Preschool work experience

[law92]

Hi I hope I'm posting this in the right place.

I'm just wondering if anyone has done a work placement or has worked at a kindergarten/preschool which is affiliated or attached to a primary school? If so, what has been your experience? How do you organise work placement for your diploma at one of these kindys/preschools? Do school preschools even take on work experience students?

I'm in the middle of organising my work placement for my diploma and thought it would be great to work at a school kindy, as I've worked in ldc before as well as asc and just want to try something new.

[Lorina]

It's definetly a good idea to try out a preschool and to keep your options open... Sometimes the preschool will be connected and affiliated with the school where you will need to approach the school principle and sometimes even though the preschool may be on school grounds it's totally separate. Best thing for you to do is, find a preschool you want to work in and go and talk to the director at the preschool directly. Explain that you want work experience and the other details etc. I don't see why they wouldn't allow it... It depends on the centre really!

Good Luck!

,
L.A

[fchaudari76]

I find having a letter from TAFE or whoever you are studying through is a good thing to have especially when you are trying to organise your own placement. It makes it more credible and centres are more likely to take you seriously

[cathiek]

I am a teacher at a kindy attached to a school and I enjoy having prac students in my class. I always advocate trying prac in as many different type of service as you can. Different locations, public schools, private etc. You will learn so much more and get so many different ideas. Good luck

[law92]

So yesterday I decided to call up a few different centres for prac, and they all said that they were full up with prac students and couldn't take anyone else on. So I then decided to call up a school kindy. A lot of the school kindys I looked up didn't have their own phone numbers, but this one was one of the only ones that did have a direct number for the kindy.
They are attached to a private Christian school, so they asked me to go and meet them and bring my CV. I made sure i was dressed up and went down to the kindy that afternoon and they seemed really keen to take me on. I took my CV with me as well as a cover letter, photocopies of all my certs, and all the TAFE work placement agreement forms, my TAFE confirmation of enrolment and my TAFE study schedule so they could see what units I have to do. I spoke to the kindy teachers and they were really lovely and filled out my placement forms on the spot! They are really keen to have me to help them out with portfolios, really keen for me to help with excursions, go to all their staff meetings and everything I'm stoked.
They just have 4 teachers working there as well as a guy doing a traineeship for his cert 3 which he is nearly finished and I think they have another girl working there as a group leader but they are expanding the kindy next year and the guy said that they might be looking for another staff member then.

The teachers were really keen that I had finished my cert 3 as well. Towards the end of the meeting they said that they have had bad experiences with taking on students in the past which is why they wanted to meet me first, so I really want to do a good job in this placement. I'm just so happy that I've got this opportunity to work in a nice kindy after all my bad experiences with working at centres in the past.

[cathiek]

Sounds great. Wishing you all the best. As a kindy teacher in a Christian school i am more than happy to help out with suggestions, advice etc if you would like. I would suggest you Find out what skills, concepts, themes etc they are working on so you can be proactive with assistance, ideas etc. Have fun and enjoy the kindy kids