Bayside Early Learners

Remember Play? We do! The child’s right to play guides us in everything we do at Bayside Early Learners.

Learning occurs throughout the whole service, children are afforded time and space to enjoy the indoor and outdoor environments at their own choosing. Our Play environments support the need for children’s curiosity, freedom, and capabilities. Loose parts and sustainable resources are found throughout the whole service. We embrace learning taking place in all spaces, both indoors and outdoors. This is achieved through our Bush/Beach Kindy programs and various community outings.

Our service sits on Butchulla country, we foster an understanding and acknowledgement of the traditional custodians of the land and pay our respects to elders/ past, present and emerging.

Case Study: What do we offer children? A childhood!

By Renae Powell – Bayside Early Learners

Every child deserves a play filled childhood full of fun and joy. Nature play is something we are passionate about at Bayside Early Learners, we believe that children should be immersed in nature to have a happy and healthy childhood! We incorporate aspects of nature into all environments and ages within our centre both indoors and outdoors. Children have the freedom to move between both environments as they choose which sees most of their day spent outdoors engaged in play. Advocating for the rights of the child to play is at the heart of everything we do at Bayside Early Learners.

A childhood at our place is messy and fun. Our days are filled with sunshine and laughter. We find joy in the everyday moments of simply being together in nature. Our vision for our service was to create a place that felt like our own backyard growing up. We are a family owned and operated service, so we have always felt that sense of belonging extended to our families and Educators. We want our children to have childhoods like we did, we allow them the space and time to explore and delight in their own adventures.

Loose parts and natural elements invite our children to be curious and indulge their senses in free play. Don’t expect to find worksheets, group times or colouring in at Bayside! We are creative and passionate about letting children play and passionately believe that learning goes hand in hand with play. We know our children are capable learners, we celebrate our differences and know that we all progress at our own pace. Nature play is highly valued, children are absorbed in all aspects of the outdoor world. Free access to the outdoors is always an option with most children choosing to fill their entire day outdoors. Even when the children are indoors, we like to remind them of what they are missing out on, we use natural resources to provoke learning and wonder.

Our family of Educators is full of playful adults who live what they promote. Their family time is spent enjoying the spoils of our beautiful town Hervey Bay, whether that be swimming, fishing, or boating. We share our love of the outdoors with our community through our Bush/Beach Kindy programs. Our children spend their days exploring rockpools, climbing trees and feeling the sand between their toes. We have watched the children grow with confidence and spirit as they master new challenges and make their own discoveries in nature. While at Bush/Beach kindy, the children are calm and content in the moments they are creating for themselves.

Our families support us in every aspect of what we want to achieve, they to want their children to experience the joy of a childhood spent in nature. Families choose our service not because we are shiny and new but because we are warm and welcoming; we feel like home. Our passion and advocacy for young children motivates us to keep pushing the boundaries of what ‘childcare and Kindergarten’ can really look like for the children in our community.

Our relationship with Nature Play QLD developed after stumbling across a Nature Play passport. We loved learning all the ways we could involve children in nature and soon found ourselves sharing this newfound passion with families who attended our service. We soon signed up for an action research project which saw us really testing what direction we wanted to take our service in. The unanimous conclusions drawn from our data was that everyone preferred to learn outdoors. The children chose nature over plastic while Educators reminisced about childhood days spent making mud pies. It was clear that nature was the glue that bound us all together, a place where we all felt an overwhelming sense of peace and joy. These feelings of freedom and fun have stuck with us and guided every policy and procedure at Bayside Early Learners since.

It’s easy to open our doors each day. Together we have created a place where children play. Bayside Early Learners is for children and that’s what we offer, a childhood.