From our office 

 Half way through the year already! It's amazing how quickly the time flies. It certainly feels good to be welcoming back the cooler weather! I hope everyone has had a good start of the winter season so far, as we slowly but surely return to a sense of normality.  So, given the colder weather that is incoming, I would like to reiterate the importance of not sending sick children into childcare. A child who is not feeling well needs to be with their parents/grandparents at home. . The aim of exclusion is to reduce the spread of infectious diseases. Please watch for symptoms such as fever, drowsiness, decreased activities, breathing difficulties, poor feeding, sensitivity, pain, rashes,... and if in doubt please seek medical advice without delay.   

A few  dates to remember 

 The photo days have been booked in for Tuesday the 23rd of June and the 24th of June, from 9am to 12pm. In your child's bag you should have found an envelope. We ask that you please complete the details on that envelope, selecting the appropriate options and returning it to the centre at your earliest convenience.

Next month, on Friday, 17.7.2020 is a National Pyjama Day, the comfiest day of the year is coming and we will wear pyjamas to support children in foster care. More details to follow soon.

Finally, on the 21.06.2020 we are turning 10! It's so hard to believe that it's already been 10 years, but does surely fly by when you're having fun! I want to thank everyone, the staff members past and present. The families that have been here for years, and the families that have been here for months! Together, we have built a community that has lasted a decade, and will surely continue to grow, blossom and flourish! 

 

Return to Child Care Subsidy (CCS)

As you would be aware, due to the impact of COVID-19 the Australian Government introduced the Early Childhood Education and Care Relief Package to support early learning services and allow them to remain operating whilst ensuring that, at a minimum, 'essential workers' were able to access quality education and care for their children during the pandemic. The package came into effect on Monday 6 April and during this time, families have not been charged any fees to access childcare. In effect families have received 'free childcare' during this time. As you may have seen in the media, the arrangements under this Relief Package are now scheduled to conclude at midnight 12 July 2020. We are therefore getting ready for the return of the Child Care Subsidy (CCS).Over the past few months, we have experienced numerous changes in terms of child attendance. We may have changed the timing of care sessions for your child or perhaps your child has not attended our service since the health crisis began to unfold. To help us move beyond the current arrangements, we are asking all families to get in touch with Natasa by 29.6.2020, to discuss your ongoing attendance needs (ie. number of days, hours, etc).We will then be able to confirm bookings and enrolments and calculate an estimation of the gap fees payable each fortnight – this will include the latest CPI increase to the Child Care Subsidy (CCS). In some cases, you may need to confirm this new enrolment through your MyGov account. Below is a statement to families from the Department of Education, Skills and Employment, which we urge you to act upon, in order to ensure that you continue to receive the CCS beyond 13 July. If you received Child Care Subsidy (CCS) for 2018-2019 you are required to confirm your income with Centrelink. This includes CCS paid directly to you and CCS paid on your behalf to your childcare provider. Most parents have already confirmed their income, but if you haven't, do it now. If you don't confirm your income by 30 June 2020, your CCS will stop on 13 July 2020.To confirm your income with Centrelink, you and your partner need to either: lodge your tax returns with the Australian Taxation Office (ATO)complete an 'Advise non-lodgement of tax return' in your Centrelink online account through myGov or your Express Plus Centrelink mobile app If you've already confirmed your family income for 2018-2019, there's nothing else you need to do. From 13 July onwards, our service will reintroduce fees. As per our Payment of Fees Policy, fees are payable in advance of your child's attendance. Invoices will therefore be sent out from 6.7.2020.To ensure a smooth transition back to CCS, please do not hesitate to speak with management personally to discuss any of the above. We appreciate that the employment and income of some families has changed, and we encourage you to speak with our team to ensure that you are receiving all of the subsidies to which you are entitled, taking into considerations options such as the 'relaxed' Activity Test, as well as the Additional Child Care Subsidy (ACCS) for Temporary Financial Hardship. We would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support during the past few difficult months. We are excited to return to the 'new normal' and look forward to focussing our attention on educating and caring for your children.

Keep smiling, Natasa 


Room Reports 

 Hi Everyone,

Welcome to our Pips' room. First, we would love to welcome the new babies in the room Zayn, Reylin and Jaxton.

In the Pips room currently, our routine is very flexible. We adjust our routine according to the babies' interests and needs. Recently, we have been taking the babies outside to play when the weather gets a little warmer after the morning. All of them love going to play outside and running around. We are really excited to see Emilia and Eugenie walking confidently and Levi and Zayn are not far behind.

We have also been doing a lot of messy activities for the last few weeks. Moon sand play is our favourite. It is excellent for sensory learning. They all love to explore the soft, crumbly texture of the cool moon sand. They also enjoyed spaghetti play and did colour finger painting on the large table. Group art activity not only enhance babies sensory motor skills but encourages social cooperative behaviour at their early stage of life.

Thanks to all the parents for packing warmer clothes and blankets in the babies' bags. Sometimes the babies' bibs get mixed up with our Centre's bibs. If you can't find your baby's bib, please ask us and we are happy to find it. Also, if possible, please label your children's belongings (e.g. bottles and drink cups).

Cheers for now,

Sanchita and Annie

Hello and welcome everyone in our little sprouts Room. I would like to welcome Madeline , Daniel and their families to the Sprouts 1. They both has settled very well into the Sprouts routine and enjoying to play with their new friends.

Because of this weather changing can I please kindly request the families to put some warm clothes in their bags in case the they feel cold so we can use.

Here are some of our focuses in our room:

All of the children are back now and we all enjoyed our activities and learning new things in the room. We celebrated  Mother's Day and the Environmental day and learnt about respecting the environment and exploring new skills. We also focused on our social and emotional interactions and our fine motor and gross motor skills. 

Children develop their social skills by getting to know their friends and learn through play with their peers. Besides, we will start with colour recognition, number cards 1 to 5, body parts and we also sing our favourite songs. Children in our room will continue developing their language skills to express our emotions as well as learning to take turns in our learning and play.

children have been exploring their world with their sensory capability. For instance, children have a great time participating in different sensory activities such as play dough, sandpit, paper cutting, water play, we also have  been exploring the different areas in our room such as home corner and science area and this month we also did the science experiment to make Volcanos. We have also being focusing on our fine motor and hand eye-coordination through threading and changing the pages in books. We also have been busy exploring our gross motor abilities through challenging ourselves on the obstacle course and all these activities help children to develop their fine motor skills, manipulation skills, hand-eye coordination and imagination.

The curriculum in our room emphasises the outcomes in the Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) and our intentional teaching strategies support children's independent learning. We would like to encourage family input regarding our learning stories which are displayed.

We look forward to work collaboratively with you on the children's learning and development. Thank you.

Miss Amanpreet and Miss Vivian 

 We would like to welcome all our families and new members Harmony and Arthur to our group.

In the room, children have shown a lot of interests in sensory exploration participating in a variety of learning experiences exploring different textures of items in our new sensory table. Children also enjoyed participating in art/craft (painting/collage), we will be continuing childrens' sensory exploration extending on their learning, experiencing experiences outside, with sand to make them understand differences in textures like rough and smooth.

Over the past few weeks children have involved themselves using their imaginations/role play and joining in play with their friends in home corner area, choosing a variety of foods (fruit/ vegetables) and pretending to eat and have a tea party around the home corner table.

We will be continuing children's interests communicating about healthy eating and hygiene through learning experiences and group times. Join in singing songs.

Children's portfolios- can parents please provide an A3 display folder or scrap book for your child's artwork and photos to be placed into.

Thanks from Buds Room, Ms Sharon, Ms Sawraj and Ms Chen Li.

 Hi all Blossom's 1 parents,

Time flies! We're already in the middle of the year! I would firstly like to say a big welcome to our new additions to the class, Louis, Jiraiya, Stephen and Emir, whom moved up from Buds room, and to Maura and Grace whom newly joined our Piptree family.

As it has been sometime since all the children have resumed normal classes, we will be working on reviewing our room routine/rules for the next few weeks. We will be doing lots of singing and dancing to help us transition from one activity to another. I am sure the children will all have their best listening ears on when we sit down for group reading before transitioning on to group play time, helping to develop good reading habits in the future.

Last month, we really focused on personal hygiene, such as washing our hands regularly and coughing into our elbows, so the children know the importance of personal hygiene; not only during these times but also in general to help keep the sick bugs away. We will continue to be reinforcing personal hygiene by integrating these concepts into the songs we sing, and into our routine (such as before tea time) over the next coming months.

The other day, the children found a caterpillar in the garden during outside play, and was very intrigued and interested by the caterpillar. We took this opportunity and decided to transform this into a very spontaneous learning experience. World environment day is on the 5th June, so it is perfect timing for us to teach the children the importance of keeping the environment clean and healthy, so that these creatures such as our friend the caterpillar, can survive in its environment. We looked at the caterpillar lifecycle during class, which the children all had a wondering time learning that caterpillars turn into beautiful butterflies as adults. We will also be doing gardening activities, and learning about recycling for World Environment day.

We will be looking at doing many more of these spontaneous learning experiences in the future, so that the children can be a part of the programming, and have a say in what they would want to learn. This will help them to develop initiative, and also explore areas that they are interested in. Our new Science table has been put into good use since we've gotten this new resource. The children enjoy the magnifying glass component of the science table the most, as they explore what different objects look like under a different magnification.

Lastly, I would like to kindly remind all parents to bring spare clothes, and also warmer clothes as the weather has been starting to get chilly. Please also remember to bring your child's water bottle and hat.

Stay safe and until next time!

Miss Nikki and Miss Briohny 

 What an unusual time it has been for the first half of the year. Due to the lower numbers , we decided to combine blossom 2 and poppies for the last few months. With all these changes happening, children have remained energetic and are learning about all the things they can do to keep themselves safe. In the past few months, we have practiced good hygiene and put proper hand washing into our routine. We have learnt a great hand washing sequence with the song 'Happy Birthday'. Beside learning about the importance of hygiene, we have been busy learning our letter sounds, alphabet and letter tracing. Children have been using different mediums to interact and engage with the letter of the week. We sing a phonics song, practice tracing, use playdough and other hands on activities with the letter sound each day. These are all important upon entrance to prep next year. Parents can help children learn their letter sounds and alphabet through shared reading by pointing out the sounds in each word, finding letters in words on the pages and practicing forming letters from left to right. A  highlight for this month is our cooking time. We all enjoy putting on our chef hats and making healthy treats from scratch. This month, we made some delicious vegetable buns!

Recently, children are slowly coming back into our room, and we will continue to focus on skills that are needed before prep next year. These include, simple counting and maths using objects and writing their own name. A kind reminder for parents to bring with a jacket with their child as it is getting quite cold in the morning and afternoons.

Until next time and take care!

Miss Yu-mei and Miss Cindy

 Greetings from the kindergarten room, otherwise known as Poppies.

We are so happy to see the return of almost all our kindy kids. The room is buzzing again and how good is that!

With the return of children, a lot of parents are concerned about their child's readiness for prep next year. Literacy and numeracy being the main concern. As mentioned during our parent/teacher meeting and conversations with you as parents, although those learning skills are fundamentally important so is your child's holistic growth with social and emotional intelligence essential for a smooth transition. How can you aide or support your child's growth at home? Everybody should now be familiar with our online learning resource, EDUCA. This is a great indicator which provides information what is happening in the kindergarten room. Our curriculum wall (in the room) is another source of information as the children's learning is displayed. These you can use and apply at home to support and aide not just your child, but their teachers as well if you wish. There is also a section on EDUCA to communicate with the teachers should you have any concerns or ask for suggestions in how to support your child's ongoing learning.

Currently, the children are interested in recycling. They are bringing items from home and request what they would like to do with it which we then facilitate them with. This is a great way in teaching children valuable lessons about sustainability and how we want to leave the world for the future.

In the kindergarten room the children are engaging in a variety of games that develops auditory memory skills and auditory skills. In the first instance, we used different colours and on another day, we used numbers where the children were asked to step on the colours or numbers according the order requested e.g. yellow, blue, green or 4, 2, 3. More can be added as the children retain this order but not more than five depending on their age and stage of development. Animals can also be used. Auditory processing impacts reading, spelling, writing and maths skills. Auditory skills are about understanding what they hear and responding appropriately. This we did through clue games as well as providing a selection of items the children must describe, developing receptive and expressive language. This create the foundation for achieving academic success. The children enjoy these games/activities which makes learning so much more fun.

Winter is here! Runny noses and coughs are occurring which is normal, but we ask that in this sensitive time where we continue to work hard in keeping the children and staff safe from Covid-19 (everyone is doing so well), to keep your child at home when their colds are severe. Thank you.

As social distancing is still in place, if you have any concerns or need to talk to me, please feel free to contact me telephonically or leave a message either on EDUCA parent communication section or in the communication book in the room.

Until next time. Stay warm.

Cheers!

Ms Tertia (ECE) Ms Razzia (Assistant)

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