Salisbury Christmas Snippets

salisbury child care

CHRISTMAS SNIPPETS ISSUE 3/4 | CHRISTMAS 2011

inside this issue | 03/4 | CHRISTMAS 2011

centre happenings

upcoming events

news from the office on our bookshelf happy feet fitness agm & your pac a parents review

christmas closure & re-opening times

news from the kitchen

meet our team

cooking with Asoka

sheila rachel silvana

general news

room news

end of year words 2012 children enrolments staff room placements babysitting

bumblebees dragonflies lady bugs

news from the office Welcome to our final edition of Salisbury Snippetts for 2011.

Another year nearly over and it has been a very successful one.

Who can believe that Christmas is upon us once again.

It is a busy and expensive time of year, but what a wonderful time of year for the children!!

All the Educators are working extremely hard in the rooms and I am very proud of the team and all that they achieve not only each day but throughout the whole year. All Educators are undertaking specialized training courses to extend their knowledge of the new curriculum that is being implemented.

In the Early childhood setting we now have a new National regulation we will adhere to and in the New Year the National Quality Standard will be implemented with the assessment and rating system process commencing in mid-2012. This new structure will allow us to capture and extend on educational concepts and practices, structural quality, interactions between educators and children and targeting services to meet the needs of families and local communities.

We have seven Quality areas that we will be assessed on which are: 1.

Educational program and practice

2.

Children’s health and safety

3.

Physical environment

4.

Staffing arrangements, including staff-to-child ratios and qualifications

5.

Relationships with children

6.

Collaborative partnerships with families and communities

7.

Leadership and service management

This is a big process, however it is an exciting time in the education and care sector.

As Educators we will be asking for parent input and involvement, as this is a two way communication that will guide us with key information when designing the curriculum for the room. This curriculum is open for all family and children input, all suggestions and children’s learning will be extended and challenged.

If you have any questions or would like some more information about the National Early Years Framework please don’t hesitate to ask.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the staff that have done a fantastic job in caring for your most prized possessions. If it wasn’t for their hard work and dedications the centre would not be operating at full capacity.

We would also like to take this opportunity to thank all the parents from our Parent Advisory Committee for all their hard work and dedication over the past 12 months.

We look forward to a happy and successful 2012.

Finally we would like to thank all our parents, children and staff a very merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Have a safe time over the holiday period.

See you all in January 2012.

Warm regards

Lisa Ewa &

on our bookshelf You may have noticed the books that are for sale in the foyer on the shelf? These books are for sale to all families.

Why not take advantage of the discounted offers that are provided to us by the bookclubs that kindly leave their books there for us to look at monthly.

If you would like to order any of these books you will need to write your name on the order form and mark which book/s you would like to purchase.

Then next to the EFTPOS machine there are book club slips, fill it out accordingly and place the money and the slip into the plastic money bag and pop it in the fees slot.

All money must be paid before the books are delivered or you will miss out.

The books are delivered to Lisa in the office and she will then distribute them to you. If you have any further queries see Lisa and she will be able to help you!

toys and more fundraising catalogue

A big thank you to everyone who ordered ... we received a voucher for $386.11.

national child carer’s appreciation day

On Tuesday the 25th October the centre celebrated National Child Carer’s Appreciation Day. We recognised the hard and dedicated work all the staff do on a daily basis. Our staff work very hard to provide high quality care to all the children. They work above and beyond the call of duty to ensure that the children are in a happy, safe and secure environment at all times. The centre provided a special morning tea and a small gift for all the staff on the day.

We would like to thank each and every staff member for all their hard work and commitment towards the children, parents and our organisation.

multi skills for tiny tots

The centre is introducing a new Multi Skills tailor-made programme.

That provides young children with a solid foundation in physical activity along with their social and overall wellbeing. The programme is for children aged 3 years and above. Neil will be coming to the centre on Friday mornings at 9.30am to provide the 30 minute class. The cost will be $7 per session or $45 for an 8 week programme. If you are interested in your child participating or would like any further information please see Lisa.

enrolments for 2012

It’s that time of year again!

Thank you to everyone who returned their forms.

Lisa is madly working through the puzzle and will be forwarding confirmation letters to all familes once the process is completed; this is usually around the middle of December.

Also, should our child no longer require care for 2012, please ensure that you give 2 weeks written notice of the last day your child will be attending the centre.

staff allocations for 2012 Bumblebees Room - (0 – 2 years) Team Leader Diploma:

Silvana

Educator Diploma:

Lisa.K.

Educator Cert 111:

Rachel

Silvana will be having Monday’s off and Lisa.K. will be having Friday’s off and Disa will be covering them on these days.

Ladybugs Room – (2 – 3 years) Team Leader Diploma:

Emma

Educator Cert 111:

Brooke

Educator Cert 111:

Marie

Educator:

Sheila

Dragonflies Room – (3 – 5 years) Team Leader Diploma: Educator Diploma: Floater:

Chevon Diana Disa

Cont... from previous page Inclusion Support: Kitchen: Office:

Julie and Blair Asoka Lisa

All educators are happy with the changes and we hope that you will be too!!

christmas closure

A friendly reminder to all parents that all 3 centres will be closed from: Friday 23rd December 2011 at 5.45pm with the Centres re opening on Wednesday the 4th January 2012.

No fees will be charged during closure period.

outstanding child care fees

The end of the year is fast approaching, therefore, we would like to have all outstanding child care fees paid up to date prior to Friday 17th December 2011. This will assist us in preparing accurate end of year reports for accounting purposes for City of Bayswater Childcare Association.

If your child is leaving the service please ensure all fees are paid up to date, if you are unsure of your final payments please see Lisa in the office and I can help you with your enquiry.

farewell

Farewell to all our children and families who are leaving us and moving on into the big wide world.

We will miss you all, and hope that you will call in to say hello every now and again. We love to keep in touch with our “Graduates�.

what’s cooking ... with asoka SWISS CHICKEN CASSEROLE 6 Skinless boneless chicken breasts 6 slices Swiss cheese 1 can condense cream of chicken soup 60ml milk 475ml herb seasoned stuffing mix 55g butter Instructions Preheat oven to 175c Arrange chicken in a greased 12 x 8 baking dish. Top with swiss cheese slices Combine soup and milk and stir well. Spoon mixture over chicken and sprinkle stuffing mix.

Drizzle butter over crumbs Cover and bake at 175c for 50 minutes.

Please remember to provide your child with a piece of fruit on the days they attend.

happy feet fitness Every Thursday morning at 9.15am.

Miss Nikki from Happy Feet Fitness comes to the centre to educate and entertain the children with exciting props, costumes, music and magic tricks.

The sessions last for 30 minutes each at a cost of $8.50 per child, per class.

Every week there is an exciting new theme to keep the children interested and at the end of the year the children put on a Happy Feet concert for their parents to come and watch!!

If you would like to know any more information about Happy Feet there is an information pack in the foyer next to the EFTPOS machine or alternatively you can go to www.happyfeetfitness. com.au

S W E N G BI

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recent events 12th and 13th July – Bouncy Castle fun days. Thanks to Jumping J-Jays for proving the centre with a bouncy castle for the 2 days. Lots of fun was had by all the children and the staff too!!

August – Dental Awareness Month. Thanks to Colgate who provided the centre with activity packs and posters on dental hygiene. The children showed lots of interest to learning about looking after their teeth.

12th August – Soccer Incursion. Neil from Total Football Academy came to the centre and provided a multi skill program for the Kindy children. They all had a great time kicking the balls around together!!

22nd August – Happy Feet Health and Fitness Incursion. The children learnt about how healthy eating, exercise and dental care are very important for our bodies.

6th and 7th September – Photo Days. Once again Onsite Photography came to the centre to take the children’s photos. It was a very busy day but all the children posed nicely for their photos!!

23rd September – Happy Feet Multicultural Incursion. The children learnt through dances, instruments and different languages about the range of countries and cultures throughout the world.

7th October - Annual Family Evening (AGM) was a great success and the largest attendance to date.

18th October - Spineless Wonders Incursion. The children got to hold all the creepy crawlies, and there was a huge range for them to explore and learn about. The children were introduced to new insects as well.

21st October - Child’s Play Music Incursion - Alec Duncan came to the centre with all his home made musical instruments. The children had a great time experimenting and making different sounds with the instruments. a great time was had by all.

27th October - Children’s Week Picnic to Whiteman’s Park.

agm

Thank You’s for the AGM •

Brad Foote, cooking the BBQ for us all tonight.

Anne Appel, donating the hand bags and body wash for the raffle draw.

Denise and Wendy Thomson, donating the awesome hamper for the raffle draw.

Wendy & Tim Count

7. Child Carer’s Appreciation Day Gold Class movie tickets

2010 / 2011 PAC Members

Chair Person: Hayley Lethlean (Outgoing) Vice Chair Person: Anne Appel Treasurer: Tanya Dobbie • Secretary: Tracy Bryan (Outgoing) Newsletter: Kelly Matusik • General Members: • Tim Priest PAC Achievements Danielle Darragh 1. Purchased 3 new camera’s for the rooms 2. Buying staff their annual Christmas present of Lisa Foote Tim Count (Outgoing) a $50 Coles/Myer voucher Katy McDougall (Outgoing) 3. Purchasing new outdoor equipment for the Jade Firth (Outgoing) children 4. Held a ‘Busy Bee’ for the first time this year in April 5. Kidzabuzz voucher books as a fundraising opportunity 6. Toys and More Fundraising Catalogues •

Nominations for 2011/2012 PAC Chair Person: Lisa Bevan Vice Chair Person: Tim Priest Treasurer: Tanya Dobbie Secretary: Liz Perkins Newsletter: Kelly Matusik General Members: Kylie Burath Virginia Prescott Neshka Turner Damian Lailey) Lisa Foote Anne Appel Danielle Darragh Carmen Maughan Caroline Seubert Nicola Messervy

Treasurers Report 2010 / 2011 Outgoing Money • 15 x $50 Staff Christmas gift vouchers - $750 • 3 x New camera’s, cases and SD cards - $618 • Purchasing new outdoor equipment for the children - $2547.75 • Busy Bee – Plants for garden bed - $284.75 • Kidzabuzz Voucher books - $550 (which we will receive $700) • Staff Christmas Vouchers Incoming Money • # of families who have paid fundraising levy to date (56 families have paid) • Made $150 for Kidzabuzz voucher fundraising books • Final account balance $2,539.95

agm family evening Our biggest event ever!

The family Evening and AGM to put simply, was a HUGE SUCCESS! We had the biggest turn out in the history of the evening with close to 200 parents and children in attendance!

As always the face painters were a huge hit with the children and there were lots of different face funning around. The lovely weather allowed families to mingle around outdoors and catch up with familiar faces while the children played. The highlight of the night was the children’s concert and they all perfomed so well!

All in all a great night was had by all.

A BIG thank you needs to go to Brad Foote for cooking the BBQ on the night and to Anne Appel for donating prizes for the raffle, also Denise and Wendy Thomson for donating the huge hamper for the raffle and also another thanks to Wendy for providing and cutting up all the onions for the night. I would also like to say a special thanks to Tim Count for producing the magnificent DVD he put together of all your wonderful children.

We’d like to congratulate all the prize winners’ on the night 1st prize 2nd prize 3rd price 4th prize 5th prize

Ellul Family Ellis Family Rachel from the kindy room Byleveld Family Manfredini Family

With you generosity we managed to raise over $600!! from the raffle and gold coin donation, this money will provide your children with some exciting new equipment!

christmas picnic 2011 Often we take for granted the set up and organisation of events. We don’t consider the hard work behind the scenes as we’ve been personally struggling with our own logistics in getting out of the house on time.

I want to take a moment to thank the contributions made by the staff of Salisbury Child Care who create and put on these events (in their own time) to make our centre a unique a special centre to be involved with.

I will personally provide a note as was advised by Tim Count who witnessed Lisa’s contribution of being at the park by 8am that day to assist in the setting up of the bouncy castles and the shade tents for us.

This is now my fourth christmas picnic and although the thought behind the change of location for heat purposes was a great decision .. the sun had other thoughts in mind!

However, the day was a huge success. Children played, bouncing was paramount, presents where received and ice creams were licked. My son (master four) was content when we made our way to the car and promptly fell asleep on the journey home.

Every year without fail Santa makes his entrance, albeit three at the same time I don’t believe there is ever a question uttered on who the other two are by the kids ..... they just know he has presents! My most favourite year was when he arrived by sled dog but unfortunatley the City of Bayswater are not that accepting of this kind of thing and did give the staff a hard time with a list of what not to do at our park! But they managed splendidly and this in turn resulted in a successful day had by all!

I’m sure you’ll agree, that we all look forward to next year!

dragon flies

Well we cant believe how the year has flown by! We are all gearing up for that one special day now – Christmas of course! We are all very excited in doing our christmas crafts and beginning our long wish lists to santa (in which we are very specific). Most of us Know that school will be starting for us soon and cannot keep our anticipation contained. While Emma and Rachel mope around dreading the ever closer day, in which we graduate dragonflies. We are all sharing our news and boasting over the lunch table to eachother.

We have recently had some wonderful excursions and incursions to tell you about. We went to whiteman Park to celebrate childrens week. We thoroughly enjoyed our double decker bus ride there and in particular the bouncy castles. We also enjoyed making a ruckus with all the instruments that were brought in by the music man, and were intrigued by all the spineless creatures brought in by fleur. We were surprised at the size of the cockroaches and amazed by a glow in the dark scorpion. We had a wonderful Melbourne Cup, in which we made fascinators and ties, put on a parade and watched the big race. While we thought it was very exciting, we also thought it was hilarious to watch all the carers jumping up and down, and breaking that one golden rule. “ Inside voices!”…. Whoops!

We hope you all enjoyed our performance at the AGM, we all loved showing you what we had been working so hard towards. Along with decorating props and our room to show you all and after all our nerves we were very happy to see your smiling faces enjoying yourselves. If anyone was stage fright it was Emma & Rachel!

With Spring here now we have been spending more time outdoors and soaking up the beautiful weather. We will be starting our new worm farm soon and making compost for our garden. We want to start a vedgetable garden soon, and are also looking at brightening up the place with some more beautiful flowers, that we can watch grow. We are very interested in possibly making a fairy garden to explore and sit in, so if you could make any contribution at all, we would be very grateful.

Sadly we are all growing up so fast, and well I guess its time to face the fact, that are heads are getting bigger!

Haha . As the weather heats up our brains are expanding! Please check or ask the girls if its time for a bigger hat for your child. Also in accordance with our sunsafe policy please ensure your child brings a t-shirt that covers their shoulders for outside. And a second set of clothes would be great also, as we are beginning to have lots of fun with waterplay.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the parents, for their input into the programs. By filling out the “what we did on the weekend” forms it gives us a great starting off point to extend on your childs interests and experiences. If you haven’t been able to fill any out, it’s probably because we haven’t been able to catch you but please be assured that your child is still being programmed for. If you have any queries please feel free to ask us.

We would like to wish everyone a very merry Christmas and a safe and happy new year! To all the graduates we wish you a wonderful and happy experience at school and all the best for your bright futures. We hope to see everyone at the Christmas picnic and look forward to seeing you again in the new year.

Merry Christmas from all the dragonflies!

bumblebees Well here we are in December and it’s almost Christmas.

The babies have been very busy gluing and painting and doing all sorts of art and craft.

Some love it and some just won’t have a bar of it so if you miss out on an item of art that is why.

We have been very busy all through the year and all their hard work will be given to you at the end of the year to be a reminder off the first year in daycare.

We would like to think that their first year was a very happy and pleasant experience and we hope that it was for you as well.

We have been getting outside more now that the weather has been lovely and warm and we would like to ask everyone to check that they have supplied a suitable hat to protect your child’s nose and head while playing outside.

Please make sure your child has suitable clothing on to protect them from the sun.

Sunscreen is applied but covering up is much more effective and shoestring straps and tank tops are just not a good idea.

We have seen a few of “our” babies graduate to Toddler room and as much as we would like to keep hold of them it’s good to see them grow and meet the new challenges of the toddler room.

We have had the pleasure of welcoming our “new babies” and a lot of them are siblings and so they are used to seeing us in and around the centre making their introduction into day care happy one.

It’s so nice to see our familiar mums and dads coming back to settle their new babies with us.

Please remember to fill out your “My Child” form and return it to the staff. We try and program for your child on a regular basis and the form helps us to bring events and home life into the day care day.

We work on interest base program and try to provide toys and equipment that your child particularly enjoys playing with.

Well we will look forward to seeing you at the annual picnic and hope that we all have a great time chatting with you outside of daycare.

So we would like to wish all our families a very safe and happy Christmas and New Year.

See you all Next year for another year of Fun and challenges.

Silvana ,Brooke, Diana

lady bugs Well, once again the year has flown by and we find ourselves in the midst of fairy lights, carols, glitter glue and everything to make the room christmassy!

We’ve had a great year and a busy one, with a lot of toilet training going on as the year has progressed.

We enjoyed a visit with the kindy kids from the music man who brought in his homemade drums, xylaphones and pipe instruments which we all had a go at playing.

Every Thursday most of the children in our room join the kindy kids in doing ‘Happy Feet ‘ with Miss Nicky which they thoroughly enjoy and get a lot out of.

We are sad to see Heather depart now on her 12 month maternity leave after 10 years with Salisbury CCC. She would like to thank everyone for making her time here so enjoyable. she is sad to leave but looks forward to her impending arrival.

We would also like to wish all our parents and children a wonderful Merry Christmas and hope you have a wonderful and relaxed break!

With love & christmas wishes the Lady bugs Chevon. Heather, Marie, Sheila, Blair & Julie

staff profiles

?? ? ?

Recently we asked our staff to partake in the giving forth of information .. possibly with items that you don’t know about the carers who take loving care of your prescious ones.

•

How long have you worked at the centre for?

•

What’s your favourite meal that Asoka makes?

•

What’s the most rewarding part of your job?

•

What hobbies do you enjoy?

•

What’s your favourite TV show?

•

What’s the funniest thing a child has said to you?

Turn over to view their answers.

Introducing Sheila •

22 years

•

Roast and vegetables

•

A child’s achievement or comforting a new child

•

Yoga, keep fit, walking

•

R.P.A. ‘Sunday Night’

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Looking closely into my face and asking ‘Why have you go all those crinkles’?

Introducing Rachel •

1 year 6 months

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Pumpkin scones & spaghetti bolognese

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Forming relationships & bonds with children & seeing the children grow and learn new things, doing childrens’ hair! ha ha!

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Swimming, scrapbooking, art & craft

•

I was making playdough with the kindly kids & a child said to me ‘Rachel, you are the master chef’.

Introducing Silvana •

4 1/2 years

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Pumpkin scones & soup

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Meeting new families & watching the babies grow & learn, settle into their new environment and watching their little personalities develop

•

Walking & cooking

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Winners & Losers

•

In the babies room a 20 month old asked me is she could do painting. I replied ‘yes , in a little while we can’. she said straight back to me, ‘NO Vanna, I want to paint now!’ I was TOLD and I made sure we did painting straight away.

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