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Welcome from our Dargaville Centre Manager
Karyn Connelly
I was born in Southland and made Northland my home 40 years ago, where I have built both my life and career. For the past 28 years, I have worked in early childhood education, including roles as a Centre Manager, Regional Manager and with the Ministry of Education.
"I am passionate about creating a centre grounded in whanaungatanga, where strong relationships are nurtured, and manakitanga, where everyone feels welcomed, respected, and cared for."
Working alongside kaiako, I strive to create an environment where tamariki feel safe, valued, and inspired to learn. By partnering closely with whānau, we can achieve positive outcomes that support every child to thrive and reach their full potential.
Nurturing Spaces for Growing Minds
We empower tamariki to direct their own learning while ensuring they feel supported, included, and safe.
Our childcare centre in Dargaville features three age-appropriate classrooms, each fostering Tuakana/teina relationships and engaged tamariki. We utilise a range of resources and age-appropriate materials to encourage teachable moments and happy, learning-focused experiences.
The clean, open, and inviting spaces of our centre feature a beautiful rural outlook, and our friendly, passionate teachers are always proud to show off our rooms.
Childcare Classrooms at Our Dargaville Centre
Busy Bees Dargaville Early Education Centre has three classrooms tailored to the different ages and developmental stages of young children.
Wairoa Pēpi (up to 2 years)
In our Wairoa Pēpi space, we prioritise our tamariki and their sense of belonging. Our room is designed to foster loving and trusting bonds between our infants and toddlers and their kaiako. Kaiako work closely with whānau to establish excellent routines that support each tamariki and ensure their individual needs are met.
We strive to set a safe and nurturing environment where relationships are at the core of everything we do. The tamariki are provided with open-ended resources that encourage them to discover, experiment, and develop their own ideas and create theories about the world around them. We also encourage our tamariki to take risks and challenge themselves, with the support of our kaiako.
Rūma Tokatoka (2-4 years)
In Tokatoka, independence is woven into all aspects of our curriculum. Our kaiako help our tamariki balance the desire to be independent and their need to be nurtured and cared for. We collaborate closely with whānau to ensure that all of our tamariki feel a strong sense of belonging. This age group is ready to explore their sense of self, whilst still needing more care than the older tamariki. A focus on emerging social skills and independence makes this space.
This room facilitates free-flowing play-based education, which entices children's curiosity and encourages exploration. We highly value the process of testing, trying, and embracing challenges. Our kaiako provide unwavering support to our tamariki, enabling them to confidently take on these challenges within a safe and secure environment.
Rūma Tāne Mahuta (4-6 years)
Tāne Mahuta Room is Busy Bees’ preschool in Dargaville. We prepare tamariki for their next learning journey by weaving our school readiness programme throughout all aspects of the curriculum in a play-based, meaningful way. This programme is further supported by small groups attending learning through play sessions at Dargaville Primary School, a few times throughout the term.
Our curriculum is designed and implemented through free play and the use of provocations to meet our tamariki’s current interests and learning dispositions. Areas that we encourage and support are self-help and self-regulation skills, mathematics, literacy, name recognition and fine and gross motor development. This is woven into our play, daily routines, and daily rituals. We believe our programme is mana-enhancing and we value and try to instil confidence, self-worth, and a can-do attitude in all tamariki.
Food & Nutrition
Our in-house cook provides freshly made meals for children each day, using our dietician-designed Nourish menus and recipes, based on the New Zealand Heart Foundation Tohu Manawa Ora | Healthy Heart Award for Early Learning Centres. We believe that through nourishing food, children are fuelled to thrive physically and mentally, whilst enjoying the benefits of coming together and connecting as a group at mealtimes.
Education Through Food
Our early childhood centre in Dargaville has vegetable gardens and fruit trees. These gardens help tamariki learn through hands-on activities, encourage them to work together to plant and harvest, and teach them where food comes from. They also help children develop a love for nature and care for the environment. In the Tāne Mahuta classroom (4-year-old room), children place fruit and vegetable scraps in the compost bin. Additionally, we partner with a local farmer who collects our food scraps at the end of each day to feed their pigs.
Lunchbox Day
Once a week, on Thursdays, we ask whānau to provide an empty lunchbox, and we supply the food. The children fill their lunchboxes and practice eating from them, learning to ration their food instead of eating everything at once. This helps them develop important skills for their transition to school, where they will need to manage their own lunches.
Our Curriculum
Our programme is grounded in Te Whāriki, the New Zealand bi-cultural Early Childhood Curriculum, which guides the education and care of children from birth to school age. It reflects learning as a lifelong process that begins from the very start of life. Our kaiako work alongside your child to plan and extend their learning, celebrating each child's uniqueness and the value whānau bring to their learning journey.
Our Programmes
Bee Curious, our Busy Bees Curriculum Framework, has been created to guide and inspire kaiako in supporting tamariki through rich, interconnected learning experiences. Built on the strong foundation of Te Whāriki, it reflects the principles of Aotearoa New Zealand’s early childhood curriculum and the aspirations we hold for our children as they grow.
Nutritious food is the foundation for healthy growth and development in our children. Our Nourish menus fuel our children and support full, healthy tummies enabling clear minds to focus on the learning and set children up to thrive at our centre.
Our MOVE programme deliberately sets out physical activities that give children the opportunity to learn, practice and master physical skills whilst developing their resilience, perseverance, patience, co-ordination, gross-motor skills, teamwork and much more, all while having loads of fun!
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