Philosophy and Approach

Building Brighter Futures

Buttercups Childcare & Early Learning Centres believe each child, family member, educator, and the community form vital elements of our Centre.

To nurture a sense of community we endeavour to embed a holistic approach that caters for the needs of each individual that  engages, advocates and collaborates with our Centre.

1 – Buttercups believe every child has the right to feel safe and secure; physically and emotionally by:

• Encouraging and building each child’s self-esteem and sense of agency.
• Providing opportunities to embrace and respect each individual child’s home routines and rituals.
• Developing trusting, nurturing relationships between each child and educator.
• Encouraging, respecting, and valuing each child’s diverse background, contribution, and perspective.

2 – Buttercups believe every child is important, unique, and special and endeavour to foster this by:

• Promoting and incorporating each child’s voice and ideas into daily practices
• Providing a nurturing educational environment which reflects each child’s uniqueness in language, culture, customs, religious beliefs, spirituality, and values.
• Acknowledging and embracing each child’s uniqueness encourages them to express their ideas, creativity, and feelings naturally and freely.
• Supporting each child’s varying abilities and providing all children the opportunity to participate in experiences.

3 – Buttercups believe parents, carers and families are the first significant and constant caregivers in children’s lives and that invaluable family to educator relationships will allow us to collaboratively work together to promote positive early years education and care by:

• Supporting parents in their role.
• Encouraging the ongoing exchange of information in a respectful manner.
• Welcoming family participation, input and voices into our programs and practices.
• Providing parents / carers with information relating to other services available to them within the community.

4 – Buttercups believe children learn best through play and that early year’s education should have an emphasis on fun by:

• Co-programming between educators, families, and children.
• Providing time and opportunities for each child to develop their own sense of autonomy, responsibility, and independence.
• Encouraging each child to show respect for their environment and recognise their responsibility in the preservation of their world.
• Implementing sustainable practices by embracing the use of the natural environment and recycled resources within our programs to enhance learning.

5 – Buttercups believe critical reflection is essential when reviewing, evaluating, and updating our Centre curriculums, policies, and procedures to ensure we are consistently evolving along with industry standards whilst supporting our stakeholders. This is evident by:

• Challenging staff to see possibilities for extending and developing their learning, as there is always something new to learn.
• Involving children in the regular reflection of experiences, providing opportunity for each child’s voice, personal likes, dislikes, and opinions.
• Providing opportunities to all parents/families via surveys, newsletters and conversations with educators.
• Networking with various community agencies and services to share resources and evolving a support network to benefit all
• Implementing risk assessments, adhering to policies and procedures, safety checklists and compliance checks to ensure the safety and wellbeing of all individuals in our Centre.

6 – Buttercups believe in embracing the strengths of individual educators is essential for the provision of quality care within the  centre, we scaffold these strengths by:

• Encouraging ongoing staff professional development.
• Providing an environment that is supportive of each individual educator’s needs, especially in relation to their professional and emotional needs.
• Supporting staff, encouraging open, honest, communication, enabling the building of strong team relationships, and ensuring staff strengths are embraced.
• Creating a positive culture within the staff team that encourages staff professionalism and responsible conduct.

7 – Buttercups believe in providing a safe and inclusive environment that caters to and embraces each individual child, family and educators needs, abilities and culture by encouraging acceptance, respect and understanding within our community. We facilitate this by:

• Promoting stimulating environments that are inviting for all children, families and staff.
• Encouraging orientation visits prior to starting care to promote the establishment of supportive relationships as a basis for sharing knowledge about each child’s individual care needs.
• Supporting each individual child or educator’s nutritional requirements based around all medical or cultural reasoning.
• Supporting each individual child or educator’s medical and health needs.
• Being advocates for children rights.(Oct,2022)