September 2017 Newsletter

​Haere Mai/Haere Ra: We have said farewell to Ra and Ana who have gone to Australia for a while.  We hope to see Ana back at pre-school next year when they return.  We do have a few spare spaces available now so if you are interested in picking up days this year speak to Annabel ASAP before they get filled. 
Learning Environment:
You may have noticed that when you arrive in the mornings that the teachers have been working on setting the environment differently every day.  We have been doing some professional reading on Reggio Emilia and we working on introducing a Reggio Emilia inspired environment.  Reggio Emilia has a natural learning environment where children can explore and make discoveries and believes that the environment should be considered as an extra teacher.   As we work on this change we have been collecting interesting loose parts and natural resources.  We have been op shopping and were very excited with some interesting things that we found.  If you have any interesting loose parts or natural resources at home that you are no longer wanting please see a teacher as we would be grateful for any contributions that are made.   We are looking for loose parts for outside and inside.  The idea of loose parts is that they are materials which can be moved around, designed and redesigned, and tinkered with; create infinitely more opportunities for creative engagement than static materials and environments.  We have put up a wall display by the name trees of some ideas of different loose parts. 
 
Children writing their name:
We have noticed a number of children showing a keen interest in writing at the moment.  When working with your child and their writing we encourage to you to use lower case letters as it is important that they learn to write in lower case letters apart from a capital at the beginning of their names.
 
Pet Parade:
We are going to have our annual pet parade on Wednesday 27th September at 9.15.  We invite all children to bring their pets along to pre-school to join in the parade and have an opportunity to show all their friends their pets.  This will last half an hour to an hour at the maximum.  If you child doesn’t have a pet we encourage the children to decorate a fancy hat to parade.
 
 
 
 
 
Planning:
The teachers continue to work on their professional development around planning and improving learning stories.  Please remember to check our planning wall around by the small mat.  This is a work in progress wall and is changing all the time as children achieve their current learning goals and new goals are developed.  We have a space on the wall for you to share stories from home.  You will find some sticky notes by the sign in sheet that you are welcome to note a story on and stick them with the stories from home on the planning wall.  We always love to have input from home on what your child is learning and interested in so we can continue to build on this at pre-school. 
 
Child Health Policy:
We have had many children who have been unwell and away from pre-school over the past couple of weeks.  Attached with this newsletter is our updated child health policy for you to have a read and familiarise yourself with to help us limit bug spread. 
 
 
Emergency kit:
It is the time of the year that we need to update our emergency kit.  We are asking if parents could all donate something towards our kit.  We have plenty of water and canned food so we are looking for food such as chips, crackers, biscuits, chocolate, lollipops, muesli bars etc.  We would really appreciate any donations that we can get. 
 
Reducing Rubbish:  We are wanting to decrease the amount of rubbish that we collect at pre-school to continue to be more sustainable.  If we could all please work together to decrease the amount of packaged food by using reusable packaging or containers in children’s lunches boxes we would really appreciate it.  
Playground development:  We have had Richard Ashcroft come in to talk to the teachers about our playground redevelopment.  He has redeveloped many play grounds around the Wairarapa/Wellington/Palmerston North areas.  He will be drawing up a couple of plans and we look forward to sharing these with you next term.     
Pre-School Photo:  We will be having our pre-school photo next term on Wednesday 1st November at 9.15.  We will provide you with more information next term.
Enrolling in Hadlow School:  Just a reminder to all families who are thinking of sending their child to Hadlow School in the future you need to fill out a separate enrolment form at the school office.  Please note they do have a long waiting list so it is best to have their name down in good time.    
 
Important Up Coming Dates:
Monday 11th September – Grandparents morning tea 10am
Wednesday 27th September – pet parade 9.15am
Friday 29th September – Term 3 ends
Monday 16th October – Term 4 Starts
Wednesday 1st November – Pre-school photo 9.15
Wednesday 13th December – Pre-school Christmas concert – 9.30
Thursday 14th December – Term 4 Finishes at 12.45