Atelier Kids is High Park’s only licensed Reggio-inspired childcare centre with five beautifully appointed classrooms of natural light-filled space and a calming interior colour palette. We take our inspiration from the Reggio Emilia educational approach where we emphasize quality communication, authentic relationships, and a thoughtfully curated environment. Our educators facilitate, with the children, a curiosity about the world around them and represent their learning in a myriad of ways – including conversation, mark-making, painting, music-making, dramatic play, and extensive time in nature. We believe each child is born creative, intuitive, resourceful, and has a strong potential for development from a very young age.
Our classrooms provide a calm, home-like environment; an engaging space for curious young minds. Providing a clean, safe, sanitized environment is our goal, everyday so that we can minimize any potential school closures. We ensure that our community’s youngest citizens are safe in our centre as we have designated ”pods” within each classroom and limiting interaction between these pods of children indoors and out. We encourage frequent hand washing, sanitization of high-touch surfaces and toys, mindfulness of the physical-distancing throughout our centre, and our educators wearing masks indoors and out. We are moving above and beyond safety regulations. Each morning we greet our families and follow up with a two-step Wellness Check. We spend lots of time outdoors in our backyard play area and take neighbourhood walks to enjoy the fresh air and outdoors as much as possible.
We stress creativity where children imagine, dream, consider possibilities, and feel inspired. We share this amazement, curiosity, and joy as an integral part of how we learn together, as “co-researchers”. The image of the child is a central focus of our Atelier Kids Reggio-inspired philosophy, regarding children as the dynamic, insightful, capable contributors that they are: unknowingly mindful and present.
Atelier Kids promotes the child’s innate resourcefulness to inspire out-of-the-box thinking and the ability to visualize all the possible ways to achieve a desired outcome. We hold the image of the child as one of a resourceful researcher on their path to prepare for the kinder-years, in our own Ontario Curriculum Kindergarten program.
We enjoy routine visits to High Park with our preschoolers and when our weather cooperates, we’re enjoying picnic lunches in the nearby park. Most importantly, we continue to educate and comfort. Many things have changed in our centre and that’s to help keep us safe and healthy, but other things will always stay the same . . . we will play, laugh, learn, remain curious and wonder, we’ll dream, grow and celebrate what makes us uniquely a part of our HighPark/Bloor West Village community.
Our childcare centre is the only one of its kind in Toronto. We’re in your neighbourhood. We welcome you to take the time to get to know us.
Interested in learning more: contact our Atelier Kids Director, Kathleen: director@atelierkids.com