An interview with Ms Anna Siedlecka, MA – Director of Przedszkole nr 1 in Bolesławiec.
Ms Anna, you run Przedszkole nr 1. Does the number one also mean that the institution is a leading one?
- We try to make it so. The building is spacious. The teaching rooms are adapted for various individual and group activities. There is a doctor’s office and a gym equipped with wall bars.
That concerns the facilities. The preschool staff are professionally prepared. Three teachers have higher education, while the others have graduated from teacher-training college. The entire staff is deeply committed to working with the children. We provide counselling and speech therapy.
We teach German. We organise artistic performances and dance parties several times a year. Every year, we hold Children’s Day celebrations outside the preschool grounds, so that the children can see, proverbially, a piece of the world. Most often, we travel outside the city by coach.
We cooperate with the Day Care Home, and not long ago we hosted its charming residents at events held for Grandmother’s and Grandfather’s Day. Music therapy sessions are conducted here by a student of the Academy of Music in Wrocław; in addition, we enable students of the Medical Secondary School in Bolesławiec to complete practical training. All this brings benefits to both sides.
Can our institution be called a leading one?
Our overriding goal is to do good educational work and earn the greatest possible recognition for our work in the eyes of the parents. We also want to be seen as a preschool offering diverse and increasingly modern solutions in educational and community work.
How many children does Przedszkole nr 1 teach?
-We currently have 90 children. We can accept around 120. I encourage parents to enrol their children in our preschool. In addition to care and interesting activities, we offer the foreign-language instruction already mentioned, as well as individual activities for children who require special care, such as corrective and remedial exercises or speech therapy, and for musically gifted children, music therapy sessions. Enrolment of children in preschools for the 1994/95 school year begins in April.
Is it easy for a woman and a mother to be the director of the largest preschool in the city? Are there any problems?
-It is certainly not easy. Independence does not always have positive sides. However, I have the ability to adapt to all kinds of circumstances in life. Optimism helps me in life, and I carry out every activity I become involved in with passion. I have no particular problems managing the institution. The only problem and source of concern is the destruction of the preschool yard by children living in the neighbourhood. I would like to appeal on this occasion to those children and their parents from the housing estate to ensure that the yard used for play retains a proper, attractive appearance and serves as a showcase for the housing estate.
What should people wish you on the occasion of Women’s Day? Do you recognise this holiday?
-It is a lovely holiday. Everyone needs acceptance. A woman likes to be noticed, valued, to have a positive opinion formed about her and to be loved. The holiday is an opportunity for men to remind themselves of this and realise that without women their lives would have no meaning.
And what should they wish you?
I suppose good health and success in my work. May the children love me as much as I love them. On this occasion, on behalf of myself and the staff, I extend my best wishes to ALL PRESCHOOL TEACHERS IN BOLESŁAWIEC.