FAMILY-LIKE & CHILD-FRIENDLY ATMOSPHERE
The years spent in the kindergarten, play a very important role in the life of small children, especially from their mental development perspective. A great advantage of our kindergarten is it being small, its groups are low in numbers, therefore we have enough time and give plenty of attention to each child.
The family-like, child-oriented, positive atmosphere of the kindergarten and the supporting, empathetic behaviour of the staff provide vital emotional security to the children. The integration of small children into the new groups, takes place gradually, in their own pace, and according to our professional experience in the field.
We find it especially important to create a coherent community spirit, and to nurture a good relationship between different age groups. We actively strive to create and maintain such a friendly, welcoming, and coherent environment.
The kindergarten education together with the family should actively serve the development of a child, hence why the co-operation with families is so important. It takes place at daily personal meetings, common programmes, open hours and parents’ meetings.
BILINGUAL EDUCATION: English-Hungarian and German-Hungarian bilingual groups
Habakukk has been working as a bilingual kindergarten since 1991. Based on our methods tested, and experiences, that we gained in children’s education in German language, we have also started English bilingual groups, from September 2002.
Our purpose is to establish bilingual education, make German and English languages popular, improve early language skills, by acquiring certain vocabulary and speech panels.
In our kindergarten from the age of 3 there is an effective, logically set up German or English education integrated in the daily life, which means, that we not only talk in English or German to the children but it is used as part of regular German or English activities.
We put a lot of emphasis in our methodology workshop helping the education of the German language. Our German language teaching program and visual aids were recognised in several professional competitions. In 2001 and 2003 we organised competition-sponsored conferences and workshops for kindergarten teachers and experts and in 2004 we published a series of books on the methodology of foreign language teaching for children. Our efforts, as mentioned in the introduction were recognised by the European Language Award in 2005.
COLOURFUL KINDERGARTEN LIFE
We consciously build upon keeping children inspired and open minded, working with their individual skills and abilities, so every child can thrive and their individuality can emerge in various ways.
Children can meet many new things, in accordance with their age and individual development, they can try various activities. We organise weekly excursions, museum visits, puppet-theatre shows or concerts for our kindergarten pupils. For the older nursery children we provide different programs every month.
Kindergarten kids can participate in the following optional activities: swimming, ballet, piano, soccer. From the age of 5, all children go ice-skating. For pre-schoolers we organise 2 or 3-day excursions in the summer.
(PRE-KINDERGARTEN) NURSERY GROUP FOR THE SMALLEST
In our nursery groups we accept children from the age of 18 months. We have groups of 10 to 12 children, and there are always 2 teachers dealing with them.
Beside the loving, personal solicitude, we would like to develop consciously children’s skills and abilities by such means, activities that are appropriate to their age and interest. Playing – storytelling, singing, rhyming, gymnastics and crafts activities are on a daily basis in our nursery as well.
As for attendance in our nursery , we have more options to choose from:
- 5, 4, 3 full days a week
PRE-SCHOOL GROUP FOR THE OLDEST
Primary schools these days have high requirements for the children. The main task of the pre-school group is to prepare them for a school start free of care, and especially to learn to deal with certain subjects that are most important in the 1st grade. We prepare kids for future school tasks playfully ( reading, writing, counting, etc.).
We pay particular attention to observe and monitor children’s maturity, their individual skills and abilities so that they can get help in time to make up arrears. Teachers take notes continuously regarding the development process of children and parents are always informed of the results. Kids leaving for school have a special school maturity examination each year.