Early Learning Centre

Celebrating Harmony Week in Preschool

The week of 21 March is an annual cause for celebration at ELC, where we celebrate Harmony Week as a community. 

“Harmony Day is a day to celebrate Australian multiculturalism, based on the successful integration of migrants into our community. Harmony Day is about inclusiveness, respect and belonging for all Australians, regardless of cultural or linguistic background, united by a set of core Australian values” 

Since the opening of our ELC in 2020, Harmony Week has been a prioritised celebration to provide children with deeper opportunities to learn and grow about concepts such as inclusion, belonging, tolerance and appreciation for all cultures. On Harmony Day, children and educators wore a ‘splash of orange’, the colour of Harmony Day, to show our commitment to working together and building an environment that is safe, accepting and encouraging for all. 

Our Preschool class shared some of their understanding about Harmony Week: 

“Harmony Day is a day to celebrate people” – Lola

“It doesn’t matter what we look like, we are all different” – Narah

“We wear orange” – Jamie

“It’s about sharing” – Vivia

“We celebrate where we are going” – Finley

“We celebrate because we need to” – Travis

“We celebrate and wear dresses for our culture” – Athan

“It doesn’t matter what colour we are. We are the same but different” – Jemma

“Celebrate people and share” – Levi

As our Preschool class continued to navigate our way through our journey of discovery, we further enhanced our understanding of Harmony Day through the medium of oranges. Using the metaphor that we are ‘all the same, but different’ we explored our oranges. Some oranges had smooth skin, some bumpy, some had green skin, some more orange than others. However, inside each orange was the same fresh juice. 

This concept was reinforced through our story prompt, 'Happy in our Skin' by Fran Manushkin, which reiterated to us that God created us with a rainbow of skin colours, but inside each of us is the same. We used the oranges as a canvas to draw self-portraits, celebrating our diversity by identifying the things that make us the same and the things that make us different, whilst acknowledging that God made each of us. 

We are blessed with a culturally diverse staff team that add a richness to our learning environments and relationships. Mrs. Chew shared a meal significant to her family culture; dumplings! Mrs. Chew shared that this was a dish she grew up making with her family, and every time she makes dumplings, it makes her feel like she is being surrounded by her family and it fills her with love. We were able to come together around our meal, and ate them for morning tea. Most of us loved it and wanted more! 

Celebrating Harmony Week in Class 3

Our Class 3 children displayed a sense of identity and belonging as they shared about their homes, families and cultures. They explored the richness of skin colour in their class, experimenting with hand painting, creating with different shades of playdough and creating their families using natural loose parts. They also enjoyed reading different multicultural stories and singing and dancing to different multicultural songs. Children were deeply invested in exploring the shapes and sizes of their bodies, creating life size cut outs of themselves. 

As a class they pondered about what makes them different and the same. They discussed that people live in different places around the world and that each Class 3 member lives in Australia, but we have different backgrounds and heritages. Children took turns to choose a figure that they felt represented them and add it to our class map of Australia. 

Our Class 3 children shared their reflections:

“We are different” – Shiloh

“I live in Australia” – Evie

“I go to Chinese” – Dandi

“I come from Chinese” – Noah

“Ari has short hair, I have blonde hair” – Sam

Our ELC families bring a richness of diversity to our community and this is very special as we can learn from each other and grow in our togetherness. Our ELC families and Junior School classes were invited to share what Harmony means to them and peg their reflections on our sharing ribbon. These reflections grew over the week as more were added to our collection displaying the diversity of ideas and hopes and wishes for harmony that our wider community share. 

Why is this significant?

The Principle of the Early Years Learning Framework – Respect for Diversity shares so warmly...

“Children are born belonging to a culture, which is not only influenced by traditional practices, heritage and ancestral knowledge, but also by the experiences, values and beliefs of individual families and communities….Educators value children’s unique and diverse capacities and respect families’ home lives. They build culturally safe and secure environments for all children and their families… Educators recognise the diversity contributes to the richness of our society and provides a valid evidence base about ways of knowing. For Australian children it also includes promoting greater understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander ways of knowing and being and actively working toward Reconciliation”  - Early Years Learning Framework V2.0, page 16

An encouragement for each of us as we take this journey together; “May God, who gives this patience and encouragement, help you live in complete harmony with each other, as is fitting for followers of Christ Jesus” Romans 15:5 

Lisa Bennett

Early Learning Centre Educational Leader/Lead Teacher

Grandparents' and Special Friends' Day - Brooklyn Park Campus ELC - 6

Tuesday 4 April

From 9:00am - 11:00am

Dear Grandparents and Special Friends, 

On behalf of our ELC – Year 6 Junior School Students, we are so excited to invite you to visit our school. After a few years of being unable to run this special day, we are thrilled to invite Grandparents and Special Friends to come and spend some time with us in our classrooms.

As a College, we recognise that some families may not have Grandparents who are able to attend and so for these families, we wish to extend the invitation to those Special Friends who step into this important role for your family.  

RSVPs are essential! Please use the following link to register your attendance: http://events.humanitix.com/grandparents-bp 

We looking forward to hosting you for a wonderful morning of sharing and community.