Wawanesa Wee Care Inc. |
Come along on our pedagogical jouney with us....
Our journey began in 2018. We already felt as though we were a very progressive program, but we were looking for more! How could we really make our program child centered? How could we use the interests and abilities of the children to really move into a program where children flourished and had the confidence to try new things while being supported and encouraged?
This photo of the path will make more sense later in our journey!
Before RISKY PLAY, before pedagogy, we were like many child care programs. Panning activities, usually seeing what the children were interested in, or basing our activates off of the time of year (farming, Halloween, etc.) We had 'rules' in place for 'the safety' of the children, and for our own peace of mind and dare I say, some control! No pushing chairs, that too noisy! No dumping all of the buckets, that makes too big of a mess! NO climbing on the shelf, it’s for toys and our climber is for climbing. And other very 'grown up' and practical rules like that!
Our board has always been very supportive with professional development, and when I presented them with the idea that we could hire Brigitte as a pedagogical mentor for one year. This meant we had her visit four times a year, meeting with Jenn, Sharla and Teresa to discuss various parts of our program, and really dig into what we were doing and why....and if we needed to change it in any way to meet our goals and vision for Wee Care. The three of us then filtered the info to the staff. We spent each visit discussing our topic, then observing the children, taking pictures and videos, then dissecting them. It was amazing how we really began to SEE the children, their interests, personalities, the learning that was taking place and the needs that we could meet by a few program tweaks! It was a lot of self-control to not change everything in our program at once, but to take baby steps! We tried new things, observed more and took many opportunities to just watch and wait....count to 10 and see how the children could solve, discover or learn on their own or from each other. ONLY offering help, suggestions or even keeping another child from intervening for optimum learning to take place! Check out each visit in the following pages!
This photo of the path will make more sense later in our journey!
Before RISKY PLAY, before pedagogy, we were like many child care programs. Panning activities, usually seeing what the children were interested in, or basing our activates off of the time of year (farming, Halloween, etc.) We had 'rules' in place for 'the safety' of the children, and for our own peace of mind and dare I say, some control! No pushing chairs, that too noisy! No dumping all of the buckets, that makes too big of a mess! NO climbing on the shelf, it’s for toys and our climber is for climbing. And other very 'grown up' and practical rules like that!
Our board has always been very supportive with professional development, and when I presented them with the idea that we could hire Brigitte as a pedagogical mentor for one year. This meant we had her visit four times a year, meeting with Jenn, Sharla and Teresa to discuss various parts of our program, and really dig into what we were doing and why....and if we needed to change it in any way to meet our goals and vision for Wee Care. The three of us then filtered the info to the staff. We spent each visit discussing our topic, then observing the children, taking pictures and videos, then dissecting them. It was amazing how we really began to SEE the children, their interests, personalities, the learning that was taking place and the needs that we could meet by a few program tweaks! It was a lot of self-control to not change everything in our program at once, but to take baby steps! We tried new things, observed more and took many opportunities to just watch and wait....count to 10 and see how the children could solve, discover or learn on their own or from each other. ONLY offering help, suggestions or even keeping another child from intervening for optimum learning to take place! Check out each visit in the following pages!