreciation of the place we learn, play and grow in. 🌏💚

We can’t wait to see Adrian bring the final touches to life and continue this meaningful learning journey with our children!

Bush Kindy

What a wonderful day of exploring, creating, problem-solving and building confidence in our Bush Kindy environment! 🌳

The children challenged themselves in so many different ways — swinging, climbing ladders, balancing, exploring the trees and even having a go on the stilts. And it wasn’t just the children having fun… even Miss Alana joined in and had a go! 😊

Using our natural environment and loose parts, the children worked together to build a cubby using fallen sticks, experimenting with different ways to balance and construct their shelters. They used hand drills, developing coordination, strength and persistence as they explored how tools can be used safely.

We also explored the wonderful world of natural dyeing, using turmeric to create beautiful colours on cloth. 🌼 The children were able to see how natural materials can be transformed through hands-on experimentation.

There was so much more happening throughout the session — climbing, balancing, building, creating, imagining, taking safe risks, negotiating with friends and developing independence.

Bush Kindy provides endless opportunities for children to learn through play, connection with nature and their own curiosity. 🌿💚

Professional Learning & Our Brain-SET Environment.

Our Educators were incredibly lucky to engage in professional development last night with Dr Kathryn Murray, creator of the original Brain-SET process for shaping early childhood environments to promote learning.

Today, Dr Kathryn joined us at our service and worked alongside our team to reset and rethink our learning spaces. Together, we created dedicated spaces for intentional learning experiences and explored how our environment can support children’s brains to feel safe, connected and ready for thinking and learning.

A key part of today was recognising the value of seeing our room from the children’s perspective, getting down to their level, considering what they see, what captures their attention, what may overwhelm them and how the environment can invite curiosity, exploration and learning.

We loved the opportunity to put our learning straight into practice and reflect on how thoughtful environment design can make such a meaningful difference to children and Educator wellbeing.

A wonderful two days of professional learning, reflection and inspiration! 💜

“A calm brain is a thinking brain.”

Learning Through Our Outdoor Environment

Our outdoor learning environment is thoughtfully created using loose parts, recycled materials and real-life resources, from bricks, timber and pipes to shovels, buckets, pots, pans and cooking utensils.

These open-ended resources provide endless opportunities for children to explore, create, problem-solve and learn through hands-on experiences.

Through play, children are developing:
💪 Gross motor skills, strength and coordination
🧠 Proprioceptive awareness through pushing, pulling, lifting and carrying
🤏 Fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination
💭 Imagination, creativity and pretend play
🔎 STEM learning through experimenting, building, balancing and problem-solving
🤝 Collaboration, communication and teamwork

There is so much learning happening when children are given the freedom, space and resources to explore their own ideas.

Our outdoor environment is not just a place to play — it is a space to investigate, discover, create and build confidence through real-life learning experiences.

Dig, Build, Test, Reflect!

There was digging… and more digging! Then came tunnels, teamwork and lots of messy STEM learning!

Our Kindy engineers worked together to build tunnels and pathways before we turned the water on to see what would happen. They watched, tested, reflected and problem-solved when the water didn’t flow as planned.

The children strengthened their tunnels, made dam walls to redirect the water and experimented with new ideas. Through this hands-on experience, they were developing engineering thinking, problem-solving, collaboration, persistence and early scientific understanding.

It was messy, it was fun, and most importantly, learning was happening every step of the way!

Happy School Principal's Day, Mrs Bakker!💐

Today we celebrate and thank you for all that you do for our school community. Your leadership, support and care are truly appreciated.

We hope you enjoy these flowers and card, given with love from all of us at Kindy, as a small token of our gratitude.

"Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart." – Colossians 3:23

Wishing you a wonderful day! 🌸

Set your alarm, tomorrow your dollars are on double duty because it’s 👖Jeans for Genes Day! Time to break out the double denim and make your donation have double the impact.

Double your donation here: https://fundraise.jeansforgenes.org.au/double

Bush Kindy

Another wonderful morning spent with Wild Gully Therapy & Nature Play

Today we continued to build on our interest in rope play, using the trees to tie and secure ropes. This encouraged fine motor development, problem-solving, teamwork, and perseverance as children worked together to create and explore.

Our loose parts and construction area was busy with children designing and building, while others developed their hand strength and coordination using hand drills. Creative play flourished through the making of fairy gardens, painting, and imaginative small-world experiences.

Mud play and sensory exploration remained a favourite, with children enthusiastically mixing, pouring, experimenting, and discovering different textures and consistencies.

It was a morning full of creativity, collaboration, curiosity, and meaningful learning through play in nature.

We currently have limited vacancies. Please contact the kindergarten if you are interested in finding out more information.