Gowrie Victoria

This term, the children at our Minindee Road Kindergarten have been learning the language of clay, finding more than one way to shape an idea.

Educators guided the group through pinching, rolling into coils, joining pieces together and smoothing surfaces with water, building confidence in each skill before combining them. A pinch pot became a spider guarding a nest of eggs, a rolled coil became a rocket ship ready for lift-off.

Children are learning there is no single way to work with clay. Clay lets them express their ideas, tell stories and share their interests.

In the lead up to Early Learning Matters Week, educators at our Broadmeadows Valley service asked the children what they love about learning while playing at kinder, and they expressed their thoughts in different ways.

From art mediums to conversations and photos, the children created posters, books and displays throughout the hallways to share with families who were invited to come play with the children in their learning environments.

Our team always enjoys being able to showcase and share children's learning with families and the community!

This week, the children in our Barrawarn room at The Harbour have been having fun mark-making with chalks, pastels and paints, and visiting the local park near the library to play.

By engaging in these experiences, children have been developing skills to carry with them including teamwork and problem-solving on the climbing equipment, crossing the midline through painting, strengthening wrists by drawing on vertical surfaces, and taking risks with the support of educators.

When we provide children the tools and opportunities to explore, they build the confidence and curiosity to keep learning for life.

The children in Wattle Group at Oberon Kindergarten have been enthusiastically using dice to support their counting and number recognition skills. They rolled the dice, counted the dots carefully, and matched loose parts to the corresponding numbers shown.

As their confidence grew, the children extended their learning by combining two dice and adding the numbers together. They demonstrated increasing accuracy in counting, one-to-one correspondence, number matching, and early addition skills while remaining engaged and focused throughout the activity.

This hands-on experience supported their ability to recognise numbers in different forms and helped build a deeper understanding of number concepts.

A friendly reminder to graduates of the Mentoring for Provisionally Registered Teachers (PRT) Program at Gowrie from 2019 onwards, we invite you to participate in a joint research project between Gowrie Victoria and Deakin University who are working together to better understand your experience of the value-added elements of the program.

To learn more and express your interest in participating, please email Deakin University Researcher, Dr Jessica Ciuciu at [email protected]