Dannevirke Kindergarten staff continue learning started in lockdown

Lead teacher at Appleton Kindergarten looks at feedback on her Facebook page from parents and children.

While kindergarten children were officially allowed back to kindergarten on Wednesday, April 29, both Central and Appleton staff in Dannevirke knew there would be relatively few in attendance because they have been in regular contact with parents throughout lockdown.

Now, at level 2, it has been full-on but they are prepared because the children have been learning from home.

Recognising that during the lockdown and despite the holidays, parents and caregivers would be needing help to manage their children, both kindergartens set up a virtual kindergarten programme online.

Using their Facebook pages and Story Park they set up contacts with parents and their children starting with Virtual Mat Time at 10am each week day.

Over the ensuing days and weeks the children have tasted programmes involving story-telling, art activities, science experiments, numeracy challenges, music experiences and literacy challenges.

They even celebrated birthdays with virtual cakes.

There have been enthusiastic responses from parents and children, parents posting back their children's efforts through Story Park - an online learning platform which allows parents to gauge their children's progress.

Enthusiastic support from head teachers Bridgett Augustine of Appleton Kindergarten and Hilary Hirst of Central Kindergarten has motivated all staff who have been involved working from home and many hours have been put in to ensure the programmes have run well.

Manager of the Dannevirke Kindergarten Association Antoinette Perry is thrilled with the commitment of the staff, saying it was a huge challenge but the association was starting to head towards more online contact with parents even before the lockdown.

Despite the hard work she was right behind the initiative using a phrase she heard recently as a motivator – "negativity in infectious but positivity is contagious".