We love good stories, and think ours is one worth telling.
A long time ago…
It all started a long time ago - before we were here, in fact. For tens of thousands of years the Gadigal and Bidgijal people of the Eora Nation lived where Coogee is today. Our suburb’s name comes from the local word ‘koojah’ or ‘koojay’, which refers to the unique smell of seaweed drying on the beach. Seaweed sometimes washes up on Coogee Beach today, and we can smell it from our preschool! When we look out our windows, we see the ocean that was so important to life for the Gadigal and Bidgijal people (and sometimes we see a whale!).
With Indigenous cultures’ traditional focus on education and growing individuals to know and be part of their community, St Nics’ Christian Preschool acknowledges that the land on which we work, learn, and play on is the land of the Gadigal and Bidgijal people, and we hope to XXXXXXXX
From Coogee’s best playgroup…
Since 2004, St Nicolas Anglican Church ran the highly successful St Nics’ Playgroup. Children, mums and dads from all around our community would gather for two mornings a week to play, learn and grow together. They would play in the garden, sing songs, hear a Bible story, and do crafts. It was a lot of fun.
And, St Nics’ Playgroup came to be known as the best playgroup in the whole Eastern Suburbs (no small feat)! Parents would come each week knowing they and their children would be cared for, kept safe, and have fun.
Playgroup grew to have over XX children each week. In 2016, it was decided: it was time for playgroup to transform.
…to Coogee’s best preschool.
A new mission: transform Coogee’s best playgroup into Coogee’s best preschool. Two members of the St Nicolas community chose to give large bequests to the church in order to renovate the the church halls into beautiful, custom-built classrooms for our new preschool. Their names were Marie Smart and Fred Cooke. In their honour, we named our two classrooms after them: the Smartie Room and the Cookie Room. We seek to be generous and kind, just like them.
Today, we provide families in our local community with a caring and kind preschool environment, giving children the best start to life, and reflecting the love of Jesus in all that we do.
A preschool that loves Jesus - our beliefs
We believe that Jesus Christ brings life and freedom to all who trust in him, so you can see why we think he’s truly good news. We believe that God created the world perfectly, but that it isn’t as it should be — because of our rejection of God, or ‘sin’. In his love for his people, God gave his only son Jesus to pay the price we should have taken for our sin, through his death and resurrection, making us fully right with God and allowing us to live in proper relationship with him.
Our staff believe these things are true, and that Jesus is really important news, so we love talking about it! This truth doesn’t only change how we speak, but also how we act — how we treat each other, live our lives, and care for the world.
At Preschool, this looks like…
Saying a prayer before mealtimes
Singing songs about Jesus’ love, and reading stories from the Bible
Following Jesus’ most important command: love one another. We try to be joyful, peaceful, patient, good, faithful, loving, gentle, and self-controlled.
You don’t need to be a Christian or go to church to join us at St Nics’ Christian Preschool. We accept families of all backgrounds, family structures and faiths.
We’d love to chat further about this or any questions you have — contact us.
A caring and professional team - our staff
Our staff are passionate about providing your child with world-class early childhood education to help them grow day by day into the person they were created to be. Our team, led by Director Lucena Neal, is fully qualified in early childhood education. Our staff maintain regular shifts so your child feels comfortable during the day, and so the otherwise-stressful drop-off and pick-up times are made that little bit easier with a friendly face greeting you each time.
Meet Lucena, Director (pop out profile?)
Meet XXXX, Educator (pop out profile?)
Our future
In 2020, we embarked on the life-changing journey of being the preschool at the centre of the hit ABCTV series Old People’s Home for Four Year Olds. Taking this concept, our preschool has joined forces with researchers at Neura, UNSW and Sydney University to produce a program to collect scientific evidence on the effects of intergenerational play on health ageing, child development and community wellbeing. As such, our children experience the benefits of engaging with older members of our local community during supervised programs.
And this is just the beginning. We’d love to invite you to join us on a tour, or contact us for more!