Ms.Alison Euler Interview - Founder of Baby Buddies and Alison's Letterland (Part1of4)

The background and history behind Alison’s Letterland and Baby Buddies.

A = founder, Alison Euler

J = host, Justine

J: Hello everyone and welcome to today’s segment of MamiTV. Next to me here is the founder of Alison’s Letterland and Baby Buddies, Ms. Alison Euler. Hello!

A: Hello.

J: Thank you so much for being here with us today.

A: Thank you so much for inviting me.

J: How about we start off with a bit of an introduction of yourself as well as the background and history behind Alison’s Letterland and Baby Buddies.

A: Yes, for sure. I am an early childhood educator, I have been for the last 25 years. My dream here in Hong Kong was to create a fun, happy learning environment for children and their families and to build up our own sense of community here in Hong Kong and for the children to remember their preschool days as happy ones.  We first opened our doors here 18 years ago, with just 5 students. Now we successfully our passion of education within our 4 schools on Hong Kong island and the one that we’re here now (J: Yes) in Jordan (J: Right). My dreams came true! I work with an amazing team of teachers here within our schools and a real passion for education and a lot of hard work.

J: When it comes to education and children, there are many different kinds of teaching styles and philosophies.  So how about you talk about, you know, the philosophy here at Alison’s Letterland and Baby Buddies?

A: Yes, for sure. We follow a very child centered approach to learning which engages children & their families in their learning experiences. This is based on the British National curriculum, which is called the Early Years Foundation Stage and this curriculum we follow through in all of our classes, in all of our schools. All of our teachers are employed from the UK and they are highly qualified within the Early Years Foundation Stage. So all our classes are delivered to a very high standard here at Baby Buddies and Letterland.  Within the Early Years Foundation Stage, 2 years ago, we incorporated our own learning system, which is called the Learning Tree of Life, which you can see just behind you there. This we engage families and their children to take part in the planning.  The children will take a leaf home with them, related to our topic. For example, if it’s transportation, they’ll stick, obviously pictures of some transports and for our planning of the day, if we take down their leaf and it’s got a boat on it, then our topic for that day will be all about boats.  This gives the children some control and some say about what they’re actually learning with us, which is so important for the children and also encourages them families to join in with their child’s learning journey, while is also very important.

J: Yes, thank you.

 J：大家好，歡迎收看今天的MamiTV，我身邊這一位是Alison’s Letterland及Baby Buddies的創辦人Alison Euler！你好！

A: 你好.

J: 謝謝你接受我們的訪問.

A: 感謝你們邀請我.

J：不如請你先自我介紹一下，以及講解一下學校的背景和歷史

A：好的，我很早就是一個幼兒教育工作者，我已經做了二十五年。我的夢想是創造一個有趣、愉快的學習環境給學生和家長。並在香港建立歸屬感，想孩子記住他們的上學的開心點滴。我們學校創辦了十八年，當初只有五位學生。因對教育的熱愛，我們現在成功開設了四所學校在香港，和這裡是其中一間，在佐敦。我的夢想終於成真了。我有一個很捧的教師團隊，我們的老師都是很熱愛教育及很用心教育。

J: 談到教育和兒童，有許多不同種類的教學風格和理念，對你而言你的理念是什麼？

A：好的，我們遵循一個非常以兒童為中心的教學方式，在於兒童和家長的學習體驗，我們基於英國的教學課程，這就是所謂的早期基礎階段和課程是套用在所有的班級。在我們所有的學校，所有的老師都在英國僱請，他們是高水平的早期基礎階段教育者。因此我們所有的班級都給了很高的水準在這裡，在早期教育中，大約兩年前，我們整合了自己的教育系統，稱為人生的學習樹，就是在你的後面。這是我們想家長及孩子一同參加規劃，孩子們將葉帶回家，是有關於我們今天的課題。譬如是交通工具，很明顯地會放一些交通工具出來，如果我們除下他們的葉子和把船放上去，然後我們那天的話題是所有關於船的。這給孩子們一些選擇，有的說跟我們學了什麼，這對孩子很重要，並鼓勵家長與孩子一同學習，同時也是非常重要的。

J：是的，謝謝。