Skip to main content
11 minutes reading time (2263 words)

Jubilant July News 2017

From the Office

​​We have had a wonderful opportunity to share our educators with the children of the pre-prep poppies room over July as Miss Alexandra went on a fabulous overseas holiday. It is such a joy to extend the trusting relationships 'circle of security' in our Centre for the children as Miss Rosemary from Nursery Pips and Miss Julie our Educational Leader stepped in for Miss Alexandra's absence providing an already familiar continuity of care and education. I have loved observing the creative projects going up on the walls showing the children's language, knowledge, and imaginations. We value our educators demonstrating that we are listening to children at all times.

Information for Nursery Pips parents regarding food:

​At Piptree we are aware of the significant role diet and nutrition play in infancy with regards to introducing new food choices and discovering food sensitivities. Therefore, we do not provide food for the Nursery. The reason for this is because in the Nursery we have vast developmental differences when it comes to eating and drinking. We could have a 6 week old who is just on a bottle, a 3 month old on pureed foods and a 12 month old who is on solids. Being so different in needs and requirements is the reason we ask parents to provide the food for the Nursery room children only. We are respectful to parent choices and routines. It is up to each parent when they feel food should be introduced to their child and we are happy to follow parental choice/wishes as well as routines when it comes to feeding the babies in our nursery.

By the time the Pips grow up to Sprouts parents have had an opportunity to establish their child's diet and any food intolerances have had an opportunity to be diagnosed with health professionals. We understand food allergies can happen at any time however in infancy we believe the best decision for food choice is the parents. Once we reach Sprouts (15mths+) we are able to provide Morning Tea and Afternoon Tea.

Our winter menu includes:

​Morning Teas ​Afternoon Teas
​Fresh cut seasonal mixed fruits
Raison toast or bread
Toast or sandwiches with jam & vegemite
Nut & bolts (cheerios and sultanas)
​Rice crackers and cheese squares
Crumpets with butter, jam or vegemite
Roasted vegetable pizza
Popcorn
flavoured yoghurts

Miss Deb-Deb and Miss Ro-Ro would like to welcome our new little friend to the Pips Nursery room, and say a sad goodbye to 'Tommy'and 'Darcy' as they move up to the Sprouts (Toddler)room on their new adventure...we will miss you both! 

For the month of June and July, we have been very busy exploring lots of interesting themes and activities in our room that the children have been actively participating in and learning from, extending a wide range of their learning skills. 

One of our new learning areas that we are exploring and extending on is an 'All about ME and MY FAMILY tree', and our 'PETS wall' .which includes photos from home. If you haven't brought in your family photo or a photo of your pet, we would still love to see one, so that your child can be a part of this activity – 'IDENTITY'. They love to discover themself and family members in photos, which are displayed around our room. 

Last month we enjoyed having a special visit from 'Aunty Janice', an Aboriginal Elder whom through the use of different mediums told us the story of 'The Rainbow Serpent Snake'. We learnt a new action song, looked atAustralian animal flash cards as we sang songs to music, and became hands-on byhelping to hand print on our very own centre'Serpent Snake' cloth.

Having Aunty Janice visit was a wonderful way to introduce N.A.I.D.O.C week this month. All the Pips participated by creating their own hand prints on our Aboriginal flag to hang in our room.


  Last month we enjoyed having a special visit from 'Aunty Janice', an Aboriginal Elder whom through the use of different mediums told us the story of 'The Rainbow Serpent Snake'. We learnt a new action song, looked atAustralian animal flash cards as we sang songs to music, and became hands-on byhelping to hand print on our very own centre'Serpent Snake' cloth.

Having Aunty Janice visit was a wonderful way to introduce N.A.I.D.O.C week this month. All the Pips participated by creating their own hand prints on our Aboriginal flag to hang in our room.



At Piptree Mt Gravatt East, the wholecentre enjoyed celebrating all 3 State oforigin games this year by dressing-up inour favourite State of Origin colours.Even some of our parents joined-in by dressing-up too! We all enjoyed sharing Miss Bari's Game 2 State of Origin cake(Yum Yum) and had lots of fun playing a game of football with only 2 people on the NSW team.... QUEENSLANDER!!!

That's all for now from the PIPS room...so until next time..."Ya minyah" (Goodbye in Wiradjuri Aboriginal Language)

Miss Debbie and Miss Rosemary (and also Miss Julie.T)


Welcome to another month of watching us sprouting!!! Miss Bwari and I would like to send a very warm welcome to our new friends that have transitioned from the nursey. Hope you enjoy watching us sprout.

Children are showing so much interests in exploring their sensory skills. To extend their interests we have initiated a variety of learning experiences to explore different textures while joining in.The most experience the children have shown is MESSY play! Each day we initiate an experience with different textures. To extend their sensory exploration, we have been setting out experiences with hard/soft objects, sensory wall with varied materials and have created small sensory bottles. Please feel free to bring in empty bottles to create more sensory bottles and any other materials to add to our sensory wall. It's nice to see children investigating, using their imagination and creativity while exploring these objects.

Just a reminder - Children love messy play especially painting in the room, this experience expresses their feelings, using their imagination, creativity, learning their fine motor skills to hold and manipulate a paint brush, eye/hand coordination. This shows you how much fun they have during the day! We kindly ask, could you please dress your child in childcare clothing while your child attends for your child to experience messy play that we experience throughout the day.

Thank you, until next time Miss Lorelle and Miss Bwari

A big welcome to Oliver and Kamalini join in our Buds room. They have all settled in well and have started to play with some new friends.

Our Buds children have shown strong interest in is friendships as many children were excited about seeing their friends in the morning. We have been discussing what it means to be a good friend and asking the children who their friends are and what they like to play with while at Buds room. It is wonderful to see children seeking out their friends and including them in group games and individual play experiences.

In the Buds room we like to give the children access to a wide range of open ended materials. These materials stimulate the children's imagination and creativity as they work out what an object can be or how they can change and make a new product from these items. Allowing them the freedom to choose their own resources means we are not limiting their learning. It also means they have to select, organise and be responsible for their own learning materials. This is a very important learning skill which they will use for the rest of their lives. When they are constructing with open ended materials they develop their problem solving skills, fine motor skills and communication.

 

Room rules

We continued to work on the children's self-help skills with little duties like getting them to put their own bed sheets in their lockers; taking out and putting back their water bottles; packing away the toys after playing and so on. We set up the room rules to encourage the children to take ownership of their learning and behaviour, such as:

* Using listening ears * Using gentle hands * Using walking feet inside * Using quiet voices inside * Sitting on our bottoms * Listening to our teachers * Looking after our belongings * Being nice to each other * Playing, eating, and resting / sleeping well. The children are progressing well.

Until next time

Miss Na, Miss Raisa & Miss Shahnaz

Hello and welcome to newsletter July, 2017. I would like to take the time to welcome all new families, existing families, and families whose children are moving up to "Blossoms" from junior kindy. Firstly, I would like to introduce myself as being lead educator in "blossoms" senior kindy from June, 2017.

I, Nishita Jani, am honoured that I have become a part of Senior Kindy "Blossoms" as a Lead Educator. I will be responsible for the care of your child in Blossoms and I am privileged to be given the opportunity. I am acutely aware of parents' wish that their children must be given care, learning, and love in their absence.

Children have been a part of my career life since 2015 while studying Certificate III in Early Childhood Education and Care and working in a childcare centre. I joined Piptree Mount Gravatt East in 2016. I am always learning something new to better myself as a Child Care Educator and providing helpful insight into individual needs of children. I am a continuous learner and made a pledge to myself that I will continue working for children's care and development.

To progress myself more into early years curriculum, I am studying Diploma in Early Childhood Education and care.

I am grateful of being a part of Piptree Mount Gravatt East Centre and I love to see the look on their little faces when they learn something new. I am also looking forward to meeting the parents/guardians of all the children that I will serve and developing positive close-knit relationship with every single one of you.

Whilst I have been in the Blossoms Room, Miss Leanne and myself have made some changes in the room. We have moved some furniture and have re-organised the room. I appreciate parents for showing positive response about the change.

Learning and activities for children

Daily activities for children are planned a week prior. I try to do different activities with children and the activities are planned according to developmental needs of the children such as building with blocks, cutting and pasting, craft activities, painting, drawing, outside play such as catching bubbles, digging in the sandpit, cooking activities, circle time with microphone etc. The objectives for the activities are social, physical, cognitive, motor skills development of the children 2.5 - 4 years old.

We look forward to everyday with you,

Miss Nishita, Miss Leanne & Miss Bree


We warmly welcome all new children and families to Poppies room. We also welcome Sofia, Abby and Ruby who have successfully transitioned from the Blossoms room. As per our room philosophy, each of these children are assigned a "Room Buddy" to have support during this transition.

CHINESE FAN DANCING

We were fortunate enough to have Phoebe and James visit us for fan-making and fan dancing. The children learned some cultural information about China. They discussed Chinese dragons and empathised that these dragons are friendly and wise, unlike the dragons in popular Western stories. Phoebe explained that the fan dance is a cultural dance, used in China to welcome guests and the Chinese New Year. 

The children then painted their own fan for their dance using very fine brushes, some had fireworks or a dragon stamped on their fans for decoration.

After our fans were dry, we learned some Tai Chai names to help us learn our dance moves. We learned "The Tiger Up the Mountain", "The Rooster" and "Floating Cloud". These words helped us to remember the moves in our dance.

Thank you to Nouri and his family for their kind donation of books. They are very much appreciated by the children (and us!)?

Thank you for all those wonderful boxes and unwanted materials such as old magazines, catalogues and other items. The children love these new supplies as it fuels our imagination and our creativity and our showing increasing understanding for environments through re-purposing. Also unused toys/books are always welcome to be re-purposed in our room or Centre. "A little bit of home", if you like!?

Congratulations to Nouri and Noshil and their families on the safe arrivals of their new babies.

I will be away from the 24th June to 24th July on annual leave. Miss B will remain as Educator to assist the children during my absence during this transition.

Take care everyone,

Miss Alexandra

With Miss Alexandra, away on holidays we had the pleasure of Miss Rosemary from the nursery room. The last 2 weeks we have learnt some Aboriginal names like Gibbar (boy), and Yurumkin (girl) and we made our own Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags during NAIDOC week.

While Miss Rosemary has been in there we have been learning about the community and what is in our area, the children painted their idea of the community which is so different from how we adults see it, the children see it as there being a Catholic School, parks, roads, some houses and a rainbow. We have also been talking about class room rules and my have we had some strange rules but the children have had so much fun talking about the rules and having them on the wall for everyone to see. The children are also now starting to learn to write their names every morning, and practising to write the alphabet and numbers.

0