​Our Philosophy

1. Relationship building as the core value and the foundation of learning

We believe that children learn best when a good relationship is developed between parents and educators. Having a good relationship means that we understand better to provide the best support and care to meet the needs and interests of the individual child and family. When children develop strong secure relationships with staff members at Playhouse Learning Center, they feel a sense of belonging to our learning environment and being a part of the community. We aim to provide an environment where children can foster their love for learning whilst being valued and supported throughout their journey.

We want to establish and maintain respectful, trusting, and reciprocal relationships between children, families, educators, and the wider community. We believe children can realise their full potential under the collaboration between educators, families, and the wider community.

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   2. Children as capable and unique individuals

Children as capable learners

We believe that children are competent learners and can communicate ideas, problem solve, make decisions, explore, investigate, and co-operate with others, to acquire their own knowledge and skills. We respect children’s own perspectives and consider them as capable learners. We encourage children to be the constructor of their own learning and development.

We plan the environment and activities that allows for children to revisit, explore, discover and construct their own knowledge. Children are invited to interact with their peers, educators and the environment to gain knowledge. We view children as capable individuals and plan time for children to explore and revisit their learning

Children as citizens of the society

We advocate for children’s right and the importance of high-quality early childhood education and care in the community. We believe that children’s interests, needs and voices are always the core value and focus on our teaching. We ensure that children’s perspectives can be heard and reflected in everything that we do.

Each child is unique

We acknowledge the uniqueness in each child. We gather information about children’s individual needs, strengths, interests, and background from families and through observations of children. We take into account the diversity in planning and implementing our program. We value each child for his/her abilities and his/her sense of ‘being’ is respected in the process of planning our learning curriculum.

  3. Learning through play

We adopt a holistic approach in our curriculum. Our educators intentionally plan to support and promote children’s social, emotional, physical, and cognitive development. Our learning program encourages children to engage in positive interactions with their peers and educators through meaningful play-based experiences. Our team of educators creates environment that is inspiring, aesthetic, sustainable and stimulating for children’s learning.

We apply the Early Years Learning Framework and multiple early childhood pedagogical theories to guide our practice and to scaffold children’s learning.

We incorporate ongoing observations, evaluation, and critical reflection into our educational program. Every individual child is given sufficient support in consideration of their needs, interests and learning abilities.

We facilitate children’s development of life-long skills such as socio-emotional skills, communication, numeracy and literacy skills, love for getting involved in a variety of learning experiences and connecting with the world through play and intentional teaching. We also believe that social competence is one of the essentials in early development that leads to a successful future.

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   4. An inclusive community

We support children to develop a sense of belonging to the local Playhouse and the wider community. We value cultural diversity. We believe that an inclusive environment helps children gain confidence to explore their becoming and to explore their cultural identity.  We believe that children can develop empathy and understanding for others when they are part of an inclusive community.

We like to see children feeling connected to the broader community and being respectful to diversity.  We scaffold children in developing an awareness of their own world view and acknowledging others’. We believe that children’s positive attitudes regarding cultural differences are beneficial to our community.

Playhouse Learning Center follows practices that are inclusive and responsive to diversity and children with additional needs. Playhouse’s team of educators considers all children’s social, cultural and linguistic diversity (including learning styles, abilities, disabilities, gender, family circumstances and geographic location) in curriculum decision-making processes.

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Our philosophy is inspired and developed by the Australian Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) (DEEWR, 2009), the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) (United Nations, 1989), John Dewey’s progressive approach, Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory, Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory and Reggio Emilia’s project-based approach