From the Office
Firstly I would like to thank our families who have supported us in our learning of living things by donating the Woolworth's seedlings. The children have assisted their peers and educators from each room and created their very own garden. Once the seedlings outgrow their little containers, the children will plant them in the outdoor environment where they will continue to look after them. Thank you for providing opportunities for our little ones to get involved in their outdoor environment.
Re Enrolment Forms for 2020
As we progress further towards the end of the year and say goodbye to our Kindergarten children, re enrolments are now being taken for 2020. A re-enrolment link has already been emailed to parents for completion. If you did not receive the link or do not have an email address, re-enrolment forms can be collected from the office. Once complete please return as soon as possible.
If you are taking holidays over the Christmas New Year period please record these dates on the re-enrolment form and return to the office either via email or in person so we can schedule these days for you.
Christmas & Graduation Photos
D'Arcy Pforr Photography will be attending the Centre on Thursday 24th October, Tuesday 29th October and Wednesday 6th November. They will be taking photographs of each child in attendance on those days. If your child does not attend on any of these days and you would like your child's photo taken you are welcome to bring your child in one of the photo days.
Photo envelopes are located in your child's room pocket. If purchasing a graduation photo your child will be dressed in a gown and hat for the photo. Please ensure you have your credit card details recorded on the envelope for payment or alternatively you can place cash in the envelope provided.
Kindergarten Transition Statements
As you will be receiving your child's Transition Statement shortly please ensure you have returned the Transition Statement Consent Form to your child's teacher or the front office. This form allows us to send a copy of your child's Transition Statement directly to the school where your child is enrolled to attend next year.
Outside the Kindergarten classroom are lists of where your child is attending Prep next year. Please fill in your child's school so parents can talk to their child about their new school and if any of their Kindy friends will be attending the same school.
Child Care Subsidy Balancing
Over the past few weeks there has been some changes to parent accounts where your percentages and hours of care have decreased resulting in higher gap fees for your child. This has occurred because Centrelink is balancing CCS for the 2018-19 financial year.
Throughout the year, Centrelink pays your Child Care Subsidy (CCS) based on the details you've given them. At the end of the financial year, they balance your CCS to make sure you received the right amount.
You need to confirm your family's income for the 2018-19 financial year before Centrelink can balance your CCS. You and your partner do this by lodging your tax returns with the Australian Taxation Office. Once you've confirmed your family income, Centrelink will work out how much subsidy you were entitled to for the financial year. They compare that amount to how much you were paid throughout the year.
Centrelink then makes any necessary adjustments. This includes adding CCS withheld throughout the year. Centrelink withholds 5% of your weekly CCS during the year as a default. If you were paid too much CCS at any time during the year, Centrelink will also factor that in. This may happen if you had a change in your family's circumstances or if your family income estimate was lower than your actual income.
Up Coming Events
Thursday 24th & Tuesday 29th October - Photographs
Wednesday 30th October - Parent Teacher Interviews
Thursday 31st October - Halloween Dress Up
Wednesday 6th November - Photographs
Nursery
Welcome to our Nursery
This month we said goodbye to some of our Nursery friends Angus, Alexis and Binali as they have moved into the Toddlers room and we welcome Adsach, Caiden and Miles.
Over the past month the Nursery children are beginning to meet a lot of their developmental milestones. This is exciting as we draw closer to the end of the year before we have to say goodbye to all our friends.
During October we will continue to reinforce gross and fine motor skills, social and emotional skills and most of all self help skills. Group time is our favourite time of the day where we come together on the mat and read books and sing songs. During our reading the children are recognising animals and pictures in our stories and are making the noises of the animals or are trying to repeat words such as hello and goodbye. Some children are able to say bye to their parents as they leave for work for the day.
Our children are becoming more inquisitive when entering the playground and watch their peers as they climb on the obstacle course or fort. They say hi, smile and wave as the Toddler and Tweenies children say hello. This type of play and interactions are building our children's confidence and self identity.
In continuing to explore the outdoors the children have assisted educators in setting up our very own garden where we have planted seedlings from Woolworths. Once the seedlings establish we will plant them in the outdoor tyres for the children to explore their sense of touch and smell as the seedlings grow.
Until next time
Miss Praxa, Miss Arley & Miss Chloe
Toddlers
Hello and welcome again to the toddler room. Firstly we would like to extend a big welcome to Angus, Binali and Alexis who moved up from the Nursery Room and to our new friends Shrut, Tanner, Jaspreet, Everline and William who started recently in our Toddlers Room. We are excited to have you join us on our journey. We are happy to have you on board and are pretty sure we will have lots of fun learning together.
This month we started on our Spring theme and our journey has taken us an on the exploration of anything about nature: flowers and growing plants. The children have had the opportunity to explore different textures of nature: sticks, leaves and flowers. At group time, we have been discussing about how leaves and flowers grow and looked at our discovery garden. We have been working as a group on planting our seeds by taking turns on watering them.
Our toddlers have been enjoying the beautiful weather outside challenging themselves to gross motor activities like running, climbing up the fort and walking in the balance beam.
We will still be doing lots of sensory play activities this month with our toddlers and that include: sensory bins with flowers, rocks, leaves and sticks.
We are happy to hear from you some ideas about out curriculum. If there is anything you would like to speak about your child do not hesitate to come and see us.
Thank you!
Ms. Arleen, Ms. Faapepe and Ms. Khushi
Tweenies
Hello, G'day, Namaste, Xin Chao, Kamusta, Talofa Lava and Bula Vinaka! Welcome to our newsletter for October.
Firstly, we would like to extend a very warm welcome to our new classmates who moved up from the Toddler room last week, and Sarah who joined us last month. We have loved getting you know you all better and look forward to seeing your growth and new friendships in the room.
This month we are learning about cultures. Many of our children returned our 'All About Me' form and we are learning about the different cultures of our peers. Last week we learnt about India - with a flag collage, sari decorating, elephant sand art and curry tasting provided by Ms Khushi. We also watched some beautiful Indian dancing on the laptop and all the children got up to dance as well. This week we are learning about Australian culture with boomerang painting, Aboriginal flag sand art, Australian bush animals, Aboriginal dancing and creating Australian bushland with playdough. Over the next couple of weeks, we will be learning about other cultures in our room and trying different food from around the world.
We would like to thank our parents who have started toilet training with their children at home - your open communication and feedback has been wonderful. Just a friendly reminder, that all children in the Tweenies room are required to provide their own nappies. If your child is toilet training, we encourage the use of pull ups as these make toileting much easier.
If you have any questions or queries, please do not hesitate to speak to one of the room staff.
Kind regards,
Cassandra, Cariad and Margaret
Pre Kindy
Hello to all our beautiful families and welcome again to another edition of Pre Kindy newsletter. We would also like to give a warm welcome to all our new families who have joined our growing pre kindy family. We hope you enjoy your time with us.
This month so far has been going very well. We have had some of our Tweenie friends' transition into our room the past week and I'm happy to say they are settling in great. This month our focus topic is All about me, Getting the children to learn about each other and each other's families! They also learn that every child's thoughts and ideas are important, and no one is more or less important than another. If you have any input for this month's topic, please do let us know we would love to incorporate your ideas in our weekly program.
Just a reminder to ensure your child's names are on all items i.e hat, sheets, shoes and spare clothes. We like to make sure all items find their way back home. Please make sure you bring your child's hat daily. Hats are a must as we are promoting sun safety and setting the children up for a positive future in their health and safety. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to come see Sarai, Esther or myself.
Till next time!
Kindy 1
Hello Parents, Families and Children of Kindergarten One.
Doesn't time fly when you are having fun in the Kindergarten One room. Another month of exciting experiences has brought us even closer to the end of the year.
Kindergarten One have been learning and practicing their social skills, like how to not be too bossy, listening to their friends and growing friendships. The educators have been modelling appropriate behaviour and encouraging the children to role play and practise during their play time.
Reminders:
Please remember to label all items.
Pack a sheet, blanket, hat, spare clothes and a LATE snack (If required).
NO TOYS PLEASE!
DRINK BOTTLES AND LUNCH BOXES ARE NOT REQUIRED!
The children in Kindy One have been learning the alphabet and letter sounds through the Jolly Phonics songs all year. Each day the group sing and do hand actions to all the different sounds. They do many other activities around learning and playing with letters and sounds including, puzzles, bean bags, handwriting, reading, cutting out letters from junk mail, exploring their names and more. It has been so enjoyable to watch the children improve in their numeracy and literacy skills.
Indoor Experiences: writing our name free hand, working as a team to keep the room tidy, searching for small green triangles, learning our Graduation Song, matching letter cards and toys, making our name with glitter and sand, cutting out letters of our name from old magazines and catalogues, giant number and alphabet puzzles, painting, role playing in the Home Corner, threading, Crete paper art, exploring the Alphabet Soup, dancing, singing, colour sorting, playing dolls and Doctors, letter sound Jolly Phonics group flash cards, and much, much more.
Outdoor Experiences: Blind partner orienteering, bouncing and doing tricks on the balancing beam, monster and zombie chasing games, baking in the sandpit, climbing the obstacle course, building letters and numbers out of wooden blocks, socialising and building friendships, chalk body tracing , watering the garden, building tall towers with large blocks, finding name in coloured rice, watering the gardens, and much more.
As we are coming towards the end of the year and closer to the start of Primary School we encourage you to come and chat with us about any concerns you have with your child. We are here to work in partnership to help prepare your children for school.
Until next time we meet, have a Great Day!
Miss Jazmin and Miss Phoebe
Kindy 2
Hello from Kindergarten 2!
So what's been happening in Kindergarten? In the final week of term 3 the children created a worm farm and a mini composting station to enhance their learning of sustainable practices. Over the holidays the children continued to feed the worms by collecting their fruit scraps from morning tea and placing them in the worm farm and compost station.
As Term 4 begins and to continue our learning of sustainability and what the great outdoors brings us our Kindy children are learning all about lifecycles. The children have been provided with hands on experiences of growing their own mini garden thanks to our parents who have donated Woolworth's seedlings. Outside in the garden bed behind the shed the children have assisted Miss Renae in creating our very own veggie garden. We have planted spring onions, beetroots, carrots, beans, potato's, sunflowers, corn, cucumbers, silver beet and capsicums. As term 4 progresses we will learn the lifecycles of some of these vegetables and will be able to transfer this knowledge of the lifecycles as we water and watch the veggies grow daily.
The herb garden in the playground has also had a makeover with the children assisting Miss Renae to plant basil, mint, spring onions and parsley for Miss Kylie in the kitchen. Once established Miss Kylie will use these herbs in her daily meals provided to the children. Outside during free play activities any water that is not consumed from the drink station is poured onto the herb garden to assist with our recycling and sustainability program as well as plant growth.
As the end of the year draws near and Transition Statements are being prepared the children are focused on strengthening their literacy and numeracy skills. The children participate in daily handwriting sessions of writing their name, letter of the week and number of the week which are written on red and blue lines just like they will do in Prep next year. Scissors skills are also being used to cut out the shape of the week from coloured paper and gluing into their term writing books. All writing activities are performed independently which allows the children to build confidence to perform tasks on their own. This confidence and willingness to learn will assist them when undertaking handwriting or independent tasks next year.
We have recently introduced gold sight words (magic 100 high frequency words) during morning group time activities. By learning these words and understanding the concept of left to right when reading your child is developing pre reading skills which are necessary in their first year of schooling.
On a final note as the weather is warming up please remember to dress your child appropriately in sun smart clothing e.g. hat, shirt with sleeves and appropriate foot wear e.g. sandals, crocs or runners. Please No thongs.
Looking forward to seeing some of you next week for parent teacher interviews.
Miss Renae, Miss Casey & Miss Karen
Kindy 3
Hi everyone
First of all we say farewell to Miss Allana who has left to continue her love of learning at a new Service and we welcome Miss Naomi who has joined us for the rest of the year.
As you know from last month we are focusing on plantation and are learning about sustainability. The Children are very excited to assist in growing plants and they share their ideas with educators and peers. They also shared stories of their home garden at group time and by doing so have developed their confidence and communication skills. They are assisting by watering the plants and are observing how plants grow.
Literacy – The Children who are transitioning to school are practicing independent handwriting on worksheets. All the children of kindergarten 3 are focusing on the common topic of learning colours through various art activities like drawing, painting and Crafts. We are exploring literacy skills with ABC puzzles, sand cards, flash cards, magnetic letters and chalk writing.
Numeracy - Children are learning and revising the numbers from 0 -10 this month. They are counting objects and doing activities related to numeracy .eg - transparent coins, shape pattern, cooking experiences (Using Measuring cups for the kitchen ingredients) mud kitchen.
Construction - Children are exploring their imagination skills, numeracy, literacy and fine motor skills by being involved with various activities in the construction area. They are learning to use their turn taking, eye-hand co-ordination, sharing skills whilst playing with different activities like lego, zoobs, Blocks, etc..
Imaginative Play- In our room our new home corner which has a shop is most popular among the children. While being engaged in imaginative play children are showing and learning social skills, self help skills, hygiene practice, technical skills, communication skills and creating interest in healthy diet while playing different roles (shopkeeper, customer, parents and children ). During this play they are making shopping lists and then going to buy grocery with shopping baskets.
During the outdoor play children are also exploring their range of skills gross motor, sensory skills and literacy skills while climbing and jumping on the obstacle course, running races, riding bikes, sack races and cooking in the mud kitchen.
All the children are showing a positive attitude towards learning and are showing more confidence at being an involved learner during daily routines.
If you have any concerns about the program and your child's learning or development please feel free to speak with the educators
Thank you
Manpreet, Naomi and Florence