HomeApril Newsletter
From the Office
Hello Families!
Just a reminder about parent teacher nights coming up on Tuesday 1st of May. If you would like to attend for a short meeting with your child's Educators please see the office for available times. If the day or times don't suit you but you would really like to have a meeting, you are welcome to organise a meeting time with your child's room Educators that suits you both. Our next parent teacher night will be in October this year.
Thank you to everyone who attended our Easter Celebrations this year and helped with our fundraising by purchasing raffle tickets or donating to the raffle. We had six winners with some great prizes and we were able to raise $217 which will help go towards new resources for the children to use at the Centre.
We have another upcoming Public Holiday on 7th May 2018. Just a reminder that the Centre will be closed on this day.
We have been serving meals at the Centre now for 4 months and most of the Children seem to be really liking the food. If you have any suggestions or feedback on our menu please let us know. We have a suggestions notice on the Kitchen's notice board in the foyer if you would like to write down some ideas. The menu will be changing to a Winter menu by the end of May, so the children will have some lovely warming meals for the colder months.
Until next time...
Nursery
Hi to all our wonderful families! We are happy to welcome in our Nursery room the families of Jasmine and Luka who have joined us early this month. We look forward to a great start to your child's day care experiences and are available to assist with their transition in any way needed.
We have had a fantastic Easter celebration and we thank our families who came and joined with us in our Easter activities and some afternoon tea.
What have we been up to? We have started our "All About Me" Theme early last month and we are now moving on exploring each child's cultural background. Special thanks to those parents who have handed in their child's baby photos. They are already displayed up on the wall and our children keep on coming back to look at their own and their friend's baby photos.This is the African poem / finger play we have started learning with our children:
Africa Fingerplay
I'd like to go to Africa (Point to self.)
Where natives build straw huts like this (Join fingertips of two hands and form roof)
Where elephants have big, gray trunks (clasp hands and swing arms in front like a trunk)
Where natives' arrow seldom miss (Shoot arrow in pantomime.)
Where lions shake their manes and roar (Shake head & roar)
I'd like to go to Africa. (Point to self)
We have seen in our older babies their enthusiasm and interest in holding a writing tool so we have provided them experiences like scribbling with crayons and coloured pens and easel painting with a paintbrush. Most of them have shown a good pincer grip so we are extending it into real –life experiences like holding a plastic spoon or fork at mealtime for their emerging self-help skill.Please feel free to have a chat with us regarding any concerns about your child. We would love to hear any ideas and suggestions you would want us to include in our room programme. Till next time!
Your Nursery Educators:
Ms. Arleen, Ms. Courtney and Ms. Khushi
Toddlers
Hello Toddler Families,
We are welcoming our new families in the Toddler room. The children who started last month and this month have now settled well in our room and seem to be feeling familiar with the Educators and their peers.
The children are demonstrating they are becoming familiar with our routine and activities and more confident to engage in our different learning activities. This participation helps to build confidence in their ability and develops a sense of belonging.
We are still focusing on their language & communication and we have noticed an increase in confidence and the volume of communication this month between children and directed towards the educators. Language and communication is our main focusing area but along with them these are the other areas we are focusing on and children are showing their interest in...
Which are
* fine and gross motor
*Dramatic play
*Group time
*cognitive skill
Etc
We are looking forward to the year full of excitement and achievements.
Till next time...
Miss Praxa, Miss Kim, Miss Cariad
Tweenies
Hello to all our Tweenies families and welcome to this months newsletter.
Firstly, we are happy to see that our new friends, Arin, Kerry Anne and Theo are settling well into our room and routine. This has been one of our main focuses over the month and we are so happy to see them engaging not only with the room Educators, but also with their class mates.
As you may have seen, the numbers in our room have grown, and we have been making some changes to our room and routine to see what works best for our little Tweenies. If you have any questions or suggestions, please let us know.
From last month, we have extended our topic to "Our Farm". The children have loved discussing the different animals on the farm and participating in a range of activities that relate to this. Some of these sensory activites are quite messy (but fun!) so please ensure you pack extra clothes for your child to change into if needed.
Lastly, we would like to remind our Tweenies parents to please ensure all your childs belongings are labelled as some items have been mixed up or misplaced.
Thank you to our children and families for a wonderful month!
Junior Kindy
Welcome to the month of April
For the month of April in our learning journey, we will be learning and introducing to the children both colour exploration, and learning to recognise and identify basic colours.
During our group time and transition we plan to introduce to the children different colours including naming them such as Simon is wearing a red shirt and Weather discussions such as today is a "blue sky".
Learning about colour exploration, and sorting and matching play is great way for a young child to learn both literacy and numeracy skills, language development, and social interaction with other children.
The outcomes for this activity include Language development, and using descriptive words to express ideas and their opinions.
Some of the activities the children participated in this month include:
- connectors
- shapes sorting,
- assorted buttons sequencing
- puzzles,
- pom-poms,
- pipe cleaners collage/construction
- Painting, using ice bocks
- Mixing colours using shaving cream or foam
Pre-Kindy
Welcome to all our Pre-Kindy parents. We also would like to extend a very warm welcome to Inayah whom has started this month and is settling nicely into the room.
From last month's construction theme, we have noticed the children ongoing strong interest in construction and transport. We are still mashing these together with the new addition other modes of transport to continue to create a strong, engaging learning environment. As children learn through play we are extending their interest by encouraging the children to use their cogitative thinking without over stimulating them.
During our group times we have worked closely with the children with understanding and recognising letters of the Alphabet and numbers. We have enhanced their numerous skills of counting 1-20 and backwards from 10. We extended on their strong knowledge of the alphabet by using the letter wall as a transition "What letter does your name start with?" Starting this term we are going to be focusing on 1 letter and 1 number a week, so the children grasp a better understanding and recognition.
What we are going to be learning about?
Week 1 – A & 1 Week 7 – G & 7
Week 2 – B & 2 Week 8 – H & 8
Week 3 – C & 3 Week 9 – I & 9
Week 4 – D & 4 Week 10 – J & 10
Week 5 – E & 5 Week 11 – K & 11
Week 6 – F & 6 Week 12 & 13 – Revision A – K & 1- 11
We ask that upon collection of your child, could you please check your pockets on the wall as they have important information regarding your child's education that we need returned to us.
Till next time!
Kindergarten
Hi to all my fabulous parents in Kindergarten!
What's been happening in Kindergarten over the last month?
Prior to the holidays the children learnt about the importance of hand-washing to get rid of germs prior to eating morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea. During the learning process it was pleasing to see the children helping their peers and reminding them to wash with soap and then dry their hands prior to eating. To extend on our learning of physical well-being the children learnt about nutrition and the 5 food groups which form the healthy eating guidelines.
Over the curriculum break the children have built on their self-help skills by assisting Educators in the clean-up of meal times by washing their own dishes.
As term two begins the children, myself, Miss Phoebe and Miss Josie will begin our new letters, sounds, numbers and shapes. During the term we will also explore road safety and transport as well as people who help us in our community.
Jolly Phonics – Early literacy and writing skills
Each week your child learns a new letter and sound using the Jolly phonics program. Jolly Phonics is a fun and child centred approach to teaching literacy through synthetic phonics. The letters are taught in a specific order (not alphabetically). This enables children to begin building words as early as possible. This program continues through school enabling the teaching of essential grammar, spelling and punctuation skills. I would encourage the use of this program at home with your child using this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Djz82FBYiug
On a final note, I invite families to make comments in our Parent Communication Book. You might like to voice your concerns, happiness and ideas.
Looking forward to term two's learning journey with your child.
Kind Regards
Miss Renae, Miss Phoebe & Miss Josie
