We believe “Each child is unique and has individual strengths and needs in all areas of development”.

The environment at Catundra Day Care Centre Inc. encourages individuality and assists each child in gaining skills, in decision-making, independence, co-operation, communication and imagination through play-based learning.

The staff at Catundra work together to fulfill the “Rights” of each child.

We are an inclusive day care centre and we believe all families with children should be entitled to make the same child care choices within the community. Supports available in the community will be explored to ensure effective inclusion of all children in Catundra programs.

Catundra participated in Raising the Bar since its inception in 2011. Raising the Bar is a voluntary community standards program for Early Learning and Child Care. Effective April 1, 2015 we have kicked off another Raising the Bar year. We were one of four programs chosen as a pilot site for “Save the Day for Play” which is play-based learning in 2013-2014. This project enabled us to have professional development training and the guidance of a mentor to help us continuously create a play-based learning environment in all three of our programs during the 2013-2014 years.  Raising the Bar is no longer running in Hastings County but it was a good kick-off to the resource  How Does Learning Happen Ontario’s Pedagogy for the Early Years  which is also used for Licensing.

We are proud of our staff who have embraced this positive attitude toward life-long learning and we continue to learn and grow with the children and families.

A Brief History
Catundra Day Care Centre Inc. is a non-profit, self-supporting parent directed full day licensed centre. The day care first opened its doors in 1984 for employees of Sir James Whitney School. The day care is also open to residents of Belleville and the surrounding area and is conveniently located on the west side of Belleville, a half block north of Highway 2 (Dundas Street) at Palmer Road. Catundra is easily accessible by bus and is open from 8:30 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. Monday to Friday during COVID-19, we are on fixed hours and hope to return to normal hours once the Pandemic is under control.

Overall direction is given by an elected Parent Board while the day to day operations are managed by an Executive Director who is a Certified, Registered Early Childhood Educator. Your child’s early learning and care is provided by seven full-time and two part-time educators in partnership with our families. Catundra offers play-based, inclusive learning in both our Toddler and Preschool programs . Catundra has a Purchase of Service Agreement with Hastings County so is able to accept subsidy.

We encourage families to visit our web site (catundradaycare.ca) to view a virtual tour of our Toddler and Preschool programs. We have plenty of parking for our families and staff and our park like outdoor setting encourages the children’s joy and exploration of the outdoors.

We have six full-time Infant spaces (currently closed), ten full-time Toddler spaces and up to twenty-four Preschool spaces.

For more information, please feel free to give us a call at 613-966-9020 or email us at catday@lks.net .