Aspire Celebrates and Uplifts Children: National Children’s Week 2023
Aspire Early Education believes that all children should be celebrated. This is why from Saturday the 21st through to Sunday the 29th of October, we celebrate Children’s Week.
Children’s Week is a national week-long celebration that uplifts and highlights the rights, achievements, strengths and skills of children. The theme for 2023’s celebrations is "Children have the right to relax, play and take part in activities they enjoy". This theme is based on article 31 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of a Child (UNCRC).
This charter, codified by the United Nations in 1989, is a historic international commitment to the rights of all children. It is the most widely ratified human rights treaty and has positively impacted children globally for over three decades.
“We All Have Rights” is an age-appropriate resource created by UNICEF that can help explain child rights to 3–6-year-olds. It follows the story of Leepa, Viz and Zooko on their scavenger hunt for child rights.
Our Aspire Early Education Centre teams commit to article 31 of the UNCRC. We allow each child to participate in activities in their own time, and provide a wide variety of games, crafts, stories and other activities for them to enjoy.
Team leaders listen to the children to understand their interests, skills and needs, and plan out activities, incursions and excursions that they will enjoy and learn from.
The Aspire Atherstone centre recently implemented a Children’s Committee. A group of kindergarten children meet to discuss what activities they enjoy and resources they would like at the centre to play with. The last Children’s Committee meeting focused on outdoor resources and yard expectations. The children were asked what they would like to see in the outdoor yard and what resources they want. They were very creative and produced some great ideas, like new climbing equipment, bubbles, blocks and some plants and flowers. The centre has implemented some ideas already! This initiative is a great success and gives the children a voice on what they enjoy.
Aspire further commits to the UNCRC by adhering to the Early Learning Years Framework, a guiding framework intrinsically connected to the UNCRC and established by the Council of Australian Governments. The Framework “forms the foundation for ensuring that children in all early childhood education and care settings experience quality teaching and learning” and allows educators to reinforce throughout their daily practice the principles that are laid out in the UNCRC.
Community events are an integral part of Children’s Week, with Aspire centres around the state participating in local council events. Our Aspire Tarneit North, Truganina and Riverwalk centres joined the community and participated in the Wyndham City Children’s Week Picnic Event at Werribee Park. Read more about the fun the community had at the Aspire marquee during the Children’s Week Picnic Event.
National Children’s Week 2023 is an important time to focus on children, and to allow them to play, learn and express themselves freely throughout the ways they enjoy. Aspire continues this mindset throughout everything we do. Through this, our values are underpinned by the UNCRC and its role in children’s rights both in Australia and abroad.
If you would like to discuss the United Nations Convention on the Rights of a Child with your children, a child-friendly version of the Convention can be found on the United Nations website. Other resources for teachers, parents, NGOs and businesses are also accessible.
If you want to learn more about Aspire’s learning programs or curriculum, enquire here or book a tour at one of our centres.
