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Welcome from our Martinborough Centre Manager
Emma Thompson
Hi, I’m Emma. I have been the Centre Manager at Busy Bees Martinborough since 2019. In this time, I have worked closely with my team to ensure that our environment and practices here reflect the high standard of care and education we believe is important for every child that goes through our centre. Outside of the centre, I love spending time with my family and being a part of this amazing community.
Our large natural and inviting centre environment offers seamless indoor/outdoor flow with plenty of space for exploration. Our spacious outdoor areas provide many opportunities for gross motor development and for our tamariki to discover and learn more about papatūānuku.
Children are involved in active play, where they learn to safely take risks and are able to fulfil their natural desire to explore. Children feel encouraged to be kaitiaki of their environment, learning to care for the plants they helped to plant and taking pride in their environment. Delightful conversations can be heard amongst the tamariki as they are involved in interactive and imaginative play, provoked by our detailed and tailored set-ups.
Our separate indoor and outdoor areas are tailored to each age and stage of learning and development. We also provide opportunities for tamariki to come together to share tuakana-teina (older-younger child) interactions where wonderful teaching moments happen.
Our Spaces
Our learning spaces are carefully curated to invite curiosity and investigation. With seamless flow between indoor and outdoor environments, children are able to move freely between experiences, selecting materials and opportunities that spark their interest and thinking. Outdoors, our well-resourced playground offers purposeful areas for play, including bike tracks, climbing structures, swings, and sand play, supporting children to build coordination, confidence, and a willingness to take on new challenges.
Intentional teaching sits at the heart of what we do. Each day, our kaiako design thoughtful provocations; planned experiences that invite children to think, problem-solve, and revisit ideas over time. These are not one-off activities, but meaningful opportunities for children to test theories, develop persistence, and deepen their understanding of the world around them.
For our youngest tamariki, we provide a smaller, calm and nurturing infant space where strong relationships and a sense of security are prioritised. This environment allows our infants to explore at their own pace, supported by responsive kaiako who focus on building trust, comfort, and early learning foundations.
We recognise that every child brings their own strengths, interests, and ways of learning. Through responsive teaching, we extend these strengths, supporting children to become confident, independent thinkers who are actively engaged in their learning journey.
Tailoring meaningful learning for each child
We recognise each individual child’s learning progression, sharing with parents how their children are learning and being supported by teachers. We offer bespoke learning processes, where parents can see teachers, seeing their child as individuals.
Parents and whānau are involved in their children’s learning through regular Storypark updates that are fitting and highlight each child’s strengths and learning so that families feel part of the learning and feel welcome to give feedback. Hearing our proud children are of their achievements by sharing these moments helps keep parents involved in the learning.
Growing Curiosity and Confidence – Pathways to Kura and Beyond
Our Bee Curious curriculum framework, grounded in Te Whāriki, supports tamariki through rich, interconnected learning experiences. It focuses on Expressive Arts & Design, Physical Development, Communication & Languages, Personal, Social & Emotional Development, Mathematics, Literacy, and Understanding the World, creating a strong foundation for curiosity, confidence, and lifelong learning.
Here at Busy Bees Martinborough, we offer children many learning experiences that are integrated throughout our daily programme to foster being school-ready.
We also run a transition to school programme, allowing children who show an interest in school readiness, the opportunity to extend their learning through focused curriculum-based activities. We pride ourselves on working closely with the primary schools in our area, to ensure that we are providing our children with the school readiness skill they are expecting. This also includes taking small groups of children down to our local school to experience the classroom environment.
Aspects of the programme include developing self-help skills, such as putting their belongings away, phonics around the alphabet sounds, the formation of some letters, recognising their names, and sitting still for a period of time. This then provides our graduating children and their whānau a full kete of knowledge about what school readiness looks like.
What sets our centre apart is our commitment to high-quality teaching and thoughtfully designed learning environments. Every aspect of our programme, from the way spaces are set up to the experiences we offer, reflects our belief in children’s potential and our focus on extending their learning.
We place a strong emphasis on children’s wellbeing, recognising that this underpins their ability to learn and thrive. Nutritious meals are provided each day, and our Healthy Heart approval reflects our commitment to supporting healthy choices and positive lifelong habits within our centre.
Our inhouse cook provides freshly made meals for children each day using our 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 fueled to thrive physically and mentally, whilst enjoying the benefits of coming together and connecting as a group at mealtimes.
Teachers also do regular baking with the children, which provides them opportunities to engage and learn a range of food preparations skills and fine motor movements such as pouring, sifting, spooning. It is a great hands on sensory experience for children to develop independence through self-help skills, practice simple maths as they measure and count quantities.
Our transition to school programme Bee Curious reflects the same intentional approach. Children are supported to develop the skills they need for school, including early literacy, self-management, and confidence in group settings. Being part of the Martinborough community allows us to build strong, meaningful connections with local schools, supporting a smooth and well-prepared transition.
Our daily planning involves thoughtful provocations to stimulate children’s imagination and ideas. Our planning is focused on our children’s interests, so straight from their arrival at the centre, we have something planned for them, be it loose parts, exciting outside activities or sensory experiences, the children are instantly excited and engaged, making drop off easier for parents. Sometimes they even want to stay and join in the play too!
We are committed to follow the aspirations of the New Zealand National ECE Curiculum, Te Whāriki. Te Whāriki envisages kaiako in early learning settings working in partnership with parents, whānau and community to realise this vision. The expectation is that, in their early years, children will experience a curriculum that empowers them as lifelong learners, right from their early exploration of the world around them, through to preparation for school.
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.
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!
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.
The Busy Bees Way is our commitment to families and guides everything we do across our centres. From nurturing your child’s wellbeing and supporting their individual learning journey, to building genuine partnerships with whānau and respecting every child’s unique identity, culture and strengths, we’re committed to providing an exceptional early learning experience where children can thrive.
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