BestStart Sunset

BestStart Sunset is a friendly, welcoming childcare centre on Sunset Road. We're open all year round from 7.30am - 5.30pm and have a range of sessions, part-time and full-time care available to suit the needs of our families.

Believe in Yourself

Mauria te Pono

Positive, strong and trusting relationships between parents/whanau, children and staff are essential for ensuring we get the best outcomes for our children. We are committed to nurturing a strong sense of ownership and belonging for all our children and their families. When children have a sense of belonging they develop their confidence to try new things. They believe in themselves.

At BestStart Sunset our baby, toddler and preschool spaces are home-like environments with large inviting outdoor areas. These provide our children the choice to freely explore their own interests, make decisions, problem-solve, develop relationships and learn at their own pace with support from experienced and qualified teachers.

Our names of our three room represent the lifecycle of a butterfly. We link this journey to the journey of our tamariki as they transition through three rooms. 

Anuhe (Infants) - This means caterpillar and represents the learning and development of our infants as they explore and engage in the early learning of movement, safety/trust, independence, taking early risks and communication supported in celebrating their individual success and pace of learning and development. 

Raukatauri (Toddlers) - This can mean cacoon, we link this to the room being a cacoon of learning, rich experiences preparing toddlers for their journey towards the Preschool Room, developing language, independence, problem-solving, social skills and self-help care and skills an d taking risks. 

Purerehua (Preschoolers) - This translates to butterfly, and reflects the journey that a butterfly has recognising the journey they have been on and supporting the journey ahead as they prepare their wings for flight in to the wider world. Developing further skills for being school ready, independence, creative thinking, total well-being, risk taking, relationships, reasoning and thinking. 

All our rooms practice, support, reflect, acknowledging the values that are important to us such as aroha, manaaki, whanaungatanga, tuakana and teina relationships, ako, and Te Whare Tapa Wha. These concepts and values make up the frames of our days as we act, respond, learn and grow together. 

We celebrate success through promoting a can-do attitude, a give it a go environment with kaiako ready to give a hand, support, and most of all empower. 

Community connections - The community plays an integral part of our early childhood centre and curriculum at BestStart Sunset. We engage in regular excursions into our community; enjoying trips to the library, fortnightly visits to our local rest home where we implement a play-based programme for the residents alongside our children to encourage diversity in relationship building and support developing social competency. We have Matua Grant visit each Wednesday morning along with his guitar to teach us new waiata and further support our tamariki in their use of Te Reo.

Health and wellbeing - At BestStart Sunset we are committed to being a centre where nutrition and physical activity are paramount in our day to day routines. We have a dedicated centre cook who provides our tamariki with nutritious morning, lunch and afternoon kai. We have lunch box days each Friday, to offer our pre-schoolers the opportunity to prepare for school. We are also a Breastfeeding Friendly Accredited centre.

Come in and talk to the teaching team, and see for yourself all the wonderful experiences we are offering our children!

Who is BestStart?

BestStart is for families who want more from early-childhood education. Safe, nurturing and educationally focused, we’re committed to growing caring people with curious minds.

Together we teach, learn and nurture.

Our vision is to work in partnership with families, whanau and communities to enable children to achieve their learning potential.

Ko tō mātou tirohanga hei mahi ngātahi i te taha o ngā whānau me ngā hāpori, kia āwhinatia ngā tamariki, kia tū pito mata ai rāatou, hei rangatira mō āpōpō.

We are committed to being a progressive and responsive leader in early-childhood education. We do this by enhancing our services, investing in our people, developing our support structure and continuously improving the educational outcomes and experiences of our children, families and the communities we serve.

Some facts:

• We’re licensed to educate and care for 15,000 full-time children daily.
• 18,000 families use BestStart services annually.
• We have over 270 centres nationwide located from Whangarei to Invercargill.
• Each centre is managed by a Centre Manager who is supported by a local Area Manager. This gives our centre teams ongoing quality training and support.
• Te Whāriki, the world-wide acclaimed national early childhood education curriculum, is used in all centres.
• We have over 4500 permanent teachers nationally. Over 90% of our permanent teaching staff are either fully qualified with a diploma or bachelor of teaching (ECE) or higher, or are in training. These figures are very high by national standards within the ECE sector.
• We provide a two-year Advice and Guidance Programme for all recently certified teachers, providing further mentoring and training. This gives strong support for teachers from provisional registration to full teacher registration with the NZ Teachers Council.
• We regularly spend around $4 million on teacher training per annum.

We’re for children

At our heart is our commitment and passion for children. Central to this belief is our focus on the holistic development of children. We support children to explore the world around them, learning through relationships, creating a love of learning in an ever-changing world. Exploration, friendship and fun are part of the journey.

We’re for good

BestStart is a registered charity owned by the Wright Family Foundation. We support initiatives and programmes within BestStart and the wider early-childhood education sector (ECE) that support good outcomes for all children. We do this because we want to make a positive difference to the lives of all children.

Innovation leads us

At BestStart, innovation guides our thinking. We advocate positive change for learners through our research and practice. We’re proud to be thought leaders within ECE, openly challenging ourselves to think differently to provide the best for our children, families and staff.

We’re responsive

Our centres reflect their children, staff and communities. We celebrate individuality, uniqueness and diversity, encouraging a spirit of empathy, understanding and collaboration. Through our responsive relationships and our curriculum, we support learners to choose their own path.

Our people matter

At BestStart people come first. When we grow and develop our people, everyone benefits. We strive for whakamana/empowerment, nurturing a culture of excellence with engaged, talented professionals. Their commitment, skill and passion light our way.