Our Philosophy

At Dreams Unlimited Childcare Centre we believe that we are a part of the community working together with parents and other community members to give children opportunities to reach their fullest potentials, fostering their strengths and interests, that All Dreams Have Worth. Foundations established in the early childhood years are critical to children’s social, emotional, cognitive, physical, creative, and spiritual development. In order for children to be valued as active learners with individual developmental needs a strong partnership between the early childhood educators at the centre, parents, and community members is essential. By working as a team, we are establishing experiences for the children to develop a positive self concept that will remain with them through adulthood.

The staff at Dreams have regular meetings with the purpose to collaborate ideas and observations to create a rich learning environment.

Goals and Objectives

Goal: Valuing the child as an individual within the context of his/her family and community. Objective: Dreams Unlimited will promote a positive relationship with parents and community members (i.e. arrival and pick up time, message board, newsletters, and conferences), and encouraging involvement by parents and community members at the centre (i.e. volunteering, storytelling, presentations, and field trips). Goal: Recognizing a play based environment as the primary avenue for all aspects of developing and learning, offering challenges and successes. Objective: Dreams Unlimited will provide learning centres (i.e. language, math, literacy, dramatic play, block building, science, writing, art, and sensory exploration) that are self-selected by the children. The children will be given opportunities to develop their abilities to observe, perceive, explore, investigate, imagine, and problem solve at their own individual pace. Goal: Designing a safe, nurturing environment that fosters the children to develop a positive self image, heightened awareness of their feelings, and ability to express them appropriately. Objective: Dreams Unlimited will provide many opportunities for positive interactions (i.e. small group activities), where the children’s independence and self reliance are encouraged in a climate free of biases. Art experiences will be available as a means for the children to express themselves and make sense of their world and opportunities will be created for the children to make accomplishments through trial and error. Goal: The experiences at Dreams Unlimited will act as a compliment to the child’s primary care at home. Objective: Dreams Unlimited will support parents/guardians in their role as primary care givers (i.e. parent resource board and lending library). Goal: Provide a process-oriented environment. Objective: The staff of Dreams Unlimited will facilitate the children’s interactions, ask them questions, observe, reflect, and evaluate the curriculum.

Inclusive Child Care Policy

At Dreams Unlimited we believe that inclusion is a basic human right, that all children can be active participants in their communities to their own capacity. We provide a flexible program to meet the individual development needs of all of the children, regardless of gender, race, culture, physical or cognitive abilities. To support inclusion, ongoing professional development of staff, consultation on child care programming and inclusion, resource and referral information, and/or funding for additional staff may be included.

Inclusion may also include family celebrations. If you have a celebration that is important to your family, please let us know. For example, you may want to bring a birthday cake to the centre on your child’s birthday, items to celebrate Chinese New Years, etc. For clarity, the Centre does not purchase an individual birthday cake for each child but we do have a cupcake celebration at the end of each month to celebrate all the birthdays in a month (similar to some schools in the Public School Board).

In order to best guide our practices, we use core early childhood education philosophies to chart our discovery.

Reggio Emillia Approach

The Reggio Emilia approach is child-centered that uses self-directed, experiential learning in relationship-driven environments. The program is based on the principles of respect, responsibility, and community through exploration and discovery through a self-guided curriculum.

At its core is an assumption that children form their own personality during early years of development and are endowed with "a hundred languages", through which they can express their ideas. The aim of the Reggio approach is to teach children how to use these symbolic languages (e.g., painting, sculpting, drama) in everyday life. It was developed after World War II by pedagogist Loris Malaguzzi and parents in the villages around Reggio Emilia, Italy, and derives its name from the city.

Here is just one photo to capture the approach during Elizabeth and Ken's visit to Reggio Emilia, Italy:

Emergent Curriculum

Inspired by Reggio Emilla, emergent curriculum involves the whole child and meeting the child where the child-is-at: The social, emotional, cognitive, and physical realms of development and learning.

What does that mean in practice? We provide rich, diverse resources and low key, respectful support to children’s emerging interests and their various in-depth explorations and multi-media expressions. We observe to discover what the children are interested in and build on those inclinations, interests, and fascinations to help them learn naturally and holistically as powerful individual learners and as effective members in successful learning groups.

Children initiate the explorations and projects. They explore and express themselves in their own way and in their own time. Each exploration can take weeks or months, depending on the children’s sustained fascination, and can morph into new lines of inquiry and investigation.

Exploring and expressing are the fundamental strategies in an emergent curriculum. We build learning around what the children want to explore, and the learning process involves gently guiding them to explore further and getting them to express, in words, gestures, processes, and materials, when they are able, what they want, what they’re doing, and why. Thus, exploring and expressing reinforce each other. and build individual and group cohesiveness.

Learning Centres

Dreams Unlimited takes advantage of the growing literature that supports "Learning Centres" as the most powerful technique in aiding in your child's growth and development. Parents/Caregivers, follow this link for a detailed description of what are our Learning Centres and how they work together to build your child.

Family Grouping

Family grouping is the name given in child care to groups of children of mixed ages, and is so named as its composition more closely resembles that of a family -- in a practical sense, this means we do not have a separate room for our three year olds, four year olds, etc.

The benefits of family grouping are:

• Educators can encourage relationships and interactions between children of different ages.
• Older children have opportunities to mentor, assist and show empathy for younger children, building their own sense of competence and leadership.
• Younger children can learn from older peers as role models and supports in fostering complex play, creative thinking and problem-solving.
• That language development occurs very well in mixed age groups where children act as role models for others with fewer language skills. In family groups, the younger child is surrounded with language interactions of various levels and complexity, and as a result, may often develop language skills more rapidly than their peers in age group care.
• That social and emotional development occurs appropriately in a family grouped setting. New children settle more easily and feel secure with help from siblings, and older children. The settled children help guide children who are new to the setting to learn what happens during the day, and in the process develop their own self-esteem and self-confidence. They model sharing and turn-taking for new or younger children. A less out-going child can relax and interact more comfortably with younger children.
• That fewer behavioural problems are a common feature of family grouping. Children of varying ages do not have to compete for the same toys/equipment as their play interests are often very different.

Virtues Project

The Virtues Project™ is a global grassroots initiative to inspire the practice of virtues in everyday life, sparking a global revolution of kindness, justice, and integrity in more than 100 countries through Facilitators, Master Facilitators, Champions and Virtues Connections.

The Virtues Project empowers individuals to live more authentic meaningful lives, families to raise children of compassion and integrity, educators to create safe, caring, and high performing learning communities, and leaders to encourage excellence and ethics in the work place. It has inspired and mobilized people worldwide to commit acts of service and generosity, to heal violence with virtues.

The Five Strategies™ awaken the gifts of character, through inspiring programs, books, and materials that help us to remember who we really are and to live by our highest values.

The Virtues Project was founded in Canada in 1991 by Linda Kavelin-Popov, Dr. Dan Popov and John Kavelin. It was honored by the United Nations during the International Year of the Family as a "model global program for families of all cultures".

Project Approach

The Project Approach refers to a set of teaching strategies that enable teachers to guide children through in-depth studies of real-world topics. Projects have a complex but flexible framework within which teaching and learning are seen as interactive processes. Children feel highly motivated and actively involved in their own learning, leading them to produce high-quality work and to grow as individuals and collaborators.

A project, by definition, is an in-depth investigation of a real-world topic worthy of a child's attention and effort. Projects allow the children to fully explore a subject by becoming investigators within their own environment, involving three stages (what do you know, what do you want to know, and what have you learned).

The Project Approach rests on the following beliefs:

• All children come to school with a quest to understand their experiences; all children want to learn
• School is life, and teachers and students should experience their time in school as real life rather than seeing these two as separate and unrelated spheres
• Students construct their own knowledge but also need teachers to facilitate and guide this process
• Students have diverse strengths, weaknesses, interests, and backgrounds, and capitalizing on these differences enables students to learn from each other and to grow as individuals
• Students learn best when they have a positive self esteem and sense of purpose
• Students learn through a mixture of first-hand observation, hands-on experience, systematic instruction, and personal reflection
• Teaching and learning are interactive processes
• Social and emotional skills are as important as academic skills and knowledge
• Classrooms are flexible learning spaces that support and adapt to student needs

Children have a strong disposition to explore and discover. The Project Approach builds on natural curiosity, enabling children to interact, question, connect, problem-solve, communicate, reflect, and more. This kind of authentic learning extends beyond the classroom to each student’s home, community, nation, and the world. It essentially makes learning the stuff of real life and children active participants in and shapers of their worlds. Past projects have included hatching chicken eggs, exploring how bones heal if broken, and the properties of mud and how it is useful in our environment.

Project Mud: Building Our Very Own Clay Mirrors & Dishes

Project Farm: Hatching Our Very Own Chickens