A. We promote the health, safety, nutrition, and well-being of the children in our care by diligently meeting all the requirements of Ontario regulation 137/15. At Grow Together we specifically:

• Encourage nutritious eating at mealtime.
• Teach the importance of personal hygiene, such as hand washing, blowing nose, sneezing, and coughing.
• Enforce Public health guidelines during any kind of outbreak or illness.
• Communicate with families about illness outbreaks via emails, communicate app or while drop off or pick-up time.
• Sign in and out of each child on a daily basis on the attendance records;
• Ensure all staff are CPR and First Aid trained.
• Communicating with families via phone call or classroom communicate app if child does not show-up in the morning as of safe arrival policy.

A. We support positive and responsive interactions among the children, parents, staff, and educators through:

• Role-modelling for the children, parents, and staff the manners and behaviour that we wish the children to exhibit;
• Connecting with each child, parents, and staff member as an individual and in a way that is meaningful to them;
• Working with the children, parents, and staff to resolve conflicts in a peaceful and harmonious manner.

B. We encourage the children to interact and communicate in a positive way and we support their ability to self-regulate through;

• Having a daily mindfulness group time that encourage children to express their feelings, minimizing anxiety and increase happiness;
• Offering positive, non-punitive direction to every child to support the classroom communities;
• Help children to recognize their feelings or emotions and validate those feelings.

C. We foster the children’s exploration, work, and inquiry through;

• Activities that assist children to become independent and capable of assisting others in care of self, care of the environment and care of others;
• Providing activities to explore and refine all the senses, as well as to discover sequencing and order;
• Providing activities to increase vocabulary, encourage discussion, explore sounds, and begin to develop the process of writing and reading activities;
• Providing activities for cutting, colouring, painting, exploring colour, shapes, and texture, pasting and other activities helps with fine motor skills;
• Ask open-ended questions about children’s topic of interest to organize activities to extend their interest;
• Become co-researcher and co-learner with children to explore their interest.

D. Provide child-initiated and adult-supported experiences;

• Provide child-initiated and adult-supported experiences;
• Children show their interest and initiate much of the activities each day. They are encouraging to explore the world by exploring.
• Educators support each child with their learnings and help them to explore.

E. We plan for and create positive learning environment and experiences in which each child’s learning and development is
supported through;

• The daily curriculum and materials.
• The children are disciplined in a positive manner at a level that is appropriate to their actions and their ages in order to promote self-discipline, ensure health and safety, respect the rights of others, and maintain equipment.
• Children can choose work that they are capable of doing.

F. We incorporate indoor and outdoor fun (by going for nature walks, and using our park when weather permits), as well as active play, and quiet time into the day and give consideration to the individual needs of the children by allowing them to manage aspects of their day including;

• Having active time indoors and outdoors
• Planned outdoor gross activities twice a day, weather permitting as well give opportunity to children use their imagination during play.
• Catered lunch and two snacks are provided.
• Providing nap/quiet time for the children between 12-2pm.

G. We foster the engagement of an ongoing communication with parents about the program and their children in the following ways;

• Classroom educators are available outside of the classroom time via email.
• Monthly newsletter is sent to all parents to communicate general information such as monthly calendars or any changes happening at the centre.
• Photos and videos are shared with parents so they can see what their children are participating in the class via communication apps.
• Educators will share each child’s learning experiences, development milestones or any other necessary information with parents through communication app or drop off or pick up time.
• Educators will also observe and document challenges faced by the child and what strategies they will use to help the child dealing with these challenges. These strategies are shared and communicated with parents to promote similar and consistent learning at home.

H. Involve local community partners and allow those partners to support the children, their families, and staff;

• Inviting specialists to come in and broaden the children’s experiences, such as musicians, yogis, firefighters, and other community helpers.

I. We support our staff’s professional development through;

1. Staff are encouraged to attend work-related seminars and workshops to keep up with the latest changes and research in the childcare field.
2. Annual staff review and evaluation meeting.
3. Support staff in the areas they need help to reach their goals at the workplace.

J. We document in several ways;

• Logs, records, monthly newsletters, photos, and videos.
• We track all program plans; all work engaged in and observe and communicate anecdotal information on each unique child and on the class as a whole.
• We observe and discuss concerns regarding social, emotional, development or academic challenges.
• We have regular staff meetings to encourage strong communication between staff.