Terry Aizen – Director Kornmehl

School readiness

Early Childhood Services are well placed to contribute to the foundations for children’s long and short-term success at school. The first five years of a child’s life are critical to a child’s lifelong development. By supporting all areas of children’s development and focusing on building strong, responsive relationships with young children, we provide children with the skills and confidence to continue along a path of life-long learning.

Early experiences influence brain development, establishing the neural connections that provide the foundation for language, reasoning, problem solving, social skills, behaviour and emotional health. Therefore, it is of utmost importance that we prepare and develop our children’s potential and ability to learn to the utmost in these early years.

Young children’s social and emotional development is the foundation for their cognitive development. Supporting children’s school readiness is about assisting them to develop their skills in areas such as literacy, numeracy and self-care when they are ready for this, and at their own pace. Children’s social competence is at the core of their readiness for school and effective school transitions. Social skills such as sharing, turn taking and playing well with other children are essential in assisting children’s short and long-term success at school. Responsive, positive relationships between children and their educators are also crucial in building children’s self-esteem and resilience which further assist them to make effective transitions from early childhood settings to school environments.

Emotional maturity implies that a child has reasonable control over their emotions. Emotional maturity influences important aspects such as self-confidence and self-esteem. It develops over time. The link between social and emotional skills and school success is a strong factor that needs to be considered when deciding if a child is school ready or not.

Families may believe that children require some reading and writing skills to be ready for school, however these skills are not essential or a pre-requisite for school readiness. Having good social skills and being a confident learner sets the foundations for a lifetime of learning.

School readiness does not need to be a separate part of the program. Early Childhood Centres can prepare children for school by promoting all areas of their growth and development. A program that closely observes and responds to children’s needs and interests will provide opportunities for encouraging the skills and attributes needed for starting school.

We focus on using children’s current skills and interests as the basis for promoting their development rather than requiring them to complete structured academic tasks.

Below are some of the skills we promote at Kornmehl to support children’s school readiness.
Social skills to:

• positively approach other children and make friends;

participate in play;

• express emotions and deal with conflict appropriately;
• show interest in others and form friendships;
• express their needs and wants appropriately;
• separate from parents or primary carers;
• take turns in games and activities and share toys and equipment;
• follow directions and understand rules;
• participate in groups; and cope with transitions between routines and experiences.

Emotional skills to:

• be able to complete tasks on his or her own
• confidently express how they are feeling or to be able to ask for helpseparate easily from their care-givers
• be able to resolve conflict or small problems on a daily basis
• be able to make their own decisions and choices
• show or verbalise what they like and dislike
• be able to show empathy
• be able to persist at tasks and complete them competently

Cognitive skills to:

• show natural curiosity and interest in learning new things;
• have confidence in learning; and be interested in solving problems.

Language skills to:

• use language to ask questions and communicate their thoughts and ideas; listen to others
• enjoy books and being read to
• be comfortable talking to other adults

Independence and life skills to:

• cope with a small amount of supervision in a variety of situations;
• toilet and dress themselves independently;
• unpack their lunch box and use a drink bottle; and deal with a structured environment.

Physical skills to:

• use pencils, crayons, textas and scissors; and
• balance, run, jump, and use equipment such as balls and climbing apparatus.
• To be able to sit still for group times and to listen

These are some of the main skills we develop over the children’s time at Pre-schooland which support each individual child to develop the skills required to be school ready.

http://ncac.acecqa.gov.au/educator-resources/factsheets/qias_factsheet_13_school_transition.pdfhttp://www.geeyourebrave.com/2013/03/off-to-school-we-go-social-and-emotional-readiness-for-school-what-is-that-exactly.html

www.claremontpractice.co.za/newsletter-0912.html

Jam on Toast

Last week Thursday, we were entertained by the talented Jamie Madsen from Jam on Toast. James is a music educator, composer and performer.  His aim is to provide fun and educational music for children at home, as well as for teachers in the classroom. Although his main interest is in the field of creative music education, he also composes and performs popular music, choral music and instrumental music. The children loved participating in Jamie’s interactive performance of catchy tunes and delightful actions and movements. Some of the favourites were New Shoes; Fabuloso; Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle little sausage and Jamie Bom-bamie.

Pasta Making

With the help of a wonderful mum, Janice Eliovson, who is a chef, the Dolphin children engaged in making their own pasta from scratch. First, they made the dough, then rolled it out. Each child had a turn to put their dough through the pasta machine and hung their long pasta up on a rack. The pasta was then cooked and eaten up with great gusto! Magnifico!

National Recycling week

The Pre-school has been a buzz of activity this week with parents engaging with their children to make a Chanukiah using recycled materials. It has been wonderful watching the excitement on the children’s faces and delight in sharing this experience with their parents.

So far, we are blown away at the creativity and the use of materials to create something meaningful. The Chanukiot are currently on display in the pre-school rooms.

Volunteers Thank You tea

On Tuesday, we held an afternoon tea to thank all our wonderful and amazing parent and grandparent helpers this year. Each one of you has contributed in so many special ways to ensuring the success of our programs and making sure everything runs smoothly.

One mum said to me in the afternoon that she is so happy that Kornmehl creates many opportunities for parent engagement at many different levels and what a special and valued community it was. She feels privileged to be a part of such a caring, warm and inclusive environment, that makes parents feel valued, involved and appreciated in their child’s pre-school journey.

From our side as the Educators, we too feel so lucky that we have the support from parents and we love the happy, warm feeling our Kornmehl family creates.

Happy Birthday

We wish a very happy birthday to Nadav Mermelshtayn (5) and to Terry Aizen, who celebrates her birthday today.

Mazal tov

Please join me in wishing Julie Bowman our wonderful educator and her husband Richard, a hearty Mazeltov on the occasion of their son Rowland and Brooke’s wedding this weekend.