Our concept in detail
Our conceptual principles
It is important to us that the children experience themselves as an important part of society and nature. We as adults, the team and the parents, can open up opportunities and spaces of experience where the children can influence the shaping of their environment and thus experience their self-efficacy.
In day-to-day kindergarten life, the children are involved in participation, co-determination and co-design, i.e. they learn to make mutual agreements, find joint solutions, take personal responsibility through co-determination and self-determination in the daily routine, use conflict resolution as an opportunity for further development and take collective responsibility for themselves and others. In their daily interactions, the children learn to respect boundaries, adhere to rules and make compromises. Conflicts naturally arise in every group. We address these and encourage the children to find their own solutions. We help them to implement them. The correct way to deal with criticism should also be practiced. With our support, the children can learn to deal with defeat and disappointment.
Learning is much more than imparting knowledge and is only possible with all the senses. We discover and experience everyday routines together. In this way, the children build relationships with their environment and nature, perceive connections and acquire comprehensive knowledge – a child’s first view of the world develops this way. We take them on little journeys of discovery, explore our immediate surroundings – the library, the fire department, the museum – travel on different modes of transport and explore the forest, lake and much more. We observe nature, for example the children follow the development of a larva through to the adult butterfly.
Our daycare centers are institutions that complement the family. We see our work as an independent socio-educational task for the education and upbringing of children and the promotion of basic values that are essential in the family.
Parents expect that it is possible to reconcile family and career with the help of the daycare center, but also that their children feel safe, protected and supported at the daycare center as they would at home. We take this expectation into account.
It is particularly important to maintain the basic family values during the settling-up phase from the family to the nursery or to the elementary group. We want to offer every child a similar feeling of security as they have in their family.
On the one hand, children are to experiment, to develop and to discover their environment by feeling and exploring. On the other hand, they need a structured daily routine with fixed rituals, rules and predefined boundaries to guide them. It is also important that their needs for safety, belonging, appreciation and sympathy are met.
Every child has the strength and the will to develop in a positive and healthy way according to his / her abilities. They seek out opportunities of their own accord to test and develop their knowledge and abilities.
The development of a child does not follow a pattern, but takes place individually from case to case. The educators support the children on this path and always pick them up where they are. We create a stimulating, age-appropriate, diverse and inspiring environment without imposing our individual values, views and wisdom on the children.
Certain activities are also derived from the individual development paths that promise the child meaningful and goal-oriented development. Such activities can be integrated into all situations – from play to a project. In a project, children and educators work intensively and purposefully over a longer period of time on a topic from the children’s everyday lives in a variety of activities:
Projects are developed for specific reasons, such as the children’s interests, but also to introduce children to topics they have not yet come into contact with.
Projects contain play and learning activities, must be designed to be eventful and interesting and must be planned and developed together with the children.
Spontaneous ideas from the children, suggestions from parents and new ideas from the educators can be incorporated at any time. The environment outside the daycare center is included.
We develop our projects on the basis of targeted observation together with the children. This enables us to find out what interests and needs they have and what current life issues they are dealing with. At the same time, we see which topics can be dealt with within the framework of the project in order to expand the children’s knowledge, taking into account the promotion of self-determined and competent action.
A child has the freedom to choose the play partner, the duration of the play, the play materials, the location and the intensity of the play or the activities in general. This can be a game, a learning unit, a project or even reading. Our semi-open concept in the elementary area promotes this premise. This freedom of choice supports both the children’s social and self-skills and helps them to process what they have experienced through free play.
Mission statement
Our mission statement is implemented on five different levels:
- we welcome all children and respect their unique personalities and their different living conditions
- we ensure that all children always feel safe, secure and at home
- children can develop their personality with us, acquire skills and abilities, develop their independence and have a wide range of experiences. We not only give them space to do this, but also offer guidance and support
- it is important to us that children are prepared for the challenging society of tomorrow. We want to support them in this
- we offer a loving environment in which children can follow their curiosity
- our daycare centers have plenty of space in which children can move freely, learn foreign languages and develop creatively
- they are experts for their children. We rely heavily on this expert knowledge in our educational work
- we involve them so that they are informed about all important matters concerning their child
- they should have the certainty that their children are in good hands
- contributes commitment and professionalism, is professionally qualified and constantly undergoes further training
- actively participates in learning processes and is a play and dialog partner for the children
- everyone conveys basic values to the children through their example and pedagogical work
- everyone brings their own background, life experience and a wide range of language skills to the table and because
- everyone treats each other with mutual appreciation and respect
- the well-being of the children in care and their families is ensured
- special emphasis is placed on the team and that the working conditions are maintained at a high level under the prevailing conditions
- effective communication and the desired transparency are ensured both internally and externally
“I would recommend Kidspace to anyone who likes to work productively and cooperatively for the benefit of people big and small.”
Philipp Wohlwill (preschool teacher at Kidspace)
Language support in our Kidspace
Everyday integrated language development aims to support the development of language as an area of development that is a particularly important component of overall child development. Language is seen as a fundamental building block of cognitive, social-emotional and motor development, which not only forms the basis of this development, but also promotes it. We understand language in a holistic sense and take equal account of verbal, pre-linguistic and non-linguistic means of communicative expression in the first or second language acquisition of the children in our care.
Language support integrated into everyday life takes place in everyday routine situations such as drop-off and pick-up times, personal hygiene, meals as well as in planned and free play and educational situations inside and outside the daycare center (joint activities and events, projects, excursions, etc.). It is aimed at the entire group of children, smaller groups or, if necessary, individual children.
