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Network Child Care Services (Network) is proud to deliver to your inbox, the Organization’s May Newsletter.

Visiting Network’s Wade Avenue Early Years Learning & Child Care Centre

Network’s Wade Avenue Early Years Learning & Child Care Centre, located on the northwest corner of Lansdowne Avenue and Wade Avenue (544 Lansdowne Avenue), is Network’s third child care location, established in the late 1990’s. This Centre is housed within a multi-unit apartment structure which is overseen by the vibrant Tamil Community. As a cooperative building, this Centre offers a truly unique boutique charm as it spans three levels.

Entering the Centre from the ground floor, a short walk upstairs to the main level of the facility. Both toddlers and pre-school children are cared for throughout this spacious area of the Centre, which exudes an atmosphere of calm and genuine happiness. Dianne Soares, the Centre’s Supervisor, describes that what makes this location unique is its structural diversity.

Children are able to transition from the main level of the Centre to a third floor enclosed outdoor playground learning oasis. While in the playground, children delight in a number of play structures glistening in vibrant primary colours. Miniature blackboards have been secured to one area of the playground, to entice future “teachers” to host collaborative lessons, while other children have the opportunity to investigate garden boxes to conduct scientific inquiries. A truly authentic and inclusive learning experience!

Meeting an affiliated Home Child Care Provider – Ms. Teresa Domingos

In entering Teresa’s home, you will instantly feel like you are in the presence of an affiliated Home Child Care Provider who has been taking care of children for decades. Teresa has devoted a major portion of her life to the care and wellbeing of children for over thirty-two years! Throughout her well-organized child-friendly space, parents have commented year after year that they truly feel secure knowing that their children are safe with Teresa.

In coming to Canada from Portugal in the late 1970’s, Teresa has dedicated her entire lower level of her home as well as portions of the outside of her home, to delivering an amazing child care program. She brings her Portuguese culture and language to life, by infusing simple Portuguese language phrases as she warmly greets parents and children to her home, as well as throughout the child care day.

Teresa’s meals include mouthwatering pasta dishes which the children are known to consume entirely without discussion. Clean bowls and happy faces are all which remain of a hearty lunch served by Teresa. Obrigado (thank you) Teresa for a wonderful visit!

Mark Your Calendars – These Dates Are Noteworthy!

Kindly note the following significant dates and times this May

May 20

World Bee Day!
Since December 2017, World Bee Day has been celebrated to highlight the extreme importance of these pollinators. Individuals have come to realize that without bees, many of the food products we enjoy consuming would vanish from the planet. Besides, there would be no honey without bees!

Reggio Emilia – Not the Name of an Italian Cheese!

When thinking about Italy, many delicious food dishes come to mind. Pizza, pasta, prosciutto, and parmesan have contributed to those favourite culinary pursuits when thinking about this diverse country, however Reggio Emilia is not one of those foods. Reggio Emilia is a city in Northern Italy but it’s true “claim to fame” is not something which can be eaten, but it continues to be shared worldwide!


In post-World War II, Italy was struggling with huge challenges not unlike many other European countries. From this struggle, arouse a group of dynamic and determined women who had made the decision to change the education path of the future children in Reggio Emilia. According to Dr. Carol Brunson Day, these intrepid women financed the first school by selling an old tank, nine horses, and two military trucks which had been left behind by the retreating German Army. The first school was built using stones, sand, and timber which had been gathered by the villagers. It does “take a village to raise a child”!


In working collectively through the coming years, the educators of Reggio Emilia were pleased to have Loris Malaguzzi join them in the late 1940’s. Mr. Malaguzzi synthesized the pedagogical teaching techniques which were being used throughout these early child care centres, which had grown in number to care for at least half of the city’s children, hence the “Reggio Emilia” philosophy was born.


The Reggio Emilia approach suggests that children “construct” their knowledge base by exploring the world around them through all their senses. In conjunction with this building of ideas and insights, three important contributors are thought to play equal roles in supporting this learning: parents, teachers and the immediate environment of the child (i.e., home, child care, school). This approach to teaching young children was considered revolutionary for its time and has since spread throughout the countries of the world. We now coin the phrase of “thinking outside the box” which probably had its definitive roots in perhaps holding a pizza!