Introduction/specifics

Our KiTa Fünf Freunde has two floors on which the children find a large and stimulating range of rooms with bedrooms and adjoining rooms, kitchens and adjacent washrooms. A spacious outdoor area invites the children to play, explore and learn.

The specific offer of the KiTa Fünf Freunde includes:

• opening hours from 07:00 to 16:00 hrs. 
• care for children from zero to six years of age
• four groups with 70 children
• a developmental and exciting room concept, including a well-equipped movement room and kitchens at children's height for delicious cooking and baking
• child-centered planned group rooms, where the children can gain valuable learning experiences through play
• an outdoor area that invites to adventures
• regular forest days and weeks, where the children explore living spaces in the midst of nature
• fresh food prepared daily by our KiTa kitchen team from our Stepke kitchen (breakfast, lunch & afternoon snack) as well as drink bars in each group room
• language education integrated into everyday life through a language-stimulating environment
• water familiarization in the KiTa and, if possible, in the swimming pool
• personal support and advice from our professional counselors on all pedagogical issues.

Parking facilities for parents are available directly at the KiTa.

Description and Stations

Our Stepke KiTa Fünf Freunde is located in a newly growing residential area with good connections to the A1, A57, city highway and public transportation.

Train stop line 3, 4, 5: Venloer Straße

Bus stop line 140, 139

Basics

We work according to the situation-oriented approach and the "best practice principle", which includes elements of Reggio, Montessori, Pikler and Waldorf education. Important to us is a positive atmosphere as well as the empathic bond building with each child. This complements and supports the child's upbringing in the family and is intended to promote the child's overall development through general and targeted educational support and educational opportunities.

Our task is, in particular, to stimulate the child's mental and physical development through differentiated educational work, to promote the child's ability to work in a community and to give all children equal opportunities for development.

The child is given the opportunity to try out social behavior, to understand itself as a human being in the context of others, to deal with conflicts, to acquire knowledge, to do something together.

We consciously see ourselves as a family-supporting institution, in that we consider the family to be the most important field of education. We support the educational work of the parents and complement it. We offer a variety of forms of cooperation with parents. Parents' meetings and thematic parents' evenings as well as joint celebrations and work activities.

Our KiTas are an active part of the social infrastructure of the respective district. Through cooperation with the city's specialized services, other institutions and initiatives, families experience holistic support in the upbringing of their children.

Employee

All employees in our facilities are trained professionals with different qualifications - educators, remedial teachers, certified pedagogues, curative education nurses, child care workers, Bachelor of Arts (social work) and so on. The attitude of the pedagogical staff towards all children is characterized by love and respect for the child, taking into account his or her individual stage of development. Together with the families, we care for the well-being of the children and rely on a mutual basis of trust.

Specifics

We have made it our goal to recognize the most diverse development potentials of children at an early stage in our Stepke daycare centers and to support them accordingly according to their individual developmental level and their own pace.

We do this by sharing responsibility for the education, upbringing and care of children with and without handicaps or special needs.
We apply the principle of integrated support from a single source and support strategies integrated into everyday life, and provide appropriate framework conditions. This is done with qualified and interdisciplinary personnel. We work together with early intervention centers, speech therapists, nursing services, occupational therapists and physiotherapists.

We are happy to face these challenges together with our pedagogical specialists. Inclusion is a matter of course for us.

Projects

A large part of the pedagogical work at the KiTa Fünf Freunde is the project work in the groups. We do not occupy children in our facilities, but rather, after dedicated observation over a longer period of time, we offer topics and materials with which the children can occupy themselves in the groups. The aim is to pick up on children's interests and to follow them up.

A special quality feature is an appropriately designed room and material preparation.

Our consultants work continuously on our quality management.

Parental Interviews

Once a year, a parent survey takes place in all Stepke KiTas.

Overview

Children of all nationalities and denominations are admitted to our facilities.

For admission to our KiBiz groups, the following criteria lead to preferential admission:

• age of the child
• parents are single parents or in training
• siblings in our day care centers
• youth welfare measure

We take into account the individual requirements and circumstances of families when accepting children.