Dear Parents,
Welcome to the June edition of the YKU5’s newsletter. I would like to welcome all the new families who have recently joined us, and hope that they will be very happy here.
With all the rain that we have seen lately, the produce in our garden is shooting up, including potatoes, onions, peas and some lovely herbs – but we need the sunshine now!
Children’s learning and development
Amy continues to work with small groups of children carrying out activities in the BLAST programme. The older children are now working on ‘blending and segmenting’ activities during the Letters and Sounds sessions, in preparation for going to school in September, where they will further develop these skills. The Reception year is the final year of the Early Years Foundation Stage, so whilst they are ‘going to big school’, they are still working within the Early Years curriculum for one more year.
Alex from Kaya Drums visited the pre-school recently and the children had a great time learning about sound and rhythm, and playing drums in time to the beat.
Staffing news
We were sorry to say good-bye to Caroline last week, who had been with us for just over a year. We wish her well for the future and she will be truly missed by us all. We will also be saying a sad farewell to Sue our pre-school administrator, at the end of the month, and wish her well too.
We welcome Helen to our team of Bank Staff, who you will be seeing from time to time in the future and congratulations go to Charlotte for recently acquiring her Level 3 Diploma in Children’s Care, Learning and Development.
Dates for your diary:
Term 5: 16th April – 1st June 2012
‘Olympic’ themed Sports Day and cake sale: POSTPONED – NEW DATE FOR TERM 6 TBC
29th May (morning): Chris Chard photographs – for pre-school children plus siblings
1st June (afternoon): Chris Chard photographs – for Toddlers children
End of term break: 4th June – 8th June 2012 (includes Diamond Jubilee BHol on 5th June)
Term 6: 11th June – 17th July 2012
June 22nd: Shopping and pamper evening in the village hall, from 7.30pm
Summer holiday: 18th July – 31st August 2012
Provisional start day back for 2012/2013 is Monday 3rd September 2012
Sun 21st October 2012: Castle Combe Car Boot Sale: We’ve been lucky again! We will be attending the Castle Combe boot sale on Sunday 21st October. For those of you who do not know, we are able to stand at the gates with buckets and collect ‘entrance donations’ – last year we raised in excess of £800 and the previous year more than £1000!!!
It requires very little effort and is great fun – if you can bring your children to hold a bucket – this has proved to be the best method yet! Shifts will be arranged – you will not have to stay for the entire day.
Breakfast Club and After-school care
After Easter we started offering to families an ‘out of hours’ childcare facility for pre-school age children. Breakfast Club starts at 8.15/8.30am until 9am (when pre-school starts), where children can have breakfast and play games. After-school provision runs until 4pm. Places do need to be booked termly and paid for in advance. A booking form is available in the foyer. We are considering extending the after pre-school provision until 5pm: please speak to a member of staff if you think this may be of interest to you, or if you know anyone that this may appeal to who is currently not attending our pre-school.
IMPORTANT TO NOTE:
There is no longer a landline number available for the village hall. During the daytime, we can be contacted on our own pre-school mobile number: 0776 657 9909.
Pre-school opening time
On occasions during the colder winter months, when families have arrived early for pre-school, we have been known to open the door and allow people to wait in the foyer. We are more than happy to continue to open the door to the ‘early birds’, however we will keep the hall door closed whilst we finish setting up for the session, and to keep the breakfast club children safe within the hall. The main door will be open for those parents who do arrive early, but will not be manned by a pre-school adult. Children will remain the responsibility of their parents/carers until we are ready to start the session.
Once the door opens to the hall, children can come in and find their name on a mat. These have been carefully positioned for several reasons, and we would be extremely grateful if parents would refrain from encouraging their children to swap them around.
Warmer weather
The summer sunshine is (hopefully) just around the corner, so please do not forget the named pot of sun cream, in the event that we have a hot day and children can then continue to play safely outside.
Sainsbury’s and Tesco’s vouchers
These vouchers will have to be sent off soon, so please, if you have any strays lurking in the bottom of a handbag, or at home, we have a really big box that would welcome them dearly.
A plea to parents
We have been busily saving our fruit and vegetable scraps daily for our garden compost bin, but we are in need of some cardboard. If you have any at home that you would like to pass on to us, according to our ‘compost chief’, alias Amy, it needs to be: brown, plain, not coloured, and ‘cardboard box’ style, rather than cereal box type, and plain egg boxes will be fine too.
We are also looking for someone that can make a few repairs to our display boards (which are incredibly dodgy at the moment), improve them, and offer advice….. If there is a Mum or Dad that might be a bit ‘handy’ in this department, we would love to hear from you…
Fundraising
The pre-school committee are busy creating a plan of events for the near future, and I am sure would be really glad of some help and support. With regular fundraising activity (some small, some large), we are able to buy fantastic resources for the pre-school to support the children’s learning and development.
And last but by no means least….
Congratulations to Lisa and Alex (Robert’s mum and dad) on the recent birth of a beautiful little girl, Sophia Anne, a sister for Robert – lovely news!
And as always, thank you very much for your ongoing support,
Sandra and the team