Our History

Prior to the Preschool starting in 1975, parents used to have their children one day per week in each others houses. Jenny Ansell was a qualified Kindergarten teacher and she used to work alongside the volunteer mothers.

Alistair Rodgers was the Principal at Leigh School and he had an empty building which he invited Jenny to take a look at. After looking at the building, Jenny decided it would be perfect with a little spruce up, so the parents set to and cleaned out the building so it was fit for use.

Parent helpers, especially the ones with skills (electricians, builders, etc), made the building safe and built a sandpit - with other parent helpers carting in the sand.

Jenny was invited to open the building, which is something she had never done before, so she thought “well, it’s just like launching a boat I suppose.” She gave a speech to open the Preschool, and Perry Watts did a Māori blessing. Perry’s great grandchildren have both attended Leigh Preschool.

In August/September of 1975, the Preschool started and all parents made a donation for care. Jenny worked on her own with one or two mothers and 22 children on the roll.

Jenny worked for two days a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, with the mothers. Alistair Rodgers mentioned the Preschool to the Ministry of Education, and they sent Elizabeth Denaauden from the Ministry to come and visit. She went around checking everything and said we should be paid for the work we do. After ensuring all looked okay, Elizabeth organised the Ministry to pay the teachers wages.

Now that the Ministry was involved, the Preschool obtained books and resources. The original idea was that each parent would buy one book for the library, however the parents were buying more than one book and thus the Preschool library was created.

There were more items from the Ministry, such as blocks and toys, and by accepting these items, they had to abide by the Ministry’s rules and said the preschool needed to be for three to five year olds.

We then had a full amount of toys and books etc, and they used the monkey bars in the schools playground, creating a strong relationship with the school when the nearly 5 year olds went over to be with their siblings for one hour.

Thank you Jenny for beginning the Preschool, we are very lucky!