The Magic of Rain!
Feeling it fall on our faces, catching droplets on the end of our tongue, building shelter and rain dances! The change of seasons brings so many wonderful learning opportunities - measuring the depth of puddles with Hunter's stick/elephant trunk, making leaf boats to race down the flowing stream, and collecting the beautiful array of Autumn leaves as they fall to the Forest Floor! All in a morning's mahi for our gang.
Winton School Visit
We were lucky to have Kaiako Jo and Melissa, Sarah, and Maurice come to visit and share a morning with Winton Kindy. Our tamariki were great ambassadors sharing their favourite Playscapes wiht our visitors. We also shared in waiata singing one of our favourite tunes - 'Tutira kai nga iwi'. Alex was a proud kaiawhena (leader) today, standing in front of our large group and sharing the'Power Station' Project in the absence of Charlie McPherson. Some of our school visitors were also ex Kindy friends so it was an opportunity revisit, recall & reminisce. Then, as always we shared our Karakia & Kai before Winton School headed away.This visit was a great way for the children, and parents to meet and greet their prospective teachers for Winton School. Transition to School is a crucial program created between Kindy and schools in our community to support a truly successful transition.
Showing our awhi to Christchurch
On Wednesday afternoon we headed down to St Thomas Church to share Winton Kindy's aroha (love) and support for the people in Christchurch. This service was open to the community in sharing our comradeship. During this commemoration service we sang 'Amazing Grace, "Welcome Home" by Dave Dobyn and the New Zealand National Anthem (the full version - Here's a challenge in the comments share with us how many verses there are in our National Anthem? Here's a clue - there's more than one!) The chorus on our Anthem & Welcome Home were familiar to us as we've shared "Welcome Home" as a symbol of our respect to Christchurch. The full National Anthem version was however new to us; Ava shared "has the National Anthem changed?" No it hasn't Ava :) Are you aware of the Full Version of the National Anthem? See the link to hear.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6qmdqvItkM
Father Hamish also shared a poem from AA Milne 'Busy' - a wonderful analogy of slowing down & reflecting on our diverse selves, our family & friends, our country & our world. St Thomas students talked about the importance of caring for one another, being unified and standing as one. After the service we were invited into the New Entrance class @ St Thomas School and enjoyed spending time in their New Entrant Playscape. Thank you to all who attended and showed their support for Christchurch.
Aroha Nui
50 Rocks
On the art table at Kindy we have had 50 rocks representing the 50 people we lost at the horrific tragedy in Christchurch. This week to commemorate Christchurch and the people affected we painted the rocks showing our aroha and honoring the lives lost. Next week these rocks will be hidden by Taiao Tuhura in our majestic Ivy Russel Reserve.That's Not a Box!!
That's Not a Box!! Another great week for self expression and creativity as the tamariki were provided with boxes to enhance their "Hundred Languages' - representing their understandings in a Hundre ways. The boxes were excess from Winton New World (our 'Care Package to Fiji taonga). They became endless encounters ... ice cream shops, building blocks, towers, house's, forts, boats, planes, trains, sharks, hidey holes, tents, and sooo much more!!
Check out our ' Hundred Languages' poem above the fish tank
'End of Term Clean Up'
The roster is up: can you choose a clean up task and help us keep Kindy a healthy and safe environment for our tamariki to play/learn in. Clean up begins from next week :)
"Many hands make light work"
End of Term 1 Friday 12th April. Term 2 begins Monday 29th April
Your Winton Kindy Teaching Team
