Information for Enrollment

Wonder World Childcare Kindergarten is a long day care service and runs an integrated kindergarten program, which is inspired by the Steiner philosophy of education. The service has an enrolment process to promote a sense of belonging in the service for children and their families.

The service is open from 7:00am to 6:00pm, Monday to Friday, and is closed on public holidays and closed for two weeks at the end of the year.

The service is registered with the Childcare Subsidy System (CCS), which is the main way that the Government assists families to reduce the full fee payment. The service runs a 3- and 4-year funded kindergarten program which entitles each eligible child to receive free kindergarten with support from The Department of Education and Training Victoria $2,150 each year.

The service is a private-nonprofit organization and strives to promote Steiner Early Childhood Education and Care Approach for families in the local community.

The service is licensed for 45 children and is structured as follows:

• Baby room – 8 children.
• Toddler room – 16 children.
• Kindergarten room – 21 children.

The service provides a home-like environment for play-based learning, nurturing a child’s creativity, imagination and social development. It offers children the opportunity to learn from free exploration, imitation, hands-on learning and connecting with the natural world.

Background

The history of the facility and service was a purpose-built childcare Centre in 1997, at the time functioning as “Little Palace Play Centre” from 1997 to 2024 by Jasmine and her partner before it was sold to other childcare providers.

The provider, Jasmine, has been running a small, long-day care service, Wonder World Play Centre, in the local community for the last 30 years from 1994 and directed Little Palace Play Centre for a period of 7 years from 1997-2004. Over this time, Jasmine completed the Diploma in Children Service in 1999 and bachelor’s degree in early childhood education in 2006 and worked as a teacher since 2018 as well as running the service.

In 2017, Jasmine met, Lily, who was qualified with Steiner Education Training. This meeting inspired Jasmine to learn more about Steiner Early Childhood Education and together they set up the foundations for Steiner practices at Wonder World Play Centre in 2008. Since then, Jasmine continued to engage in research through self-study from readings and published information, followed by further education through an approved 6-month training course to develop Steiner knowledge in Steiner Early Childhood Education.

In 2023, Jasmine engaged in higher education through Rudolf Steiner Early Childhood Education from Sydney Rudolf Steiner College to gain the qualification to be a Steiner Early Childhood Teacher and is now nearing completion.

Jasmine has continued to strive and apply Steiner Early Childhood practices at Wonder World Play Centre with the support of another 2 dedicated educators, Viji and Mikiko. All educators have continued to contribute greatly to the Centre over the past 7 years to adapt to the Steiner pedagogical approach and continue to do so as our team grows stronger with more educators who believe in the Steiner Approach to education. One of our biggest achievements is that Jasmine and educators have created and maintained a green environment for over 22 years that has supported numerous children and their families.

Over the last 7 years, our Steiner inspired program has grown and has been recognized as a loving environment for nurturing children’s healthy development. We have established rich connections with many families who shared a love for nature and the values of Steiner Early Childhood Education, including the traditional human ethics.

Wonder World Play Centre only can provide care and programs for 3–5-year-old children and there were many parents inquiries made for Steiner Inspired programs for younger age children in the past and some parents already on our Wish List to wait for the new service to open.

Environment

The Outdoor environment is newly re-structured, intentionally with all natural elements including large sandpits, digging patch, veggie patch, natural grass, large play area for climbing with loose and natural climbing features and open space for creation and movement. Many small plants have been distributed within the outdoor settings to create opportunities for children to engage with elements of nature and take care of them to grow.

A specially designed chicken coop offers a large space for children to participate in caring for the natural world through loving experiences such as feeding, watching, collecting eggs and repurposing food scraps. The natural environment supports children to contribute to environmental sustainability and engage in purposeful nature-based activities.

For the health and safety of the younger children in the Baby room, soft fall has been provided with synthetic grass and cannot be replaced by natural materials for safety concerns.

The Indoor environment is newly painted with a light pink color to create a warm feeling as this aligns with Steiner education for its gently active and supportive quality. Most of the furniture is specially sourced, designed and made by Jason, from My Little Workshop, who has been making furniture for Steiner settings for many years. The furniture is nature-based and hand-finished with wax and oil without painting.

All play materials are ethically resourced and natural with soft colors, prioritizing tuned, cotton, wool, linen and wood that are crafted with care. The physical environment is intentionally designed to nurture the child with warmth, softness, beauty, calm, peace, harmony and to stimulate their imagination.

We strive to maintain the healthy quality of our environment as a sustainable and eco-friendly service across all of our practices. Unfortunately, in our society, everyday life exposes us to many chemicals, in qualities of food, air, traffic, and water which are harmful for children’s healthy development. Our service does our very best to promote health and uses organic cleaning products from certified organic suppliers. Our fruits and vegetables are supplied by organic shops. We avoid any chemicals used in our environment to maximize children’s healthy development.

Environment

The Outdoor environment is newly re-structured, intentionally with all natural elements including large sandpits, digging patch, veggie patch, natural grass, large play area for climbing with loose and natural climbing features and open space for creation and movement. Many small plants have been distributed within the outdoor settings to create opportunities for children to engage with elements of nature and take care of them to grow.

A specially designed chicken coop offers a large space for children to participate in caring for the natural world through loving experiences such as feeding, watching, collecting eggs and repurposing food scraps. The natural environment supports children to contribute to environmental sustainability and engage in purposeful nature-based activities.

For the health and safety of the younger children in the Baby room, soft fall has been provided with synthetic grass and cannot be replaced by natural materials for safety concerns.

The Indoor environment is newly painted with a light pink color to create a warm feeling as this aligns with Steiner education for its gently active and supportive quality. Most of the furniture is specially sourced, designed and made by Jason, from My Little Workshop, who has been making furniture for Steiner settings for many years. The furniture is nature-based and hand-finished with wax and oil without painting.

All play materials are ethically resourced and natural with soft colors, prioritizing tuned, cotton, wool, linen and wood that are crafted with care. The physical environment is intentionally designed to nurture the child with warmth, softness, beauty, calm, peace, harmony and to stimulate their imagination.

We strive to maintain the healthy quality of our environment as a sustainable and eco-friendly service across all of our practices. Unfortunately, in our society, everyday life exposes us to many chemicals, in qualities of food, air, traffic, and water which are harmful for children’s healthy development. Our service does our very best to promote health and uses organic cleaning products from certified organic suppliers. Our fruits and vegetables are supplied by organic shops. We avoid any chemicals used in our environment to maximize children’s healthy development.

Our Philosophy

Our philosophy is inspired by Rudolf Steiner, a philosopher and social reformer that established significant findings surrounding Early Childhood Development and Education, leading to the recognition and support of holistic child-centered learning.

Our service believes that early childhood learning experiences are significant which affects children’s entire lives, their future academic learning and wellbeing. Therefore, we strive to provide healthy learning experiences to support children’s development for positive outcomes with a Steiner Approach.

Our service provides a safe, warm and home-like environment that encourages self-exploration, play-based learning, and the development of practical life skills. Our program is inclusive and welcome to all families.

Our service emphasizes developing the whole child, including their physical, emotional, moral senses, cognition and spirituality.

Our service emphasizes all elements of the Steiner Approach in our program, including rhythm, singing in circle, storytelling, blessing at mealtimes, free exploration, rest time, helping with domestic tasks, etc. gardening, caring for chickens, tidying and packing up resources in the environment.

Our service emphasizes sustainable practices and strives to reduce any waste that has an impact on our natural environment. Our resources and play materials are of high quality but simple and made of natural materials. Green scraps are used for chicken food or composed. The service is moving toward Solar power as soon as possible to help our natural environment and ecological footprint. Our educators are encouraged to follow a sustainable lifestyle, and we strive to bring all parents awareness for sustainable living in all aspects of our communities.

Our service believes educators and administrators, anyone who works at our service, are equally important for the service to provide a nurturing environment for children. Therefore, we appreciate everyone, their strengths, skills and experiences and all educators are encouraged to develop Steiner Early Childhood knowledge. We support all educators to understand the meaning of “worthy of Imitation”. Our service believes that parents are important teachers in children’s lives, and we would like to develop trusting relationships with all families to share in their wisdom and share our practices. We encourage families to apply some of our practices at home so children’s learning can be consistent.

Our service strives to build a community to work collaboratively on matters and concerns and provides opportunities to participate in classroom activities and family gatherings. So, educators, parents, families and children are well connected.

Our service strives to achieve high standards of National Quality Standards and implement Australian Early Year Learning Framework and The Victorian Early Years Learning and Development Framework.

Principles of Steiner Education

According to Rudolf Steiner’s insights about Early Childhood Development, there are distinct Cycles in human development with specific educational needs. This development theory, with 7-year stages for growth and healthy learning, greatly influences the structure of Steiner education.

Seven-Year Cycles of Development:

• Focus: Sensory experiences and physical growth
• Key activities: Creative play, storytelling, and practical tasks
• Educational approach: Emphasis on imitation and experiential learning Second Cycle (7-14 years): Emotional Development
• Focus: Feelings, imagination, and artistic expression
• Key activities: Arts, crafts, and narrative-based learning
• Focus: Abstract thinking and critical analysis
• Key activities: Academic subjects and independent projects
• Educational approach: Encouraging independent thought and ethical reasoning
• In Early Childhood Education, the first cycle is most relevant, with educators focusing on creating a nurturing, sensory-rich environment that supports physical development, kinetic learning and imaginative play.

Our Program

Our program strives to implement the Steiner Early Learning Approach through experiential learning with people, place and resources. Integration of arts: children participate in a variety of artistic activities, including painting, drawing, singing, expressive movement, simple craft work and storytelling throughout day and week.

Rhythm: The day has a rhythm, with rituals and activities like story-telling, morning circle, free play, baking, and gardening, mealtime and resting time. The daily rhythm allows children to breathe in and breathe out. Children also have activities for weekly rhythm and seasonal rhythm throughout the year Unstructured/free play: Children have intentionally uninterrupted free-flow play times to explore their environment indoor and outdoor, with natural and open-ended resources to stimulate their imagination and their cognitive and social skills.

Practice skills and hands on learning: our program focuses on learning from doing practical work and children learn healthy life habits through developing skills through activities like cleaning, gardening, folding, sweeping, pouring and cooking from educators around them. Music and movement: Children participate in singing in circle with expressive gestures and movement harmonically each day.

Connection with nature: Children spend time observing plant, trees, flowers and care for the garden each day as they see how plants grow and change and build strong connections with the natural world by participating in the whole life-cycle of a seed and sustainable gardening, composting and recycling practices.

Literacy, numeracy and mathematics: Children develop those skills from participating in storytelling, singing songs, reciting verses, interacting with peers and educators and hands-on experiences.

Imitation: Imitation is the way that children learn. According to Steiner and other contemporary early childhood experts; the first seven years of the life is “the stage of imitation” and our educators strive to be “Worthy of imitation” and role model children to perform daily tasks carefully and joyfully.

Sensory Exploration: Children interact with all natural materials in their play, we use wood toys, wool yarns and toys, variety of cotton fabric, silk, bee wax, natural dye water painting, caring for plants, playing with all different loose-parts natural materials, shells, stones, leaves, seeds, sticks, twigs etc and observe plants and season changes.

Play-Based Learning: “Play is the work of childhood” Jean Piaget (1896-1980). Our program focuses on play-based learning and children choose their own activities, based on their interests and this fosters their independence, wonder, imagination, physical and emotional development.

School Readiness: Children have opportunities to practice their independence skills, organisation skills and social skills as well as literacy skills each day. They understand and integrate persistence and focus through learning experiences that allow them to revisit skills and knowledge and modify concepts at a self-pace.

Health and Safety

Children’s Orientation: Our program tailors the enrolment process to children’s and family’s needs to support children’s orientation into the service. Children can attend up to 2-4 orientation sessions for 40 minutes each session. During orientation sessions, parents are encouraged to stay to observe the child and help around in the environment as they become familiar with the space.

Vegetarian food: Our service provides healthy and nutritiously balanced vegetarian food for morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea. Our vegetables and fruits are purchased from organic shops.

During orientation sessions any dietary or medical requirements should be discussed and made aware to Jasmine and educators to follow up procedures.

Rest time: All children have a rest/quiet time after lunch each day to maximise their physical development and this one of the elements related to healthy development of a child in Steiner Early Childhood Education.

Soft colour clothes without cartoon pictures: We encourage all children wear quiet coloured clothes without “loud” cartoon pictures when they attend the Centre.

Bag: Children need to pack a bag, with a sun-smart, wide brim sun hat and water bottle which they will be responsible for. Spare change of clothes and socks and wet bag for messy play. Raincoats and gum boots are required for children to enjoy the wet weather. Children need to gumboots to play in Mud.

Technology, Academics and over-stimulations: Our program does not use digital technology, teach children theoretically or offer any activities which are over-stimulating.

Families and the Community

Our service will be a strong part of our local communities and strives to build relationships with community groups and local schools such as Thornbury Primary School and Bell Primary School. We want our children to feel a part of the wider community and develop a deep understanding of the world around them. We welcome parents to participate in some activities such as: gardening, cooking, incursions/excursions, kneading, sewing, music or art, in the classroom with some gentle guidelines. We work collaboratively with parents and incorporate their beliefs, skills, interests and values into our environment.

Food program: Families are encouraged to contribute to the healthy eating program of fruits in the Centre and bring one fruit to share weekly.

Gardening program: Families are invited to participate in the gardening program of seasonal gardening experiences and welcome to bring any seasonal vegetable to share especially in autumn.

Gatherings: Families are invited to share cultural events and participate in seasonal celebrations. Please let educators know about your family culture celebrations. There are a few large gatherings for families throughout the year.

We appreciate parents who are interested in our program and please contact Jasmine by email, or text for any inquiries! You are welcome to complete the Wishlist Form and email us via the Wonder World Play Centre website.

Our Open Day: 6-8pm, 20th February