Children's Programs - Attachment and Primary Caregiving

All our child care programs use a primary caregiving model. Each child and their family are allocated a primary caregiver who works towards establishing a warm, secure relationship with the child and a partnership with the parents. The primary caregiver ensures the child's needs and routines are met, taking a key role in feeding, sleeping, changing, noticing, wondering and playing with the child. The primary caregiver also has the key responsibility for communicating with the family, making links to home culture and contexts and documenting the child's experiences.

Through this model, children and families settle into the Centre and develop a sense of trust and reciprocity with the primary caregiver, other staff and the environment. This enables children to feel safe, secure and valued and encourages and supports further interaction, exploration and relationship-building with other staff, children and the wider Centre community.

Our belief in the importance of attachment means that programs and plans are relationship-based to develop a sense of partnership and contact. Once staff feel that a child is securely attached to their primary caregiver, they plan to maintain this through providing children with a balance of attachment and exploration experiences as well as ensuring continuous reflection on their relationships with individual children. A prime objective is for a child to use the primary caregiver as a secure base so that their exploration and learning can be supported. The primary caregiving model considers children holistically and as developing within ever widening systems.