Criterion 1

Theme 2
Practice and environments that enhance children’s learning and growth

At Lansvale Preschool, we perceive the learning environment as the third teacher in the classroom, therefore the environment has a role in enhancing children’s learning and growth (Gandini, 2011). We aim to provide a safe, stimulating and sumptuous environment that will inspire and promote active learning for all. We want all children to develop intellectually and psychologically through experiencing the miracle and complexity of learning. Appropriate language and boundary allow for safe curiosity and problem solving skills to develop.


Positive Behaviour for Learning

Excellence is found in the implementation of our Positive Behaviour for Learning (PBL) program as it enables our children to develop clear understandings of expectations, become responsible for their own behaviour and work together to create a positive, caring and harmonious learning environment. The heart of this framework is to enable environments to increase the likelihood of children to develop social competence and support their learning needs. “A positive school environment, where all students are included and feel safe and supported improves student learning outcomes. Every member of the school community (school staff, parents and students) has a role to play in creating a safe, supportive and disciplined school environment, where students can learn and achieve” (PBL Guideline). We acknowledge, children feel a sense of safety when their relationships are warm, responsive and trusting. Their sense of safety comes from nurturing predictable and calm environments where the adults around them attend to their physical, social and emotional needs. When children feel safe, they can try new things and feel supported in their attempts to develop new skills. It provides them with the confidence to explore their environment and drive their own learning.

We have a set of expectations using the acronym PROUD - Proud, Respectful, Organised, Understanding and Determined. The PBL behaviour system is displayed with expectations throughout the indoor and outdoor environments. The expectations are tailored to each area or experience as necessary. For instance, there is a set for lunch time, using the mud kitchen, the bathroom and the sandpit. Expectations are written in positive language, with photos of the children and are strategically placed near the area or experience so that the children are reminded of the PROUD expectations. As we are a Culturally and Linguistically Diverse preschool, these posters provide visuals to support our children who are still learning English as an Additional Language. The teaching of these expected behaviours in our daily practice involves whole group, small group, individual, intentional teaching and spontaneous scenarios.

Our PROUD Mascot ‘Lenny the Lion’ and the educators utilise verbal praise and reflect positive language in explicit feedback to the children to ensure that we are building towards intrinsic motivation for behavioural choices.

As a result of this exceptional program, the culture of the preschool classroom is enhanced, the children are now more willing to share. Their sense of belonging has deepened as they have a common understanding and goal of looking after everyone and everything within their preschool. Our children are also beginning to recognise 'unfair' processes or behaviours and are learning to develop ways of solving problems and conflicts. As our children transition to the primary school they will already be familiar with the language of the PROUD expectations. These positively seamless expectations build towards producing independent, confident, collaborative and resilient young learners.

A video presentation of Lansvale Preschool's PBL journey presented at the Early Childhood Teach Meet
Lenny the Lion our PBL Mascot Visuals help remind children of expected behaviours
Transition to school

Excellence is in how Lansvale prepares our preschool children to effectively and smoothly transition to Lansvale’s primary school. Our exceptional transition to school program begins at the start of the preschool year and continues through to Kindergarten. A positive start or transition to school has been linked to a range of positive outcomes for children (Dockett & Perry, 2007). This successful program is a result of our families, school, preschool teachers and Kindergarten teachers connecting and working collaboratively.

As a majority of our preschool children continue into Lansvale Public School, we believe it is important that we begin cultivating a sense of belonging to their school community.

We do this by:

  • Giving opportunities for our children to spend significant parts of the day in the Kindergarten classroom, playground and school environment throughout Term 3 and 4.
  • Scheduling kindergarten teachers to do preschool duties to get to know our children as unique learners.
  • Regularly taking part in whole school programs throughout the year such as attending library, visiting school hall for dance recitals, play in the school field, visit the creation station, participate in whole school activities (book parade, harmony day, hat parades) all contributing to the children’s sense of belonging to the school.
  • Having structured opportunities to engage in quality dialogue with the Kindergarten teachers regarding Transition to School statements, Individual Learning Plans and other crucial information about the children. In the words of one of our Kindergarten teachers “The Transition to School Statements was a great source of information and reference for us to get to know the preschool children more. For those who have individual needs, we were well prepared to differentiate learning programs to target student needs”.
  • Giving our preschool educators a strong voice in creating the Kindergarten classes in collaboration with the Kindergarten teachers taking into account, children’s individual needs, friendships and expertise of teacher. Kindergarten classes and teachers are appointed early to allow for a more rigorous and relentless partnership between children, parents, preschool educators and Kindergarten teachers. This open and reciprocal communication among all these stakeholders promote collaboration that has the needs of the children at the forefront of the minds of all involved.
  • Ensuring all ‘access requests’ for Early Intervention Support Classes are sought for our children with additional needs. To comprehensively support and guide families to make well informed decisions about the application and acceptance of offered positions, we organise tours and visits to support classes and provide the conditions for honest and sensitive dialogue to occur between families, our school counsellor, educators and outside agencies provide guidance and support for our families to make well informed decisions.
  • Having primary buddies for our preschoolers to promote a smooth transition from preschool to school. Our buddy program establishes peer networks by carefully matching students with appropriate Stage Two buddies according to personal student learning and socialisation goals. The buddies visit our preschool children throughout the year and are involved in the Kindergarten Orientation visits.
  • Giving opportunities for our children to record their questions about starting Kindergarten on the IPads and having the Kindergarten students and teachers respond. This gives voice and agency to our children by providing opportunities for them to express their concerns, feelings and thoughts about starting Kindergarten.

As a result, our youngest learners enter their first years of formal schooling full of confidence and enthusiasm as well as feeling safe, secure and supported as their individual needs and interests are recognised and planned for as soon as they enter into Kindergarten.

Transition to school statementPDF Learning in the Kindergarten Classrooms
Exploring the Primary School
Our Primary Buddies
Physical Environment

Our learning spaces and environments offer a range of natural and manmade resources in both indoor and outdoor spaces. The environment has been carefully planned to be not only beautiful, but also functional to support a range of opportunities for play based learning. Active teacher led learning based on children’s interests, abilities, cultures and previous learning experiences to enhance students’ learning and development. The contribution of children, staff and families ensured the space was truly representative of many voices. Through collaboration our physical environments provide our children with genuine opportunities to experiment, explore, predict and take managed risk.

The Outdoor Environment

In October 2015, our outdoor environment was refurbished with the assistance of our families and children, striving to create a flexible, relationship-driven learning environment. Our goal was “to have an outdoor environment that is designed to engage every child in quality experiences in built and natural environments” (Anon, 2017)

We embarked on a journey of excellence and ensured all stakeholders were involved in the process of re-developing our outdoor learning environment. We wanted to instil a sense of wonder and curiosity for our children. We added a mud kitchen, inviting garden to the entrance of the preschool, sandstone vegetable patch, fairy garden, Indigenous garden, Asian garden, accompanied by a stationary boat. The learning spaces and program recognises and respects the whole child and family, as well as their cultural background and community culture. “Play in nature is especially important for developing capacities for creativity, problem-solving and intellectual development” (Kellert, 2005). As a team, we feel natural environments engage children’s senses and enables them to explore, take risks and experiment with their surroundings. By having a large outdoor environment, with many different areas for children to seek and engage in child navigated play, children are more willing to negotiate and take on roles, engage in imaginative and dramatic play. They have agency and choice to engage in any or all of the various planned and spontaneous learning experiences within the outdoor environment. This fosters each child’s capacity to make decisions and become effective communicators. The children and families design, plant, prune, weed and crop these gardens, enacting true permaculture. All of these learning spaces and opportunities offer children to be able to observe and reflect on the beauty of the natural environment and the relationships they encounter during play experiences.

Sustainable Practices

The children are encouraged to participate in a process that promotes sustainable practice. Sustainable practices were integrated throughout the program, by planting seeds and other cultural produce to reflect and highlight the Vietnamese and Chinese culture into our garden which further resulted in creating a worm farm and compost bin to educate the children regarding effective ecological practice. We also embedded the use of recycling by displaying visuals, use of intentional teaching and exploring real time experiences that enabled the children to be mindful with rubbish and other materials that can be used for STEAM exploration. We worked in partnership with the local council by inviting them to speak about the importance of sustainable practice in the preschool and the greater community.

To further foster the teaching and learning of sustainable practice, Lansvale Preschool work in partnership with the school to allow students from the Environmental Club to engage with the preschool children to demonstrate and be role models in taking an “active role in caring for its environment and contributes to a sustainable future.” (Anon, 2017)

We are very proud that our children are becoming more environmentally responsible and demonstrating greater respect for the environment. Our parents have commented that their children are now keen to take on the responsibility, at home, to sort out rubbish for the recycling bin. One parent has commented “He watches me like a hawk to make sure that I’m putting right things into the yellow bin”. Recently the children noticed some council workers trimming the trees near our preschool and commented “Oh no they are cutting the trees to make paper.” The emotion in their voices demonstrated that they are developing compassion, kindness and empathy.

Sustainable Practice
Environmental Club
Indoor Environments are inclusive

Alongside the outdoor environment, the indoor learning spaces also offer experiences for children to develop agency, problem solving, appreciation of cultures, innovation and creativity. At Lansvale Preschool our indoor environment provides respectful spaces for our children and families to feel a sense of belonging. For example, our foyer is a place designed for our families to engage in the daily practices of preschool by looking through the children’s daily diary or portfolios. Our community board provides our families current information about upcoming workshops, incursions and community events. In addition, our indoor environment is reflective of the diverse cultures of our families. For instance, signage and notices are translated in home languages and visible learning intentions encourage our families to be actively involved in their child’s learning.

Our indoor environment ensures the children’s learning is at the centre of its layout by providing a range of challenging, differentiated and open ended experiences to promote inclusivity for all. Flexible, supportive and responsive learning experiences and play spaces meet the needs of each child.

Indoor environments reflect the diverse cultures of our families
Visible learning intentions and translated signs encourage family involvement
Indoor Environments are inclusive
Agency

Our indoor environments provide children with a sense of agency by allowing them to free flow between the two classroom environments as well as the indoor and outdoor learning spaces. Children’s voice is vital in their everyday experiences and interactions with each other. As educators we ensure the children’s voices are heard not only through their language, but through creative arts, body language, music and movement and other experiences. We observe and take note of each individual’s action and reaction, which in turn supports our programming and planning for both planned and spontaneous learning experiences. This is an effective way for children to explore their sense of agency by making decisions about who, what and where they choose to seek and explore possibilities and make connections. We also support children’s agency by involving the children in aspects of our indoor and outdoor program. This involves sweeping, watering and weeding the garden, setting out placemats for lunch and cleaning tables. Our children develop independence and positive self esteem as they see themselves as important contributors to the daily function of preschool.

Fostering creativity

At Lansvale Preschool, we have a strong focus on fostering creativity to allow it to flourish and find expression. Children are wise and capable decision makers about their own experiences. We use a range of creative mediums such as drama, dance, visual arts, music and movement and innovative technology as tools for nurturing and expressing children’s imagination and creativity. Moreover, the classroom environment helps shape a child’s identity as a powerful player in his or her own life and the lives of others. We actively cultivate an ‘endless possibilities’ mindset and environment at every level. All children, staff and families know they are valued, feel safe and secure so risks can be taken. As educators, we respect children’s views and opinions and encourage creativity by each child expressing their thoughts in their own way through meaningful experiences. We ensure children understand there is no right or wrong answer and encourage them to think outside the box. This supports children’s thoughts and actions for future focused learning and enables them to be open to different views and think critically. To foster such an environment our educators go deeper than what is merely seen at eye level and develop a deep understanding of the underlying principles and of children’s thinking, questions and curiosities. We go beyond the obvious. At Lansvale Public School Preschool we are comfortable knowing that we cannot always know the exact outcome of intentional learning experiences. We have intentions yet we do not let them constrain us. We value the many manifestations of creativity.

Drama Music and Movement
Creativity and Problem Solving
Innovative Technology
Technology 7C’s

At Lansvale, we are moving towards excellence through innovation. We continuously strive to improve our existing practises by looking beyond what we do well, finding and analysing the innovative ideas of tomorrow and putting them into practice. We drive innovation because our children are digital natives. Therefore we feel that it is imperative that we start cultivating the 7 core competencies (c’s) of future focused learning.

We identify these 7 C’s as:

  1. Communication
  2. Collaboration
  3. Critical thinking
  4. Creativity and Innovation
  5. Cross Cultural Understanding
  6. Computing
  7. Career and learning self resilience- managing change, lifelong learning and career redefinition

Our use of technology, our Curiosity Centre, Creation Station, Robotics and Coding programs at Lansvale prepare our learners for future focused learning. This requires us to consistently have our eyes on the horizon so we can plan for emerging needs and trends in teaching and learning. We challenge ourselves to be researchers of our own practice to ensure that we are using evidence based approaches that suit our community of learners to effectively prepare children for their futures.

Curiosity centre

“We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths” Walt Disney (Sutcliffe, 2009)

Our curiosity centre support our school’s vision of challenging our children to be critical thinkers and creative, confident citizens. We know that children need to be engaged with relevant, meaningful and exciting learning opportunities that promote collaboration and that embed technology into learning experiences.

In 2016, as part of our research into exploring excellent services, we were inspired by our visit to Global Wilkins Preschool and their multiple learning spaces. Upon reflection and much discussion with our families, we embarked on a journey of creating an additional learning space for our children.

Our Curiosity Centre became the third room in our preschool, it sits effortlessly between both preschool classrooms allowing a smooth flow between all three classroom learning spaces. Learning experiences in the Curiosity Centre encourage the children to experiment and play with objects and ideas. There are numerous opportunities for inquiry, creativity, tinkering, thinking and inventing. All children have access to the Curiosity Centre and are able to articulate that they are expected to collaborate, make mistakes, try different ways of doing things and to have fun and share their new discoveries. We embrace this through thoughtful and well planned learning experiences driven by students’ natural curiosity.

Our families have remarked how confident their children are now that we are promoting curiosity through our programs. Parents have noticed our children are asking more questions. After studying cicadas at preschool, a parent commented that she had to learn about bees and honey because her child kept asking questions about them. We believe when children’s curiosity is provoked, they will explore, question, discover and wonder. By doing this they are driven inquiry learners. Excellence is in how Lansvale uses this unique space designed strategically to encourage children’s curiosity “The future belongs to the curious. The ones who are not afraid to try it, explore it, poke at it, question it and turn it inside out!” - Anonymous

We believe when children’s curiosity is provoked, they will explore, question, discover and wonder and by doing so, learn.

Creation Station

The Creation Station is a innovative technological resource created at Lansvale Public School. It is a large room with a professional green screen, Ipads, microphones, recording devices, 3D printing and interactive screens. Our preschool children visit the Creation Station once a week where they are given the opportunities to be creators of content by being producers, directors, actors, singers, dancers and performers. Our children have made films and music videos to “The Three Little Pigs”, “The Wheels on the Bus” and “The Skeleton Dance”. We like to take a well-loved story book or traditional tale and find ways to retell it in an active, playful and hands on way. Research shows that this is the best way to consolidate learning and to develop confident readers and writers in later life. As Literacy skills dwell in comprehension and language skills, which are fostered best through listening to stories and retelling them in a fun way.

The limitless opportunities in the Creation Station launch our children into future focused learning by encouraging them to communicate and collaborate. When our children re enact stories on the green screen, they become the characters and learn to tell stories that allows them to express themselves in a unique and captivating way. We know that our children’s world is ever-changing so the challenge for us is to be innovative and to make learning environments more exciting, challenging and rewarding. Our Lansvale Creation Station ticks all these boxes by ensuring we facilitate on screen/off screen experiences for our children.

Robotics and Coding

“Everybody should learn how to program a computer, because it teaches you how to think”.Steve Jobs

To further inspire the 7c’s of future focused learning, our preschool children engage in coding and robotics. At Lansvale we use Osmo coding with our children. Osmo Coding begins with an assortment of modular magnetic blocks. The children snap together numbered blocks along with commands such as “run,” “jump,” and “grab,” as they guide a tiny monster named Awbie on his eternal quest for more strawberries. Children program Awbie to shake trees, munch on strawberries, plant flowers, or tickle other characters. As a result, coding experiences have developed our children’s confidence and encouraged problem solving and logical reasoning skills. Opportunities to engage in coding prepares our children who are currently living in a world dominated by software. We believe not knowing the language of computers will be challenging for our children living in an online and digital world. Giving our children the foundational knowledge of code prepares them to perform more complex tasks on the computer where the only limit of what is possible is their imagination.

At Lansvale we have also introduced robotics to our young learners. We use Blue-Bots to bring science, technology, engineering and maths into the classroom. This Bluetooth robot can be controlled using a tablet or PC whereby preschool children create their program on screen, send it remotely and see Blue-Bot perform their program right before their very eyes!

When our children are using the command keys to send the blue bot left/right, forwards/backwards they are learning sequencing, prepositional language, problem-solving, counting, and estimation. More importantly they are turn taking and collaborating with their peers and developing higher order thinking skills to determine how to move the Beebot through complex designated courses and those they design themselves.

Our children are able to engage in coding and robotics activities as part of our weekly library program run in partnership with a our tech savvy librarian and also during play. This first introduction to programming for our children sparks their imagination and helps our children succeed in an increasingly digital world by giving them opportunities to develop future focused capabilities that will be required in the future.

Technology as a tool

Inspired by the research of Dr Kate Highfield and Dr Kristy Goodwin as children’s technology and development experts, we strongly believe that technology is a powerful tool for learning. Excellence is in how Lansvale uses technology as a tool that supports children being active creators rather than passive consumers. We are inspired by Dr Kristy’s belief that play in the digital age should be supported and enhanced by technology, not displaced or replaced by it.

Dr Highfield states we should be encouraging our kids to be thinking more deeply and recommends apps that foster creativity, building and problem-solving, as well as interactions with the real world. Therefore we critically analyse Apps before sharing with our children to ensure that they are a tool that promote skills such as creativity, communication and critical thinking. We choose making and creating Apps as they are far more engaging and foster creativity. Examples of Apps we have used are Telegami, My Storybook, Sock Puppet and Crayola. As a result our children are engaged in tools that foster designing, making and collaboration. Furthermore we see it as our responsibility to empower our parents to understand how children learn with technology. We help them know that when used appropriately, technology can support and empower their children to learn, play, collaborate and create in ways that are different from traditional media. Our “App of the week” posted on the children’s online portfolio SeeSaw, show our review and recommendations for quality apps that encourage our children to be active creators. We believe when you strengthen parent’s knowledge, you strengthen a child. It is our dedication to being media mentors who engage and empower our families to be media mentors for their children that make Lansvale excellent.

Making New Paper Project

We support the use of technology creatively, encourage problem solving, collaboration, understanding and using technology as one of many ways of representing children’s own learning. An example includes our Making New Paper Project - Our preschool children had just completed a project where they made their own paper from old paper scraps in the recycling bin. Experiences were designed to teach the children about the importance of recycling, and developing an awareness of the impact of human activity on environments. We wanted our children to understand that they can make a difference in the world that they live in so we decided to create an Ebook that would help spread the importance of recycling. The children worked in pairs and used the “My Storybook” app to draw, add photos, record their voices and add stamps to create a book that represents the process of making new paper and what they had learnt about recycling. As authors of their own books, they not only gained a deeper understanding of the impact of human activity on the environment, but children were also provided with an avenue to express their ideas, thoughts and feelings. The rich experience gave children purpose and empowered them to make a difference and influence the world in which they live in. This learner centred approach provided powerful tools for our children to work collaboratively with others to present their knowledge and understanding.

By using appropriate technology, we are enabling our children to use digital devices as one of many ways of representing their learning. Excellence is in how we support the use of technology to provide full access to learning for all children. Recognising that not all our children have the ability to hold a pencil to confidently draw or write, we used appropriate technology that enabled them to construct their own ideas through stamps, drawing elements, photos and voice recordings.

“21st Century Education won't be defined by any new technology. It won't be just defined by 1:1 technology programs or tech-intensive projects. 21st Century Education will, however, be defined by a fundamental shift in what we are teaching - a shift towards learner-centered education and creating creative thinkers.” (Fisch, 2008)