Albany Kindergarten

Kia Ora and Welcome to our Kindergarten

We believe in providing children with the necessary tools, skills and attitudes to enable them to become competent, confident, responsible and capable learners throughout their life long journey.

Kohikohia nga kakano, whakaritea te parekereke, kia puawai nga hua. Gather the seeds, prepare the seedbed carefully, and you will be gifted with an abundance of food.

The Albany area  is also known as Okahukura, place of butterflies or of rainbows. Our kindergarten is located in the heart of the community right next to Albany Primary School. We welcome families to come and visit us anytime and experience what our learning environment has to offer them.

Our children are active explorers who are encouraged to support and respect each other as they learn together. We value manaakitanga and aroha as part of our philosophy which means that caring, sharing, kindness, supporting others, and being a friend are important and visible in our curriculum here.

Te Whariki is our guiding curriculum document and emphasises our bicultural foundations, our multicultural present and the shared future that we are creating with our Albany Kindergarten whanau.

This quote from Te Whariki says a lot about what is important to us here.

“As global citizens in a rapidly changing and increasingly connected world, children need to be adaptive, creative and resilient. They need to learn how to learn so that they can engage with new contexts, opportunities and challenges with optimism and resourcefulness.”

Arohanui and welcome to our kindergarten we look forward to meeting you.

Our Purpose

To provide effective early childhood education services to ensure every child leaves kindergarten with the foundations of personal development and a love of life and learning

Your Child, Your Place

At our centres your child will learn:

• How to relate to other children and their teachers
• How to take responsibility, develop independence and self-confidence
• How to share and explore their understanding of people, places and things
• How to express ideas and acknowledge feelings
• Negotiating, turn taking, cooperation and conflict resolution
• Respect for other cultures, languages and traditions
• How to better interact with family and the wider community
• Hauora (the four dimensions of health), physical, mental, social and spiritual health
• Sustainability and the natural environment

Our History

Kaitiaki Kindergartens were originally known as the East Coast Bays Free Kindergarten Association. Torbay was the association’s first kindergarten which opened in 1954 and it is still a very active kindergarten to this day. As we grew we became known as the Northern Auckland Free Kindergarten Association. Today, we go by the name of ‘Kaitiaki Kindergartens’. Kaitiaki means, “a guardian or trustee, typically of an environmental area or resource.” This change reflects our responsibility to each and every child, community member and kindergarten in the Kaitiaki wider family.

We’re about:

• children, families and whanau
• quality early childhood education
• a qualified and registered workforce
• community
• not-for-profit
• home grown
• kiwi owned

Kindergarten is a partnership between:

Teachers

Qualified, registered teachers provide and deliver educational programmes under the guidance and support of the Professional Practice Leaders.

Our communities

Support teachers and the Association to help raise funds to ensure it has the resources required by the teachers and staff and to build community relationships.

Board of management

Elected by the community by members (parents/whanau) to govern the Association. The board sets policies and the strategic direction of the Association and appoints the General Manager to manage the Association on their behalf.