Student Hats

Dear Parents,
We currently employ a "no hat, no play" policy in the first and last term of the year to help protect children's skin and to assist them in learning about the dangers of too much exposure to the sun. The children are wonderfully responsive to this policy and try to be very vigilant about caring for their hat. However we do have ongoing issues with hats. Whilst staff are constantly reminding children about where to store them and assisting them to place hats in the correct locker our first priority must be the educational program, not hat storage. We do not check all hats before the end of the day and do rely on help from both students and parents to help us with misplaced hats. Although hats are currently regularly going missing, rarely do they actually disappear. More often than not the children put them in the wrong bag and the hat goes home with the wrong family for a few days before they realise and bring it back. With all maroon hats and mostly maroon bags it is a very easy mistake to make. Because of flexible attendance patterns, hats that have accidentally gone to the wrong home can take a week to be discovered.
We thank everyone for their understanding to date but recognise this problem is becoming very frustrating for parents. To help with this problem we would remind parents that school hats are expected to stay at school on the hook inside the child's locker overnight. This makes it easier to identify hats that really are missing and means that it is unlikely for wrong hats to go to someone else's house. We will continue to encourage your children to use the hooks and will have an in class focus in both rooms on improving this routine.
In the mean time, because of our "no hat no play" policy we have spare kindergarten hats that are regularly washed through our laundry service for children who have a missing hat to use.
Thank you for your understanding
Regards
Mel Bishop

Puppy Positivity

Dear Pirie Room Parents,
as we are sure you'll already be aware, we have been experiencing lots of dog role play on the playground this week. Students have enjoyed running around on all fours, looking for bones and creating puppy house. We have had visits from vets, police men rescue dogs stuck in the creek and many objects buried and dug up again.
Some parents have commented about the strange four legged behaviour they have observed at home, wondering if it something that should be encouraged.... and the short answer is YES!!
As teachers we have loved observing the children getting deeply involved in their dramatic play. It has encouraged children to communicate clearly to one another, negotiate, share and wait. It has encouraged children to work together, make group decisions and plan play scenarios. Students have recognised the emotions of others, experienced a sense of belonging and explored different perspectives.
Not a bad days work for a three or four year old! So to canine chaos we say yes!!

End of Term Arrangments

Dear Parents,
we have only three weeks left of term and so it is timely for a reminder about end of term arrangements. Kindergarten will finish for all students on Thursday the 9th of April at 12.30 pm(please note, the rest of the school finishes at 1.00pm) If you require care for your child for this half day and are already enrolled in After School Care please e-mail your booking directly to Cheryl on cbuck@pac.edu.au. If you already have a booking in place for that day we would appreciate it if you could e-mail Cheryl to confirm that you will be using your space. If you require care and are not already enrolled in After School Care please see Julie Porter in the front office to collect an enrollment form as soon as possible as spaces fill fast for this type of day.
Thank you
Mel Bishop

Chocolate lovley Chocolate!

Dear Parents,
Around Easter time we often have many requests from parents for children to share Easter eggs with their friends. We feel this is a lovely idea but do have a few guidelines to help keep everyone safe.
Children create Easter baskets or bags and leave them in their classroom. If others would like to leave an egg or treat they may put on the Easter Bunny ears and make some deposits. Children are reminded that no Easter eggs may be eaten until Easter time and so on their last day of Kindergarten in week eleven they take their whole basket or bag home. We would then recommend that parents of children with allergies assess whether the eggs may be eaten... yum!
If you would like further clarification please see your child's teacher.
Thank you
Mel Bishop

Our Next Unit

Dear Parents,
as the term draws to a close staff have begun to prepare for our next unit. Next term we will be investigating a unit titled "My Family Tree - Out on a Limb". We will be exploring the ideas of families, family roles and how children fit into their particular family. Unfortunately this can be very tricky for staff as young children do often have a limited understanding of how their family is inter connected to each other. It can also be difficult for staff to recognise unfamiliar names. So to assist us we have formulated a homework sheet for parents. It is a basic family tree that staff will use to help the project. It will be in pigeon holes this week but does not need to be returned until the last day of term. We would love it if you could bring it with you to the Parent Teacher interviews.
Thankyou
Good Luck
Mel Bishop

Week Eight in the Pirie Room

We had a very busy week in week eight with lots of trips, noise and excitement! We watched as the Clipsal track was prepared beside our classroom and listened to the cars screech around infamous turn eight on the corner of our playground. To escape some of the noise we visited the river Torrens on Wednesday and marvelled at the floating "paper" boats.
"Paper can float, that's why" said Harrison
Not everybody agreed so that will be a focus of investigation next week
We also headed to Henley to visit the Marine Discovery Centre. We were assisted by the wonderful year six students of Star of the Sea School and got to see lots of different marine life.

Closely observing a Port Jackson Shark We also continued to enjoy exploring water and after our visit to the River Torrens looked at how we can move and manipulate water

We also enjoyed dancing our water cycle. Above you can see us as we are evaporating. You should have seen us crash as waves!!We also particularly enjoyed the carpentry table this week. We made lots of planes and guitars!

Week Eight in the Flinders Room

Dear Parents and Friends,
We can’t believe that week eight has passed already! We have all been having such a wonderful time in the Flinders Room. We are working well together and some lovely friendships have been made. All the boys have been producing detailed and imaginative drawings, paintings and buildings. Don’t forget to come and view some of our amazing work that is now in our portfolios. They are looking great. The performances that we have seen at school recently have stimulated some great dramatic play. We have loved working with the Australian animal puppets to replay the story of Tiddalick and have even made some of our own!

Braheem helped get things going in Friday’s performance!!

We survived Clipsal this week and kept our cool in the traffic troubles. We visited the Marine Discovery Centre on Wednesday, and on Thursday, ventured to the River Torrens.
Thank you to the parents who to accompanied us on these excursions.

What a fun but very busy week!
From the Flinders Room

Pirie Library on Friday

Dear Parents of Pirie Room Students,
we are asking for your help to get us to Library on time. Please assist us by placing your child's library bag in the library basket just inside our front door before you leave on Friday mornings. It is a very time consuming task to check 25 individual bags and is stopping us from getting to Library on time.
Thank you for your understanding and assistance
The Pirie Room Staff

Last Call for Square Bottles

Dear Parents of Pirie Room Students,
as the term draws to a close we are getting close to making our wave machines as a final investigation about water. If you have not already sent a square bottle to school with your child please send a named one to school if you are able.
Thankyou
Mel Bishop

shiny shiny

Easter time is drawing near. What a wonderful time of year for children with sweet treats wrapped in shiny paper. We love using shiny Easter papers in our art. If you are one of those people who like to flatten out the paper after you have unwrapped an egg then you are our new best friend! We would greatfully receive any non scrunched egg papers for our art trolley. If you have some please pass them to your child's classroom teacher.

Week 8 Excursions

Dear Parents,
We have a busy week ahead of us with a host of excursions for both rooms to keep us away from the noisy Clipsal track.
The Flinders Room boys will be going to the Marine Discovery Centre at Henley on Wednesday and then going to observe the River Torrens and it's weir on the Thursday.
The Pirie Room boys will be going to observe the River Torrens and it's weir on Wednesday and then going to the Marine Discovery Centre at Henley on the Thursday.
We are so grateful for the overwhelming response we have had to our request for parent helpers. Unfortunately we have had such a good response to the Marine Discovery Centre we have had to turn some parents away and are making an effort to contact all parents concerned. We thank you for your understanding and look forward to including as many parents on our next trip as possible.
Thank you
The Kindergarten Team

Pirie Room Get Togethers

Dear Parents of Pirie Room Children,
The Pirie Room P&F representatives have scheduled the following functions
Monday 6th April - Coffee Morning at Nano Ready 2 Go (23 Ebenezer Place) at approximately 9.00am after drop off. Little ones are welcome (lots of room to run!)
Friday 24th April - Lets Bowl!! A great way to get to know each other in a fun environment. Bowling at AMF Woodville Bowl at 7.30pm. Cost is $31.50 and includes bowling, finger food, a beverage and lots of fun! Adults only, please RSVP by 20th March (please place your rsvp in the orange Pirie Room box in the Kindy Foyer)

Parent Teacher Interviews

Dear Parents,
We would like to give you advance notice that we will be holding parent teacher interviews in week 11 on Monday the 6th of April and Tuesday the 7th of April. Please look for a schedule sheet by the sign in sheet next week to choose a time slot appropriate to you.
Thankyou
Mel Bishop

Evenings with Steve Biddulph

Steve Biddulph is one of Australia's best known family psychologists and highly recommended reading by the staff of our centre. His seminars are not to be missed and we are lucky to have him presenting in Adelaide in June. He is presenting three seminars at the Salvation Army building at 277 Pirie Street. Each seminar costs 32$, tickets must be pre purchased and are available on line at www.salvationarmy.org.au/adelaide.

Evening One: Raising Boys - Wednesday 17th June, 7.30pm

Evening Two: The Secret of Happy Children - Thursday 18th June, 7.30pm

Evening Three: The Road to Manhood - Friday 19th June, 7.30pm

We highly recommend Steve and encourage you to avail yourself of this not to be missed opportunity.

Nuts and Illnesses

Dear Parents,
We would like to remind all our families that we are a nut free centre. We don't allow tree nuts (except coconut) and are particularly conscious of peanuts. Please do not to send loose nuts, peanut butter or nutella. We ask you to observe this rule to help us protect children in our centre with life threatening allergies to nuts.
We would also like to remind families to please let us know when children are away with communicable illnesses (eg: diarrhoea, measles, conjunctivitis, flu and colds, rotavirus, chicken pox, cold sores etc...) This helps us protect children in centre who have compromised immune systems and our newly pregnant mums.
Thank you for your understanding
Mel Bishop

Traffic Arrangments

Dear Parents,
We are currently in Week Seven of term. As you may already know, during Week Eight we have some road closures around our centre due to a large sporting event. Please check the local paper for road closures and times closer to the event. From past experience we would suggest that you give yourself more time to get to school from the 17th of March but particularly from the 19th of March to the end of that week. We understand that it is a difficult task to get students to school on these days and would ask that if your child will not be coming to school on these days due to the disruptions please let us know via e-mail on mbishop@pac.edu.au
Thankyou
Kindergarten staff

In the Flinders Room

We have been having fun with our buddies from Mr Pearce's class

Guess Whooooooooo?

Building great structures

Experimenting with polymers

and investigating the properties of ice

Phew, what a busy week!

Outstanding Portfolio Folders

Dear parents of students who attended Little Princes in 2008,
We would like to quickly remind any families that have not yet returned their child's portfolio from last year to do so as soon as possible so that we can begin to transfer your child's work into them.
Thank you
Mel Bishop

Dave the Plumber

Students of the Pirie Room would like to thank our resident PAC plumber, Dave for coming to visit us last week, with everything, including the kitchen sink. Dave showed us how taps work, how to unblock drains, which pipes are for clean water and which pipes are for dirty water and he also showed us a P trap for keeping smells down where they belong! It was very informative and he even left us a video of the inside of the drain down at our own Fiddian Wing, very interesting.

Thanks again Dave

Greedy Greedy Greedy

Tidalik the Frog sat down at the billabong to take a drink. He drank and he drank and he drank until there was no water left anywhere in the whole world. Last Tuesday we enjoyed seeing the world of Tidalik come to life as two actors performed this traditional story for us. We saw what happens when one person thinks all the water belongs to him and we watched as the animals tried to trick Tidalik into opening his greedy lips. At the end of the show the performers poured the water (a beautiful blue curtain) out of Tidaliks mouth all over the audience.

The students of Little Princes sat absolutely enthralled for the duration of the performance and there was so much talk about rivers and who they belonged to we have been encouraged to take a trip to the River Torrens to observe what has happened to Torrens Lake... I hope we don't meet Tidalik on the way!

Goanna tries to trick Tidalick into spilling some drops of precious water

Wonderful Wetlands

wow, who knew that a brown pond could be such an important environment that supported so much life. Our trip to the Urrbrae Wetlands was a real eye opener. We discovered all sorts of mini beasts living at the bottom of the pond, they were so small we had to look at them through microscopes which was very tricky! We also went fishing with Phil our guide and for those of you that are fisherman, I'm sure you'll be impressed with the Pirie Room catch, 15 fish in 15 minutes!.... and they were thiiiiiiiiiiiiiis big!! We learned about the importance of reeds and bull rushes and how they clean the water like toothbrushes clean teeth! Thank you to all the parents who joined us, without you it wouldn't have been possible.Scraping the bottoma scientist at work our fish!!