Kornmehl

Terry Aizen – Director of Kornmel

Mother’s Day Breakfast

On Monday morning, despite the current COVID restrictions, we were extremely grateful that we were still able to go ahead with our Family Day Breakfast. We had five SUPER DADS arrive at 7.00 am to help set and prepare the food for the breakfast.

My sincere thanks to Balint Hamalgyi, Alan Arnott, Rick Lawton, Tristan Freedman and Craig Haifer for their help on Monday. It is very much appreciated.

All our special visitors were delighted to spend this quality time together with their children. We enjoyed a delicious, scrumptious breakfast and parents and children were able to participate in a variety of activities set up on the tables, together with their child.

Luckily, we have a large Pre-school space and so everyone was able to spread out and find a happy place to be.

Comments from parents:

Nicola Berkovic: Thank you so much for such a beautiful morning!

Amy Friedlander: Beautiful morning thank you!

Claire Haifer: Thank you for the wonderful morning!

Daniella Alhadeff: Thank you so much to all the educators for a very special morning tea! So much effort was put into making sure that everyone had a beautiful time, not to mention the great food. Adam was so proud to show me around and spend the time doing Lego and blocks together.

Shavuot

We have been learning about this festival and in particular we have been focusing on the story of Ruth, which is about kindness and loyalty, something we are constantly reflecting on and talking about with the children. We used puppets and props to bring the story alive. Two of our teaching intentions are for the children to feel a connection to Israel and their Jewish heritage and to gain an understanding of Shavuot. As educators, we strive to create a culturally competent Pre-School and community, where we respect diversity and feel connected.

How fortunate we are to have the opportunity to experience and celebrate all these very important Jewish festivals. Through the colour, song, tastes and smells of each occasion, positive memories are created for the children, memories that will hopefully instil a love and appreciation in their hearts for their Jewish heritage. We have been counting the Omer, and we are excited to finally get to day number 49!

We celebrated Shavuot on Friday with a Bikkurim parade and yummy milk lunch, consisting of macaroni and cheese and ice cream. The children came to school dressed in red, orange, yellow or green. We made colourful crowns to wear on the day. We collected a generous supply of dried and tinned food to donate to Oz Harvest.

Many thanks to our parent helpers Kyra Phillips and Jade Marishel. Your support is very much appreciated.

A note about play

“It is a happy talent to know how to play.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Play is self-chosen. Children were born to play. They love to play. They will play all day if they’re allowed. If you have to coax them into doing something, then it’s not play. Play never feels like work or an obligation. Play is enjoyable, fun and has no agenda. Play is not the purpose of meeting adult goals. Play is inherently valuable. All play is learning. No matter what it is. Whether you can clearly see the skills being mastered or not. There is no hierarchy of play. Play is unstructured. In play, children make the rules. They decide how long they play for and what direction their play takes. Children should feel free to play and use what is available however they like, with no expectations. There’s a lot of work involved in play — problem solving, skill building, overcoming physical and mental challenges — going on behind the scenes.

There are many different types of play: solitary play, risky play, sensory play, parallel play, dramatic play, rough and tumble play, constructive play, active play, and co-operative play. Play builds the imagination, promotes social skills, advances physical development and helps children work through emotions.

There are seven basic characteristics of play:

voluntary – something children choose to do, but other children can be invited to join in,
pleasurable – a deep sense of enjoyment, which will vary from child to child,
symbolic – usually includes some type of make believe or pretend and objects assume new meanings and purpose for the player/s,
meaningful – to the player/s, but the meaning may not always be clear to an observer,
active – it requires active mental, verbal or physical engagement with people, objects or ideas,
process oriented – it’s enjoyed for the activity itself, not concerned with an end product,
intrinsically motivated – it is its own reward.

In our Kornmehl Philosophy we have the following statement about play:

We believe that children learn best through play. We see play as being the “heartbeat” of our Pre-school program. Play provides opportunities for children to learn as they experiment, explore, discover, create, improvise and imagine. When children play with other children, they create social groups, test out ideas, challenge each other’s thinking, explore language and build new understandings. Play provides a supportive environment where children can ask questions, solve problems and engage in critical thinking. In these ways play can promote positive dispositions towards learning.

We embrace and acknowledge that children come to the Kornmehl Centre with a richness of experiences. We believe that childhood is a time to be, to seek and make meaning of the world.

Care Packs

All Care Packs are due in by Friday 21 May 2021. We have already delivered our first lot of Care Packs received too Gunawirra. They were delighted with the response thus far. There is still time for families to put their Care Packs together and send them into school. We appreciate your support very much.