ABC Bayfair

ABC Bayfair is situated just a few streets back from beautiful Mount Maunganui beach and across the road from Bayfair shopping complex, with a bus stop directly opposite.

We are a small centre with a ‘home away from home’ feeling that fosters our vision of whanaungatanga – having the parent, children, and our community at the heart of everything we do!

Your child will be embraced in Tuakana/teina relationships. This is where older and younger children learn from each other, sharing and gaining knowledge in the different areas they are skilled in.  We know that your child will learn best through working, talking, and playing together with others, building relationships with people, places, and things within the centre and the wider community. Your child will see themself as a capable and competent learner who can make their own decisions through the provision of open learning opportunities.

Kaiako/teachers will get to know your child well by building relationships with not only them, but with you and your family. We’ll develop individual learning goals for your child that are consistently moved forward through inquiry-based learning and project work.

We foster a culture where your child can involve themselves in sustained, complex play, that creates depth, wonderment, and engagement. We grab teachable moments, instilling skills and qualities into the child through positive and worthwhile interactions.

The Teina Room (under 2's) is an extremely settled room. It’s a place where your baby will find a sense of belonging, feel safe, and explore their environment, as well as having their individual needs met. We build trusting relationships with you and your baby in a slow-paced environment. Come and see for yourself, what we do each day, we might be painting using our fingers, baking, exploring our rock river water garden, playing with our bunny Ryder, reading our favourite stories, cooking pretend food, and many other fun exciting things!

In the Tuakana Room (over 2’s), you’ll be surprised at how big our outdoor area is! Your child will have plenty of room to be physical, challenge themselves on the playground, and get speed up on their bike! Your child’s interests will be sustained and extended through our environment and experiences that are planned to meet their individual goals. We encourage your child to ask questions, and provide them with the tools to find their own answers through inquiry-based learning and projects. We take pride in our teaching practices and positive guidance, our interactions with children create fun and happiness!

Your child will bring a packed lunchbox from home for their lunch but as we see our kitchen as another learning space they have the option to help bake their morning & afternoon tea almost daily.

BestStart have a Be School Ready Initiative that consists of skills and competencies to support our teaching. We entwine these competencies throughout our whole centre as part of our tuakana- teina growing together. We believe that children should feel empowered and confident to be the best learners they can be, and we find our children are very ready for school, as whanau and new entrance teachers have told us so in the past.

We have a great relationship with nearby Arataki Primary School and we often go there to watch cultural performances and join in their new entrant classroom activities.

Get in touch with us today to find out how you and your child can be at the heart of our centre.