The terminoloy can be confusing to parents. In victoria pre-school or kindergarten are names used to describe a government funded educational program that must be implemented by degree early childhood qualified staff. The centre must have a certificate saying this is a government funded program. The government funds 10hrs a week for 4-5year old children, but hours and days vary greatly with many centres offering more hours. Childcare/early learning centres use many different names for their programs, some do incorporate kindergarten into a childcare program, but this can be very confusing. The main differences between kindergarten/pre-school and childcare are the staff qualifications and the time allowance the teachers have to prepare the program without children in the room. Each government funded pre-school/kindergarten across all states of Australia will differ slighly in their philosophical approach to children's learning. So some may be more sturctured or less structured, what most have in common is hands on play based learning. Learning through exploring, experimenting and doing. I am an early childhood teacher in victoria and have also observed programs in Western Australia, South Australia, Queensland and Scotland.