About this school :
The early childhood education landscape in Malaysia and the region has undergone significant transformation over the past decade. Today’s early childhood education research promotes diversity, child empowerment and learner-centric approaches using emerging themes like creativity, critical thinking and social-emotional literacy.
The Odyssey journey really began way back in 1999, when the team witnessed an amazing exhibit entitled ‘The Hundred Languages of Children’ in San Francisco. This world-renowned exhibit showcased a myriad of children’s ideas, interpreted and documented by educators from the preschool centres of Reggio Emilia, a small city in Northern Italy.
The schools of Reggio Emilia have earned international acclaim for its innovative pedagogy and powerful, practice-based theory in early childhood education. The success of this approach is attributed to its open-ended, child-centred learning. This unique educational philosophy promotes an educational culture of collaboration, observation and documentation, and focuses on the child as an active, competent learner, whilst celebrating the active role of the environment as the third teacher.
The vision for an innovative early childhood education with a difference began to take shape. In 2001, a team of our curriculum directors and senior management made the first exploratory visit to the municipality of Reggio Emilia. Our team then began our own process of researching, experimenting and exploring the various elements of the Reggio Emilia’s best practices. For the next five years, our curriculum team members made further visits to Reggio Emilia to follow up on the latest developments, and continued crafting an approach that encompasses the multi-intelligences of children.
In 2008, our relentless quest to conceptualise a unique, innovative early childhood pedagogy led to the birth of Odyssey, The Global Preschool in Singapore – named to honour the passion, commitment, enthusiasm and collaborative efforts of the management and our team of educators through a long and enriching journey towards fulfilling this decade-long dream, Odyssey represents our continued commitment to provide the best in early childhood education for our children, teachers and parents.
In 2014, we are excited to unveil our first Odyssey in Malaysia. Situated in UNESCO World Heritage Site, Georgetown, Odyssey Macalister will boast our largest campus yet at 80,000 square feet. This new centre taps on the brand’s successful and strong presence in Singapore to introduce the Reggio Emilia-inspired curriculum and a high-quality preschool education to children in Penang.
