History
This centre is the result of parents of the Glebe and Educators committed to the families of the Glebe coming together as partners and working toward a single dedicated goal: To create a place where children will have access to high quality education and care in an environment that welcomes, respects and understands this community.
While a location had been found, much renovation had to take place, as well as many inspections for the Day Nurseries License. In the interim, many families offered rooms in their homes to be schools, welcoming other families to bring their children where educators taught and continued their work.
From May 2008 through to October of 2008, educators and parents worked together until the centre was finally licensed and opened. Many of the rooms in the centre have been named and/or dedicated to these families as they were the pioneers who gave the centre its first breath of life.
The name "ACORN" was inspired by a friend of the Executive Director. After some investigation, we understand that when the first pioneers came to Ottawa, they cut down almost all of the oak and pine trees. Ottawa soon realized their mistake and has focused on replanting these very important trees for their strength, beauty and heritage. Acorn Early Learning Centre realizes the importance of good strong roots for tomorrow's future and continues to work by providing high quality programs for children while supporting partnership with parents and community.
Philosophy
Our goal is to provide developmentally appropriate and experiential programs for children who are preschool and school-age. We endeavour to achieve this by promoting the highest quality professionalism, consistency and a respectful school environment with dedicated staff that are qualified and truly care.
We believe that learning is an active process of self-construction which occurs as we; children, parents, educators and friends, go about our everyday routines and special times in the company of others. Educators treat and listen to children as individuals; competent, resourceful, curious, imaginative, and inventive, each desiring to communicate with each other and their environment. We believe that all learning is intertwined; physical, intellectual, emotional, social, moral, aesthetic, and creative. Schools, homes and the community are all social learning environments and need to have strong partnerships to enhance the child's learning.
We are your partners. We each, children and adults, bring our own unique personal history. We, as educators, need to listen to, in the deepest sense, to the children's and parent's personal stories (perspectives), in order to make our curriculum and everyday classroom experiences meaningful. Our environment will be organized to offer rich learning opportunities connected to those experiences.
Children are invited to explore and problem solve, individually and in groups, to be involved in small and large projects, to learn and to respect their world as well as themselves and others. We are cognoscente of our responsibility to prepare children for a more formal school setting and will offer experiences that will meet that need as well. We believe that it is important for Educators of young children to continue their growth and will provide and support professional development as well as encourage independent study. This will ensure that staff are ready for the challenges of providing the most up-to-date programming and best practice for children's optimum growth and development. We recognize the value of strong partnerships with families and the community in the education of young children and will promote opportunities for this growth.
We look forward to the opportunity of providing a place for future educators from local colleges and high schools to train and practice. Finally, we embrace the important responsibility given to us by parents, to care and love their children, to provide safe and beautiful environments for the children to learn, grow and play in, and to be your partners in this important time of their lives.