The Nido Experience
The first five years lay the foundations for a child’s development and health. It’s also the time where their curiosity peaks, rapidly absorbing information from their surroundings and interactions with others. Because children benefit from both multi-age interactions, as well as being grouped by age, the Reggio Emilia approach encourages and enables this.
Age groupings at Nido
We welcome babies from six weeks to school age children and have tailored learning programs for every child. More importantly, through our quality care, we will also give all the comfort that your child needs when you can’t be there.
Nursery (6 weeks to 18 months)
Your child needs love when you aren’t around, and we are here to give them this. Be it a hug, to read them their favourite story or just to make sure that they have their favourite comforter. All our Educators are carefully chosen, not just for their qualifications, but because they have extensive experience in infant education and are also loving and nurturing people.
At Nido, our Nursery focuses on five key areas:
- Identity: Starting to be self-aware and can recognise themselves in a mirror
- Community: Understanding that they are part of a community
- Regulating: Beginning to learn to regulate their feelings
- Learning: Starting to learn by trial and error
- Communication: Learning verbal and non-verbal ways to communicate their needs
Toddlers (18 months to 3 years)
As you watch your toddler become more independent, you also know that they still have so much to learn and will continue to need so much love and attention. In fact, 90% of your child’s brain development happens before they turn five and in toddlers, much of this learning happens from play.
At Nido, our Toddlers focus on five key areas:
- Identity: Starting to gain autonomy
- Community: Becoming aware of social behaviour, empathy and their friendships
- Regulating: Continuing to learn to co-regulate their emotions
- Learning: Increasing their learning by trial and error, taking on more risks and starting to problem solve
- Communication: Staring to find their verbal skills, learning how to interact and also express themselves
Kindergarten (3 years to school)
We know families have a choice regarding the introduction of their child to kindergarten. Either kindergarten in long day care, or sessional kindergarten are available for children in the year before they start school. So what’s the difference?
| Nido Early School long day care Kinder | Sessional Kinder | |
|---|---|---|
| Bachelor-level early childhood teachers |  |
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| Full day to provide flexibility for families | |
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| Full day with fully qualified and registered teacher | |
Sessions only available for total of 15 hours per week |
| Continuity of care with no change of setting required | |
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| Holiday care available | |
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| Nutritious meals and snacks provided throughout the day | |
Families must provide lunch and snacks for children |
Nido Early School Kindergarten
At Nido Early School, our kinder program is specifically designed to prepare your child for school. We focus on the social and emotional development of a child as an integral part of providing the foundations for school readiness. Our kinder programs follow each State’s framework, milestones and standards, with our Educators implementing milestones in a fun and engaging way.
Our play-based curriculum caters to all children’s interests, and we also incorporate structured learning experiences to facilitate school readiness:
- Learning to work with others and form friendships through group experiences and cooperative play
- Developing the skills needed for reading, writing and mathematics, in both structured and play-based experiences. Our literacy program includes ABC’s, speech, emergent writing, reading, letter recognition, show and tell and storytelling
- Expressing creativity through music, dance, movement, and art
- Continuing to develop verbal skills and practice active listening.
Choosing a Nido Early School as your kindergarten
The government supports the long care kindergarten program by providing funding to Nido Early School for additional resources to be implemented into our program. This does not impact your daily fees and you will still be entitled to the childcare subsidy. To be eligible for kindergarten funding at Nido, your child needs to attend a minimum of 2 days, or 15 hours across the week.
Before and After School Care
We seek to tailor learning for every child, whether they are in our care full time or with us before or after school.
We also believe children benefit from both sibling interaction and from revisiting their Early School. That’s one reason we offer before and after school care, as well as vacation care in some of our Early Schools, for primary school aged children. We also know that as a parent, you may need an extra hand.
Children in our after-school care are provided with an educational program appropriate for their age. They have the opportunity to play both indoors and outdoors and undertake projects that are of interest to them.