Our Facilities
Some information and photos of our facilities
Creche
We have two crèche rooms here in First Step Childcare that cater for children from 3 months to 2.5 years. These rooms are fully equipped with age appropriate toys, soft furnishings, books and games.
Adjacent to these rooms we have a designated sleep room and nappy changing room for the children. While children are sleeping, our staff check on all children every five minutes, ensuring the children are safe while sleeping.
Our staff are fully qualified and provide a home away from home environment for the children with lots of fun interactions, singing and dancing. The children also get to experience lots of sensory play with getting to explore different materials and textures.
The staff aim to allow children explore their environments and follow their sense of curiosity of the world around them.
“If you want to do something nice for a child, give them an environment where they can touch things as much as they want.”
– Buckminster Fuller
Junior Pre-school Room
Our Junior Preschool room caters for children from 2.6 years to 3 years, and for majority of these children it will be their first experience in a preschool setting. Our classroom is warm, inviting and has lots of toys and materials to choose from.
Children within this room begin to learn how to interact and share with others, develop their social and independence skills as well as exploring and following their own curiosities.
The classroom has a variety of materials and equipment to play with, from our Kitchen Corner, Art and Crafts station, Sensory and messy Play as well as a Book area, Construction Activities and Dress Up.
The teachers within this room are fully qualified and provide a very warm and friendly environment for the children to grow and develop within.
“Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.”
– Fred Rogers
Senior Pre-school Room
Our senior preschool room caters for children aged between 3 to 5 years on their second ECCE/ Preschool year. This room helps children to further develop their social, emotional, physical and intellectual skills before moving onto Primary School.
Our staff are fully qualified and aim to provide a holistic, child centred curriculum to meet every need of the children within their care.
We encourage parent interaction and invite parents to be involved as much as possible in their child’s learning. The material within the classroom caters for children of all abilities which lots of emphasis on free choice and exploration.
A child’s imagination is a powerful tool and we encourage each child to fulfil its use on a daily basis. We also aim to encourage independence and confidence in each child.
“The greatest gifts we can give our children are the Roots of Responsibility and the Wings of Independence.”
– Maria Montessori
Breakfast Club and Afterschool Service
We provide a breakfast club and afterschool service for parents that have children attending Faha National School, age ranging from 5 years to 12 years.
In the mornings we offer Breakfast Club from 8am, and in our designated First Step Childcare 7 seater car, we bring the children to the National school for 9.20am. We then collect the children at 2pm and 3pm from the National School and bring them back to the centre.
Our aim in the afterschool programme is to provide a relaxed, enjoyable environment for children to unwind after a long day at school. Each day the children receive a hot lunch and are supervised while completing their written homework. All learning and reading homework is completed at home with the parents.
Once homework is complete, the children can choose to play with a variety of indoor and outdoor toys which includes Art and Craft materials, Lego, Barbie/Dolls, Board games, puzzles and age appropriate books. Our outdoor toys include footballs, balance bikes, scooters as well as tennis and badminton rackets and net, running hurdles and hoola hoops.
On rainy afternoons, the children can choose to watch a movie, listen to music or play age appropriate games on the tablets that are available to them.
Outdoors
Here in First Step Childcare, we are very lucky to have such a large outdoor space for the children to play in. There is soft matting and the area is completely fenced in, making it a safe and secure environment for children to explore.
We have access to grass areas, sand and water play areas as well as a mud kitchen. We also have goal posts, a wide variety of different bikes and scooters, tractors, cars, swing and slide as well as a small climbing frame.
In First Step Childcare, we are huge believers in fresh air and allowing children to have that time outside every day, no matter what the weather is like.
Other Facilities
Hall
If the weather is very wet, we have access to a large indoor Hall area that we can use and allow the children to run around, play indoor games or have a disco! We also prepare a ‘Jungle Gym’ for the younger children with lots of soft matting, tunnels and indoor tents.
This hall is also used by the community for various classes and gatherings. Throughout the week, there are various adult gym classes, children’s Irish Dancing classes and Taekwondo classes.
Kitchen
Within the community centre, we have a purpose built catering kitchen that is inspected by HSE and TUSLA on a yearly basis. We have two fully qualified chefs that plan, prepare and cook fresh homemade meals for the childcare centre on a daily basis. A 3 week menu is on display on our Parent Notice Board.
On a Monday, Wednesday and Friday, the chef’s also prepare meals for Meals on Wheels and deliver them to the elderly people within our community.