Kallista Nature Kindergarten
The George Tindale Memorial Gardens are looking magnificent for our gathering to hear about the Kallista Nature Kindergarten. Mountain ash reach up to the sky through a floral understory of rhododendrons, camellias, azaleas, magnolias. We can see this is a place children come to – patterns of twigs and camellia petals are dotted here and there.
Educators from Kallista Kindergarten explain how their programs run. All children in the rotational preschool program and both the three year old groups spend one session per week at the site. An extra educator is rostered on for each session. The whole session is run in the gardens - parents deliver the children straight there and pick them up from there at the end. Children arrive dressed in wet weather pants and jackets and good climbing shoes, and they wear red hats for visibility. The Tindale Gardens are managed by Parks Victoria, so educators work with rangers to decide things like cancellation policies or which parts of the garden to use.
Children play with what they find on the ground – picking flowers and leaves from living plants is discouraged. They climb trees and roll down the hill. They have found a hidey hole half hidden by brambles. There is a bench they use for ‘fishing’. The children are developing a shared culture of how to use this space.
Teachers tell us they are intrigued by how the children play differently here than back at the kindergarten (which also has a wonderful outdoor space). The preschoolers are quite independent and adventurous, whereas the three year olds tend to want more educator contact, asking for help to climb and balance and find things and staying close to the adults.
Like many outdoor programs, Kallista Nature Kindergarten was prompted by the squeeze when preschool programs were extended to 15 hours. They decided to respond by ‘adding to our program, rather than just adding to our hours’. Nature Kindergarten is now an integral part of the learning experience at Kallista and has greatly enriched their practice.
Find more information about Nature Kindergarten at Kallista here.
Educators from Kallista Kindergarten explain how their programs run. All children in the rotational preschool program and both the three year old groups spend one session per week at the site. An extra educator is rostered on for each session. The whole session is run in the gardens - parents deliver the children straight there and pick them up from there at the end. Children arrive dressed in wet weather pants and jackets and good climbing shoes, and they wear red hats for visibility. The Tindale Gardens are managed by Parks Victoria, so educators work with rangers to decide things like cancellation policies or which parts of the garden to use.
Children play with what they find on the ground – picking flowers and leaves from living plants is discouraged. They climb trees and roll down the hill. They have found a hidey hole half hidden by brambles. There is a bench they use for ‘fishing’. The children are developing a shared culture of how to use this space.
Teachers tell us they are intrigued by how the children play differently here than back at the kindergarten (which also has a wonderful outdoor space). The preschoolers are quite independent and adventurous, whereas the three year olds tend to want more educator contact, asking for help to climb and balance and find things and staying close to the adults.
Like many outdoor programs, Kallista Nature Kindergarten was prompted by the squeeze when preschool programs were extended to 15 hours. They decided to respond by ‘adding to our program, rather than just adding to our hours’. Nature Kindergarten is now an integral part of the learning experience at Kallista and has greatly enriched their practice.
Find more information about Nature Kindergarten at Kallista here.