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February Newsletter

From the Office

​Welcome to all our new families!.  We hope you are all settling in well.  Please feel free to ask the staff any questions or for help with anything, we are more than happy to help in the settling in process.

We are regularly sending out emails, and notices via Educa, about important information, updates or events happening in the Centre.  We really appreciated you reading these emails and notices.  If you have not been receiving emails or are not linked to Educa, please see the front office so we can ensure you are receiving all relevant information. 

We would like to ask parents to remember to update any relevant information for your child's enrolment. This includes; change of address, contact phone numbers, child's doctor, CCS information and medical condition information.  We appreciate your cooperation with this matter.

Until next month...

Up coming events

Class photos will be taken at the Centre on the following dates between 8am - 11am.  Order forms will be going out in the children's room pockets in the next few weeks.  These must be returned to the office prior to photo day.  If your child does not attend any of the following dates and you would like a class photo, you are welcome to bring your child in on one of these days in the time allocated to get their photo taken.

Photo Dates:

Tuesday 21st April, 2020

Wednesday 22nd April, 2020

Thursday 23rd April, 2020

On Monday the 9th of March we will be celebrating Holi Day.  Holi is popularly known as the Indian "festival of colours", or "festival of love". The festival signifies the arrival of spring, the end of winter, the blossoming of love, and for many a festive day to meet others, play and laugh, forget and forgive, and repair broken relationships.  The children will be able to participate in fun, colour and water activities at the centre on this day.  Please ensure your children have spare clothes in their bags.

The 21st of March is Harmony Day, because this year it falls on a Saturday we will be celebrating Harmony Day, at the Centre, on Friday 20th March 2020.  We encourage parents to dress their children in something orange.  

Traditionally, orange signifies social communication and meaningful conversations. It also relates to the freedom of ideas and encouragement of mutual respect. Australians can choose to wear something orange during Harmony Week to show their support for cultural diversity and an inclusive Australia.

Nursery

Welcome to the Nursery!!! 

Last month we said goodbye to some of our Nursery babies who graduated to the Toddler Room.  Since then we have had lots of new babies start with us, we welcome Atasha, Maria, Daniel, Liam, Kellin and Ellie.  We are happy to see all the babies settling into the room well.

Since January we have been engaging in some fun activities such as painting, sensory play and movement activities to develop the children's fine and gross motor skills. As part of our daily program, we are encouraging the babies to engage and interact with the other children to help develop relationships which will help the babies to feel safe and secure in their environment. 

The children have also been enjoying exploring some of the different activities around the room.  In particular, the blocks, abacus and shakers are some of their favourites. 

Next month we will still continue to focus on activities to promote self-help skills and relationships, which extend on the interests of the children. 

We would like to welcome parents to contribute to the program by letting us know what their child's interests are or what they would like to see their child doing while in our care. 

Until next month,
Nursery Educators,
Miss Praxa, Miss Arley and Miss Laura 

Toddlers 

Hi to all our families,

What a great first month we have had in the Toddler Room. All children are now settled, and it has been fun getting to know each one of them. 

The theme we have been focusing on this month has been Australian animals.  We have been doing lots of different activities relating to this theme.  Our art activities have helped develop the children's fine motors skills and also colour recognition.  We have noticed that the children love all sensory play, getting in and getting messy while exploring things like spaghetti, paint and sand.

The children have also showed interest in the numbers on the wall, so we have been including counting and colour recognition into our Group Time daily. You may notice your child coming home trying to sing different songs as we have been learning some new action songs to sing at group time.  This helps develop the children's language skills in a fun new way.

With all the rain over the last few weeks we have been trying to get outside when possible as the Toddlers are really enjoying using their gross motor skills.  Their favourite outside activities at the moment are running, cars and bikes.

If you have any questions or concerns or you would like to suggest an activity for the program please see one of our Toddler Room staff.

Thank you

Until next time,

Miss Cariad, Miss Faapepe and Miss Khushi

Tweenies 

Hello Parents and Families!

WOW... what an amazing start to the year we have had in the Tweenies room.

Over the past month we have made so many new friends in Tweenies and it has been a pleasure getting to know our new children and families. Over the next twelve months, we look forward to watching them learn and grow, and we are so excited to welcome our new friends who have started over the past month.

In February we have been focusing on hygiene and looking after our bodies. This involved the children participating in a number of fun activities such as, Teeth collage which entailed the children using a number of white materials from the art trolley to decorate a picture of a tooth.

We also had lots of fun learning about flossing, for this activity we had large duplo blocks with play-dough in between the gaps. The Tweenies then used their fine motor skills to floss the play-dough out of the gaps with pieces of string.

We also involved the Tweenies in conversations and songs about brushing our teeth and washing our hands every day during our transition and group times.

Other activities the children enjoyed participating in include;

  • Germ colouring in pictures
  • Colour sorting
  • Sensory buckets
  • Valentine's day collage
  • Number sorting
  • Foam play


Just a few reminders for our families, as has been very hot we ask that you please bring your child's hat each day and to make sure they are wearing sun-safe clothing.  Also, please make sure all your child's belongings are labelled. If you are toilet training your child, please bring extra clothes and underwear. If your child is still in nappies, please provide at least 6 nappies for the day. 

Kind regards, 

Tweenies Educators,
Miss Sarai, Miss Phoebe and MIss Florence.

Pre-Kindy 

Hello Pre-kindy families and welcome to our newsletter for February!

Firstly, we would like to extend a very warm welcome to the families who have joined us this month. We are very happy and excited to get to know your child better and watch them grow and make new friendships.

This month our main focus has been on settling the children into their new room and routine. The children are loving the new layout and resources, and we are teaching the children how to care for these resources, and to pack up together to keep the room tidy. We have also been going through our alphabet and numbers 1-20. We have practiced this during group time using the visual prompts on the wall, through songs and books, resources in the room and during arts and crafts. Eg. Counting how many pom poms we have glued on to our caterpillar, how many marbles in our painting tray, etc.

We also spent a week on Valentine's day themed activities such as marbled love hearts, Valentine's day themed sensory tray, love heart hopscotch, cutting out red cardboard hearts and red glitter play-dough with heart-shaped cutters. The children have loved these activities and they are targeting fine motor skills and sensory play.

This week we have started learning about 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar', a book by Eric Carle. We have been creating little caterpillars this week and will be extending on the book with healthy eating, hygiene, fruit, counting and days of the week. Please ask your child about the story and what happens to the hungry caterpillar, what he eats during the week and what he becomes at the end of the book. The children are enjoying this theme a lot and love talking about the story.

Many of our children are toilet training at the moment and doing such a good job! If your child requires a nappy for rest time, please pack them in his/her bag or leave them with a staff member. If your child has wet clothing, a tag will be placed on their bag to remind you to collect the clothing from the bathroom. We have a wet clothing container in the bathroom under the nappy change table and their bag of wet clothes will have their name written on it. If you need any help finding this, please ask one of the staff members and we will be happy to help you.

If you have any questions or queries, please feel free to speak to one of the room staff or leave a message in the communication book and we will get back to you.

Kind regards,

Pre-kindy Educators,

Miss Cassandra, Miss Chloe, Miss Dipali and Miss Esther

Kindergarten 1 

A huge welcome to all our new families. Some of you who may not know me, my name is Miss Casey and I am the Teacher in the Kindy 1 Room. On this wonderful journey with me this year and working with your children is Miss Naomi. Miss Naomi and I are very much looking forward to getting to know you all. The children who came from Pre-kindy and Kindy 3 have transitioned with such ease and settled into the class well. I cannot believe February is nearly over already.

In the Kindergarten 1 room this month we are learning about 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar'. How did we get here? The children had been taking a huge interest in investigating what's in the garden, looking for creatures and insects. Unfortunately, we didn't find anything, but I extended this by talking about what animals we could find in our gardens. Caterpillars and butterflies were a big hit amongst all the children. So, this is what lead us to 'The very hungry caterpillar'.  During this theme, the children are set up with key learning skills of; days of the week, numbers of the fruit that he ate, colours, healthy and unhealthy foods and the knowledge of life cycle of a caterpillar.

We started our journey with the hungry caterpillar line tracing activity. They had to connect the caterpillar to the other side of the page, to the matching fruit. We also made some fruit caterpillars. For the caterpillars, the children had to thread the green grapes on to a kebab stick to create the body. At the very end of the kebab stick, the children had to mimic the caterpillar's redhead. So, for this, we used a strawberry. The children had so much fun making fruit kebab caterpillars. The children also made some hand print caterpillars by painting their palm green, fingers black and their thumb red. Then they stamped their hand on the papers created their very own hungry caterpillar.

Week 3 brought us into learning about all the different types of food he ate. We started on Monday just like the hungry caterpillar we ate some apples. The children loved exploring their senses when talking about what the apple tasted like, felt like, smelt like and looked like. On Tuesday we painted some green pears. On Wednesday the children opted to colour their plums with crayons. For their plums they used purple, brown and green crayons. On Thursday the children got to paint their strawberries with red water coloured paints. On Friday the children got to use their fine and gross motor skills when it come to juicing their very own and fresh orange juice.

After he ate all that food, he wasn't a hungry caterpillar anymore. He was a big, fat caterpillar. So, during this week we have made some fat caterpillars with pom poms and popsicle sticks, fat play-dough caterpillars, paper towel roll stamping into caterpillars and then we will also group collage of his cocoon. Next week is our last week of the hungry caterpillar theme. During this week we will be learning all about butterflies, as it is the last stage of the caterpillar's life cycle.

During these weeks of themed activities, we also have been focusing and teaching the children their curriculum learning by weeks. During the week we will revise in the morning our daily learning and recap back in the afternoon. Incorporated with their daily learning is their handwriting tasks.  Each week the children will trace, write and collage the letter of the week, write and quantity match the number of the week. Trace, write and cut out the shape of the week. Down below is a table of their learning that will be happening over the course of this term.

Week 2 – Letter "S" Number "0"Shape "Circle" and Colour "Red"
Week 3 – Letter "A" Number "1"Shape "Circle" and Colour "Red"
Week 4 – Letter "T" Number "2"Shape "Oval" and Colour "Blue"
Week 5 – Letter "I" Number "3"Shape "Oval" and Colour "Blue"
Week 6 – Letter "P" Number "4"Shape "Diamond" and Colour "White"
Week 7 – Letter "N" Number "5"Shape "Diamond" and Colour "White"
Week 8 – Letter "C" Number "6"Shape "Star" and Colour "Black"
Week 9 – Letter "K" Number "7"Shape "Star" and Colour "Black"
Week 10 – Letter "E" Number "8"Shape "Hexagon" and Colour "Yellow"

Just a reminder to please 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 Miss Naomi or myself.

Till next time!

Miss Casey & Miss Naomi

Kindergarten 2 

Welcome to our new and existing families for 2020.

Firstly thank you to all our parents who attended our Kindergarten information night on the 30th January. It was great to see so many parents getting involved in their child's learning. As your child is participating in the Kindergarten Curriculum we require a Kindergarten Acknowledgement Form to be completed. This form can be found on Educa or you can collect a hard copy from the office. Please return this form with a copy of your child's Birth Certificate or passport at your earliest convenience.

We have begun our learning journey together in hopes of working towards readiness for your child to attend Prep next year. Over the next twelve months in Kindergarten your child's outlook on life will open up as they gain a greater sense of independence and begin to explore the world and gain more confidence in their abilities and take on more challenges. Their level of understanding and communication improves and so will their enjoyment for learning new things. There will be a tremendous development in language skills and foundations in numeracy and literacy. We welcome parent input in many ways. So please feel free to communicate with us about your child, the curriculum or the room at any time.

Currently the children have been busy learning about their environment as they are carefully looking after 5 caterpillars in the classroom. This sparked an interest of the children which led us on a learning path of the Very Hungry Caterpillar. For the past 3 weeks we have been learning about the days of the week, the number of fruits the Hungry Caterpillar eats on certain days and the butterfly life-cycle. The learning which has taken place and the activities the children have taken part in can be found in "our learning journey" uploaded to Educa daily as well as your child's stories page in Educa. The children have also been exploring pre-writing skills of the letters S, A, T and the numbers 0, 1, & 2. To reinforce letter and sound recognition you can access the Jolly Phonics program on YouTube from the following link:

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2wpdvv

Looking forward to a rewarding 2020 with your child.

Miss Renae & Miss Sophia 

Kindergarten 3

Hello Parents, families and children of Kindergarten 3!

Wow, what a great start to the 1st term of the year. We've learned, experienced and created so much already. I have had so much fun with your children and am proud to be their Kindergarten teacher for 2020. 

For the first month in Kindy 3 the children and I helped make decisions together about the activities on the program and room set up including their locker tags, where different learning areas would be, etc. The children really felt enthusiastic about finding their name, choosing a colour and then determining where their Locker and Pocket Name Tag would be. The children in Kindy 3 absolutely love to play in the home-corner area, so when it was time to decide where the new home-corner would be, they felt a community and belonging. Letting the children decide on which activities they would like to experience helps build confidence and independence.

This month we have all been getting to know each other. I have learnt so much about the children's needs, strengths and interests. We have had many discussions about who we are, our family, our favourite things including what we most love about being in Kindergarten.

This is a quick glance of what we have been learning about:

Week

   1   

   2

   3

    4

Week beginning       

28 Jan.       

 3 Feb.

 10 Feb.

   17 Feb.

Letter and Sound

Aa – Zz

Review

  Ss

 Aa

    Tt

Number

1-10

Review 

  0            

  1            

   2

Shape

ALL

 Circle         Circle

  Oval

Colour

ALL

  Red           Red

   Blue

Indoor Experiences: Independently tracing, creating our names with glitter and glue, Valentine's Day Painting, free drawing, working as a team to keep the room tidy, Drawing our family, dancing, singing, colour sorting, role playing with toy animals, playing cars, free collage creations, Dress Ups and role playing in the Home Corner, playing Alphabet/Animal matching game, cutting shapes and magazines, washing and cleaning the Barbie Dolls and the clothes, building towers and much, much more.

Outdoor Experiences: climbing the obstacle course, playing chasing games, digging holes in the sandpit, collecting natural items for an art activity, searching and finding our letters and numbers in the yard, colour sorting the large lego, socialising and building friendships, building with the brand new waffle blocks, pushing our friends on the swings, cooking in the home-corner, watering the gardens, and much more.

In the Kindergarten 3 room, we do reading every day! Reading is so important in education and we love it!! If you have any books to donate that would be appreciated.

Our Favourite Songs and Dances

'Baby Shark'

'Freeze Dance'

'Please and Thank-You Song' The Singing Walrus

'I'm Gonna Catch You'

'Friends Song' The Singing Walrus

REMINDERS:

  • Please remember to label all items.
  • Pack a sheet, blanket, hat, spare clothes
  • No toys from home please.
  • Drink bottles and lunch boxes are not required.


Until next time we meet, have a Great Day!

Miss Jazmin

Kindergarten 3 ECT

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