Little Folks Academy

Our Care

At Little Folks Academy we believe Early Learning and Care is about providing high quality and professional care in a child led environment, supporting each child to reach their full potential in a safe, secure, and stimulating environment and providing opportunities that nurtures children’s learning and development in a holistic way.

We believe that each child’s individuality should be cherished by giving genuine and equal support and encouragement to each child within our care, including children with additional needs, ensuring all children are able to meaningfully participate in our setting.

We provide a safe and nurturing environment with warm and kind interactions. An environment which is inviting, encourages children to explore and provides lots of opportunities for creativity, adventure, choice, fun and freedom. Children learn best by actively engaging with their environment, both indoor and outdoor, exploring, experimenting, and being involved with their own learning.

We offer a range of learning opportunities to children, which are appropriate to the child’s stage of development. We are fully committed to being guided by the principles of Síolta and the curriculum framework Aistear.

We recognise how important high-quality early childhood experience can be in children’s lives. This Curriculum aims to encourage active learning, problem solving, effective communication, creativity, and autonomy. It aims to give children a good start which will benefit their long-term success in life. We recognise the diversity of experiences and relationships that shape children’s lives.

We provide high quality and professional care in a child led environment.

Aistear: The Early Childhood Curriculum Framework

Our programme follows the Aistear guidelines and principles. Aistear is Ireland’s curriculum framework for children from birth to six years. Aistear is designed to work with the great variety of curriculum materials currently in use in early childhood settings. Using the broad learning goals of Aistear we will adapt our curriculum to make learning even more enjoyable and rewarding for the children at the Service.

Aistear contains information for parents/guardians and practitioners that will help plan for and provide challenging and enjoyable learning experiences that can enable all children to grow and develop as competent and confident learners in the context of loving relationships with others.

Aistear describes the types of learning (dispositions, values and attitudes, skills, knowledge, and understanding) that are important for children in their early years and offers ideas and suggestions as to how this learning might be nurtured. The Framework also provides guidelines on supporting children’s learning through partnerships with parents/guardians, interactions, play, and assessment.

Culture & Ethos

We operate under a set of core beliefs that form our ethos:

We will cherish your child’s individuality and will ensure to give genuine and equal support and encouragement to each and all within our care

We uphold our image of the child and operate a rights-based approach for children.

We facilitate a holistic approach to early childhood education and development

We work in close partnership with parents and families ensuring to share your child’s experiences within our setting

Quality for us means warm and kind interactions in a safe and nurturing environment

We operate under the principles of honesty, openness, fairness, and respect

We empower our staff to share our vision of high-quality care and require that employees have the skills and drive to help achieve