Back to Articles

Our visit to the Maygrove Village!

30 September 2024

The preschool tamariki truly enjoy their excursions to Maygrove Village. For Māori Language Week, they had the wonderful opportunity to create feathers for a korowai alongside the residents. This beautiful korowai has been on display in the foyer of Maygrove Village and was gifted to us on October 9, 2024. Our tamariki eagerly anticipate their next visit to see their “new friends,” as they affectionately call the residents.

A korowai, or Māori cloak, is adorned with hukahuka (tassels) and feathers. It serves as a mantle of prestige and honor, symbolizing leadership and the responsibilities that come with it within the community. The name "korowai" embodies the respect, authority, and spiritual power associated with leadership in Māori culture.

If you have a child in an early learning centre, you may have been invited to share your family’s culture within this centre. There are many ways that you can share your culture with your child’s early learning centre but what exactly does this mean and how can this practice benefit your child as well as others?

Is there anything more fantastic than seeing an infant, toddler or young child fully rocking to a beat with their own artistic movements, not a care in the world as they create, move and groove to music that sometimes only they can hear?! There are, of course many learning benefits for children when they engage in music and movement, these are just a few of them as well as some ways that you can bring music and movement to life for your child.

Young children are learning their place in the world every single day in multiple ways. The ideas that they form from observing the world around them will often show up when children are engaging in family and dramatic play, but what exactly is family and dramatic play and what are the benefits of your child engaging in it?

Our visit to the Maygrove Village!

Sharing your Culture

Music and Movement

Family and Dramatic Play