The Odyssey Environment

Taking advantage of the generous outdoor spaces and the natural, green surrounds, Odyssey's children appreciate nature and its resources. The physical environment is designed to promote physical, cognitive, and social growth. The environment is more than just a physical space for the children, educators and parents. It is a living space; a place for learning, exploring, discovering, investigating, caring and nurturing.  Odyssey is designed to provide a welcoming place for all who interact with it.

The Odyssey environment is purpose-built, incorporating progressive design considerations for optimal stimulation and learning, including state-of-the art facilities and equipment designed to complement holistic, creative and technologically-enriched programmes for children. Classrooms at Odyssey are richly-resourced learning labs that promote individualisation, personalisation, innovation and creativity. Careful attention is given to promoting the individuality and uniqueness of each child. The presence of each child is visibly felt, heard and seen. A key function of the environment is to serve as community places for relationship building, interactions and communication.  Children are actively engaged in autonomous, self-directed exploratory and discovery learning experiences independently as well as in collaborative peer groups. The environment is designed so that children and educators can work and learn together as a community.

Selected learning labs also have an adjacent observation room with one-way windows that allow parents or researchers to observe the children without being seen. Other unique features include:

• Piazza
• Atelier
• Music and Dance studio
• Children's Museum
• Little Chef's Lab
• Outdoor Learning Centres

Display and documentation panels provide clear visual evidence of the children's and educators' work, and an insight into the rich educational experiences. The Children's Museum is an art gallery that showcases children's works of art (paintings, sketches, craftwork and models) as well as documentations of projects and children's learning.

Outdoor learning experiences are enhanced by a rich environment where making use of the readily available natural resources outdoors reinforce the insight that learning is alive. A diverse range of outdoor learning centres provide an abundance of materials and learning opportunities that encourage active integrated outdoor activities, allowing children to experience nature and fresh air while learning in a real world environment. Benches and seats are spread out across the field to allow children, families and educators to sit and exchange conversations and ideas in the mornings or evenings.