Importance of Early childhood education centres...

Our middle daughters red velvet cupcakes

Yesterday was a big day for our Aoga Fa'ata'ita'i (Samoan ECE Early childhood education) centre in our local PIC Mangere church in hosting our first fundraiser for the centre since joining the board.

My task was to design the tickets and posters with some social media promo and cooking the chicken as well as asking our middle child to bake red velvet cupcakes for the occasion which was a bonus.

A big THANK YOU!!! to all who were able to attend and who supported our cause as we plan and look forward to the months ahead with an ERO Education Review office visit as well as sharing thoughts and ideas for upgrading our aoga.

What I've noticed in the past few years is the number of Early childhood centre business franchises that have popped up around Mangere that provide generic services for local families' daycare for their pre-school aged children.

For my children growing up, my top priorities were to have my children at a centre/s that were local, with similar cultural and Christian values as well as a safe and caring environment. For the educators to be able to share in the Samoan language, songs and Christian values was very important to me as they were the teachers then become like parents to our little ones whilst we are away at work.

I believe that I was blessed to have our local church provide that Samoan and Christian ECE care for our daughters with many neat memories and I want to ensure that that service continues for many other local families wanting the same for their beloved treasures.

However, with the many new centres that I see, I would encourage mothers or caregivers to look beyond the new facilities, the pick-up and drop off, food provided and to observe the care that is given to the children as in the Christian and cultural values/principles that may or may not be taught to children as it's often spoken about how the first three years of a child's life are when a child learn's exponentially and when many things are hard-wired into their personality, learning etc.

The ways that the staff interact with parents and children i.e. the tone of the ECE centre and the ways that children interact with each other. The reason why I write this is that our children are very precious and vulnerable in any situation but with the corporate centres they need us to be vigilant in their observations of what is going on...