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Be Kind to Your Mind with Julia Grace

Julia Grace will present two interactive and highly engaging sessions, focussing on Wellbeing for Educators, Kaiako and other adults who work with ECE age children. Using her unique blend of Story, Science and Song, she will take you on a journey of honesty and self-reflection, and leave you with a topped-up toolbox of practical mental health tools and resources.Session 1: Grabable Words: Wellbeing at work and home, better Mental Health language and realistic Self-Care that works for you!Session...

Centre Leader

About CrossroadsWe are a tightknit community based Early Childhood Centre with a Christ-centred curriculum. We are open 8am-5pm Monday-Friday to partner with families in delivering excellent care and education from children aged 1-5 in Palmerston North. We are licensed for 45 children but like to keep our roll smaller than this and maintain great ratios which allow kaiako and tamariki to flourish in our mixed-aged setting.Ko wai koe | About youOur new Centre Leader will be:Inspiring and adaptabl...

Our Vision | Mission 2024

This document is the guiding road map for the future direction of CECEAA....

Connected

Ngā mihi mahana, warm greetings to you. We hope you are all gettting to grips with our new normal and that you and your centres/services are enjoying being back with excited children and relieved parents! We are reminded through this time of prolonged isolation that God made us to have relationship with each other and as nice as it may have been to spend good quality time with our families, being able to connect with those outside of our family has been great. It has also been a time when we ha...

CECEAA Christchurch Hui

Last Thursday night we were kindly hosted by Little Ones Preschool in Loburn for our Christchurch regional hui.  We had teachers join us from Spreydon and Cornerstone along with several staff from Little Ones Preschool.   The visiting teachers from Spreydon and Cornerstone enjoyed having the opportunity to have a tour of this beautiful rural setting before we enjoyed a time of fellowship and professional learning. We revisited the THRIVE document and took some time to engage with ...

Faith the Fantail visits CBK

We have loved having ‘Faith the Fantail’ visit us at CBK.  She has had the opportunity to visit all four of our areas. It has been lovely watching the tamariki share our CBK value of manaakitanga with her; that ‘we are kind and caring, we are warm and welcoming, we take care of one another’. She has had many opportunities for kai beginning at Crèche where she took part in their ‘Teddy Bear’s Picnic’ whānau event. Then she flew down the road to Kidz@303 to spend time in the p...

Seeking Shalom

After reflecting on the notion of thriving at our recent CECEAA Hui I have been mulling over the word shalom.  We were challenged by Cathryn Bell to take time out of our busy lives and really seek solitude with our heavenly Father.  It is through this relationship with God and coming from a place of rest that we can then truly experience shalom.  Shalom is much deeper than just gaining peace it is about wholeness, feeling safe, and flourishing (Brueggemann, 1976). I was discu...

Footprints Educare - Whanaungatanga

It is about being connected. It is a relationship through shared experiences and working together, which provides people with a sense of belonging. It is family and kinship. It is the principle, which binds individuals to the wider group and affirms the value of the collective. We come together on Mondays and Fridays and give glory to God. Each room takes turns to lead our Whanaungatanga time. We share special news of our tamariki and their whanau at this time. We share new things we have d...

Adding To Our Cultural Kete

Kaiako Esther receiving her certificate from Dr Mike Paki...

Individual Membership Of CECEAA

Are you aware that CECEAA membership is not just for Christian ECE services? If you are a Christian working in, or with a heart for Early Childhood Education in Aotearoa you can become an individual member.  We would love to be able to support and connect more Christian early childhood educators through the nation. If you are interested in becoming a member or simply finding out more , you can complete the ONLINE FORM or send Mel send an email on NCO@CECEAA.com...

Our Regional Hui in Manawatu

We had a great evening led by Eulalia Connor who is a Pasifika Education Consultant .  We engaged with what Tapasā looks like in our practice.  We spent time unpicking the three core values Tautua (service and responsibility), Alofa (love and commitment) and Fa’aaloalo (respect and dignity)  and Eulalia was able to share with us stories of what these values can look like in our interactions with Pasifika children and their families.  Our session ended with learning to Sasa...

Rainbow Preschool - Dunedin

OTAGO POLYFEST EARLY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOLS’ MĀORI & PACIFIC ISLAND FESTIVAL The children at Rainbow Preschool have also been preparing for their performance in the Otago Early Childhood and Schools’ Māori & Pacific Island Festival on Friday 13th September. We have had dress rehearsals for the mums and babies in our SPACE programmes, the children in our Under Two area, and other visitors to the centre.  We were also blessed with a Grant from Otago Community Trust for the purchase ...

How Facebook Advertising Could Help Your Centre

At Little Ones Preschool, we are a privately owned, rural Christian preschool. We started 10 years ago, and then added a Nursery three years later. We are licenced for 62, but have just 30- 40 children attending each day. The Ministry of Education state that the number one reason that people select a preschool, is it’s location. So previously we have basically done little or no marketing of our centre. This year, we set up a company Facebook page. We can post for free. Usually if we post a pho...

Wellington Regional Hui - 5/11/19

We hope you will join us for an evening of fellowship and professional learning: Date: Tuesday 5 November 2019 Time:5.00pm-6.30pmCost: FREE Discovery Early Learning Centre148 Major Drive, KelsonLower Hutt Our Professional Learning Focus: We will be reflecting on our CECEAA THRIVE document in relation to the Leadership Capability Framework.  What does this mean to us from a Christian Perspective? Light Refreshments will be provided Please RSVP to Melody Stuckey by the end of September to nco...

Imago Dei: Life as it is Meant to Be

We are all created in the image of God … what does this really mean for us as Christian Teachers? This is a great reading to spend some time reflecting on this concept....

Manaakitanga - A leadership of kindness

Having a deep understanding of our own identity is important to defining yourself as a  person, and certainly as a leader.Research has shown that in early childhood there is very little formal training in leadership. Most leaders learn as they go, using cause and effect as the tool to improvement. This has certainly been the case with me.We begin to delve into identity when we are training to be teachers and develop a personal philosophy. This philosophy is generally based on developmental ...

Manaakitanga Framework For Leadership

This resources was presented at the 2019 Thrive Conferences and was adapted from S & A Macfarlane: Te Pikinga ki runga....

Building a Christ-centred Organisational Culture

“Let your roots grow down into Him and let your lives be built on Him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.” Colossians 2:7Promoting and establishing teacher well-being is the foundation of a strong healthy organisational culture. Without prioritising teacher well-being it becomes challenging for children’s well-being to be at the centre of their educational experience. This internal evaluation tool is designed to enab...

Thrive Conference Presentation

The CECEAA Thrive Conference Presentation is now available for download....

Our CECEAA North Island Hui

It was fabulous to see over 80 people gather at Laidlaw College which was a beautiful setting for our weekend together growing our learning community.  It was a great time of encouragement as we grappled with some of the real issues that impact us in today’s society.  We were challenged to consider our personal wellbeing and to build our organisational culture so we can ensure we are a light in this national.  To enable us to do this Cathryn Bell talked about the importance of s...

Our Christchurch THRIVE Hui

We had a wonderful time at our CECEAA Christchurch Hui  and it was an opportunity to be inspired both personally and professional as we aim to THRIVE in all aspects of our life.  We engaged with our CECEAA THRIVE document and looked at how we can build a strong Christ- Centred organisational culture.  ‘We don’t want to just survive, God intends for us to THRIVE’.  Chris Thornley from the Teaching Council looked at ways we can strengthen our understanding of Inquiry and ...

Faith the Fantail

For some years now, Faith the Fantail has been flitting around the country, visiting different CECEAA centres and having many fun experiences with the tamariki and their teachers. Some of you will have already had the privilege of having her in your centres and will have shared stories of Faith’s adventures with us in the magazine.Faith has been having a bit of a holiday recently but she is now ready to go again and is currently exploring the environment and getting to know the tamariki at Wha...

Highlights from the THRIVE Leadership Hui

It was wonderful to be able to get together in Wellington at the beginning of April for our inaugural Leadership Hui where we launched our THRIVE. We had approximately 45 in attendance from Kaitaia to Dunedin and it was a privilege as a CECEAA executive to see connections being made and people engaging with what it means to ‘thrive’ as individuals and in our teams. We were blessed to hear from a range of speakers including Karen Haywood from InterLead, Cindy Hammond, Colleen Fryett, and Cath...

Children’s Ability to Serve Others

I was so heartened recently, after a vibrant conversation with Claire van Niekerk the Head Teacher from Bethlehem College Kindergarten in Tauranga.  The Kindergarten is involved in a Kahui Ako (Community of Learning) entitled Ngā Whānau O Karaiti that is focusing around the topic of Service Based Learning. In our conversation I was impacted by Claire’s view of the child.  She spoke with such passion about children’s ability to make an impact in their communities from a very young...

5 Simple Te Reo Pronunciation Tips

Do you want to use more te reo in your teaching practice? What’s holding you back? In my work as the author and publisher of Te Reo Singalong books, I meet many teachers who struggle with their pronunciation of te reo. This article introduces five simple tips to help you gain confidence with your pronunciation of te reo. First, let’s think about why we should make an effort to improve our pronunciation of te reo Māori. When I ask teachers in my workshops why they place importance on pronou...