Journey Durack Heights: Exciting New Centre Opens In NT
Taking a snapshot a few weeks after opening
The answer to what you want for your children is similar for many families. Even if it differs in its manifestations, all parents want the best for their children.
In Durack, one of the building blocks parents have put in place for this is Journey Early Learning. It is one of those places where so many good things come together. Each child is treated individually, challenged and encouraged by highly qualified, creative and loving teachers.
The setting is also right, as the centre speaks for itself, bright, warm, inviting and infused every day with a wonderful smell from the kitchen, which is thanks to the Future Foodies Program, the holistic food program of Journey Early Learning where fresh food is cooked every day at the centre with recipes specially developed for Journey to meet the needs of our future gourmets. All in all, a place where children and parents alike feel completely at ease.
The concept did convince, no question. But what to do when there are more requests than places?
For Journey, this was a clear case: a second centre was needed so that all children could benefit from the offer.
For a few weeks, there is now, in the truest sense of the word, the Journey Durack Heights next door in addition to the Journey Durack Centre (which has, by the way, just been rated with exceeding the National Quality Standards). Here, you will find everything that you would have loved in Journey Durack too: the open, spacious but at the same time cosy rooms, lots of natural light, warm, subtle colours, attractively designed play and learning facilities and, to the delight of the children: fantastic water elements – just the thing these days.
In addition, the Community Centre is right next door. For sure, wonderful cooperation can be developed here in the future. After all, Journey is always concerned with firmly anchoring the children in the community. Such wonderful coincidences are a natural choice. Even if all Journey Centres are similar in some respects, they always have their own character. And, of course, this is significantly shaped by our local teams. Emily, the Centre Manager at Durack Heights, has made it a priority for the team to become a close-knit community. And this positive energy that has been created here is now carried through the new daily routine at the centre.This positive energy is highly contagious.
In Durack Heights, they are especially inspired by the RIE practices.
An approach to provide the secure and respectful beginnings children need for a healthy life goes back to Magda Gerber’s Educaring approach.
Through this approach which honours infants and young children as equal members in relationships, the team is dedicated to creating a culture of authentic, resourceful and respectful people. And their work is inspired by the natural integrity of infants and the formative power of relationships in their lives. When allowed to unfold in their own way and in their own time, children discover, manifest, and inspire the best in themselves and in others.
What does this look like in practice?
Just one of many examples is that there are no highchairs or bouncers in the Nursery room. The children are free to choose when they want to come to eat or when they are finished.
What may also be different here are the schedules for the teachers. For a whole school year, the schedule is always the same. The children always know whom they will meet in the morning and welcome the routine and security. For the teachers, this approach means planning security because their own lives also need to be managed.
After only a few weeks since opening, Durack Heights is well on its way to becoming a fixture in the community – just as the sister centre next door already is. With everything you could want for your child – and maybe even a little more.
