Finding Humour!

We began the week with the temperatures soaring into the 30's  and water play was eagerly particpated in.

On Tuesday afternoon the sandpit had a body of water ready in the blue container but  the children took awahile to realise its existence!  But when they saw  the water the buckets were in overdrive, tipping the water into the sand!

Once the pools were made Tyla and Elliot stepped carefully in the cool water and managed their impulsivity by  sitting on the edge dappling their feet in.

And others kept pouring, getting excitied to see the water trickle into another pool of water!

James had his own idea and very politely asked Heather if he could 'sit in it'  who thought that  he was  asking to 'dig in it' and said, "yes James of course you can!"

James gleefully sat  down and Heather then realised what he had asked!

We love finding humour with children, even laughing at ourselves!

                                 He pai ēnei kōrero hei whakakata i te tangata 

                                 (These stories are good to make people laugh)

Welcome back to 2015 at Kindergarten!

The weather has been great over the holidays and hope that everyone enjoyed the break as we venture into a new year of many fun activities at the Kindergarten.

The first day back has been absolutely lovely as we greeted new families and reconnected with our  existing whānau.  

The children settled with their friends and found new things to explore like the bones but also returned to what they like doing last year like the bungey jump!

George explained during the morning of what they were doing,

"We persevere playing our police game!"

But significantly for the day, we  could see the children really enjoying seeing each other again as we so enjoyed being back with them!

Thank you to all our families for sharing your children with us as our adventure for Geraldine Kindergarten begins for 2015!

Ka tata mai, ka piri e, ka tino to here o te whānau.

Come together, join as one, so that the tie may be strong of this family.

Happy Holidays to all!

The 21st of December was our last day at Kindergarten for 2014. We spent the day cleaning and tidying, making everything fresh for the new year. The children enjoy real jobs and are always keen to help, especially if there is water involved. He pai to awhina, its good that you help. The sandpit was a very industrious area and some of the children were very orderly in lining up and sorting the toys. What great manaakitanga/ care and respect the children displayed for their Kindergaten resources.

 Then later in the morning we took a break and celebrated our last day with pop corn and a movie! Some children were content to have a quick snack and break, before returning to play or helping with last day jobs. Others were quite content to get their lunch boxes and enjoy a very relaxing break!

We wish you all a wonderful summer break and happy holidays. Thank you to all our wonderful whānau and people who have supported us over the year. See you all on Monday 26th 2015.

Shared Kai

Today we enjoyed shared kai with our wonderful kindergarten whānau. Both morining and afternoon families came together during session times to meet and celebrate our core principles of whanaungatanga/relationships and wānanga/ productive partnerships.

It was so lovely to see siblings join us, especially those who used to attend Kindergarten. The whole day was very relaxed and reflected how comfortable our families are in our Kindergarten environment.

He aha te mea nui o te ao? 
He tangata! He tangata! He tangata!

What is the most important thing in the world? 
It is people! It is people! It is people!

The cake is finished!

Today Heather (our secret cake decorator) brought in her cake decorating tools. The children were very eager to ice the Christmas cake that they had helped Gael bake last week. Heather explained about the special icing they were using and the tamariki helped to roll it out and carefully lay it over the cake. Normally a special smoothing tool is used to smooth wrinkles out but Heather accidentally left it at home. So problem solving had to be used and it turned out that smoothing the icing with hands works just as well. We are problem solvers, ngā tamariki kaipororaru whakatika.

The tamariki used their skills learned from the play dough table and other real baking experiences to press out the letters and shapes. The children chose what colours they wanted for the lettering and decorations. They rolled the icing into long shapes to twist and make Christmas trees and candy canes. 

 We have high expectations for our children's learning and know they can accomplish projects from the start  through to completion. These activities promote manaakitanga/ care and respect amonsgt the tamariki as they learn to make decisions together and build empathy for their peers by waiting for turns.

We will share this wonderful cake at our shared kai on Thursday. 

We started the Christmas cake today!!

We are very lucky to have Gael in this week and today, she has started her famous Christmas cake. This recipe requires mixing the day before baking. So the tamariki helped Gael with the ingredients. 

Kia ora mo tou awhina, thank you for helping.

Working interdependently, the children took turns to add what was needed into the bowl. Using the cake mixer was exciting and great way to explore food technology too. Now we are looking forward to baking the cake tomorrow. Tino pai rawa atu, excellent!

Waihi Logde visit

There was great excitment as the children came into kindergrten this morning, they were off to Waihi Lodge to sing Christmas songs to the residents. But there was a bit of a problem because it was raining and they would get wet. Ashleigh had plan. She had rung up and ordered a bus. When it arrived, we got on it with some of our whanau who had come along to help. 

The residents were waiting for us and we bagan by sharing some of our favourite chirstmas songs that we have been practicing most days at kindergarten. We felt a real sense of pride when the elderly clapped as we finished each song, ka rawe/how neat! 

Geraldine Kindergarten is a special part of the local community and we feel privileged to be able to bring joy to the elderly at this special time of year.