Niina Marni preschool children and families and welcome to the end of week 5 – already half way through the term?!
Reconciliation Week
The preschool children begin their morning circle time by singing a Niina Marni welcome song each day, often we will discuss why we sing this song and talk about how the Kaurna peoples were the first peoples on this land. We talk about our role in looking after the earth, its creatures and its spirit.
This week, Elle engaged the children in a circle time where they discussed the symbolism and importance of Aboriginal symbols and the role they play in oral storytelling. The children then used symbols to create a piece of artwork representing the Aboriginal drawings that they felt they connected with and were drawn to. Throughout this experience educators were careful to not label this artwork and ensured the children were representing what they saw and not using language that could be disrespectful.
As the preschool children are experimenting with their own creations during bookmaking and mark making experiences, exposing them to the different ways in which various cultures represent thinking and meaning making supports their understanding of storytelling, visual art elements and supports their development of cultural respect and understanding.
Farewell Hannah!
On Wednesday we farewelled our beloved Hannah as she leaves to prepare for the arrival of her new baby! Hannah has been a consistent smiling and supportive face for families, children and staff, we know you would all be just as sad as we are that she has left but we will be ready to welcome her back! We wish Hannah all of the love and happiness on her next journey and can’t wait to meet her new arrival in the coming weeks!
The children from all rooms got together to give both her and Ana (who is still with us for another month!) some gifts for their new arrivals. There were a few tears shared between staff!
Learning Intention 1
To develop safety plans as a community, ensuring children maintain their agency in assessing risks whilst remaining safe.
Why
- The sense of agency is defined as the sense of oneself as the agent of one’s own actions. This also allows oneself to feel distinct from others, and contributes to the subjective phenomenon of self-consciousness
- In the approved learning frameworks, agency is defined as being able to make choices and decisions to influence events and to have an impact on one’s world. Supporting children’s agency is about recognising that children have a right to make choices and decisions, and are capable of initiating their own learning.
- Children who have opportunities to effectively assess and manage risk at an early age will be better equipped to deal with risk as an adult. It also creates a learning environment where children can identify their limits, seek help when needed, and supports children to explore, experiment and cope with the unexpected
- Recently educators have noticed many children seeking additional physical challenges within our environment. We aim to ensure that children are taking ownership over their safety as well ensure that that all educators are using consistent strategies.
- There are many benefits to children participating in decision making, such as learning to consider the needs of others, developing problem-solving skills and it can increase their commitment to making decisions work
ILP’s: ALL
We understand the importance of risky play in the early years and are passionate about supporting children to engage in assessing risk. However, educators have noticed lately that children have been seeking more risk in their days and recognise our role in supporting them to develop these skills. This week Laura engaged the children in a circle time discussing high risk areas within the centre. The children were eager to contribute their answers about what might happen if we engage in play that may be a little ‘too’ risky.
After this, they discussed what other choices we could make if these are the types of risks we are seeking and how we could do this safely. Below are some examples of the children’s ideas and voice:
Whether it was a coincidence or an effective learning intention, educators noticed an increased level of children assessing safe risks this week and were thrilled to even see children continuing to point out things that may be unsafe and working towards changing it!
Educators also noticed increased engagement in areas that provided opportunity for risk and children engaging in ways that kept themselves and their peers safe.
The children even helped the educators to put the sand back in the sandpit after discussing the danger that could be present when there isn’t enough sand inside the pit!
Bookmaking/Mark making
Spotlight Term 2: Illustrators draw things on purpose
ILP’S: AG, IP, JD, AA, MG, RM,
This week, Elle and Laura wanted to work on making books together during circle time to role model the bookmaking elements we are focusing on under this term’s spotlight.
Together, they made a book called ‘The beach rainbow’! Whilst this experience was scaffolded by the teachers, the children came up with the ideas – going page by page to ensure the story was consistent and featured elements of characters and illustrations telling the narrative to the reader.
One of the children even came in the next day having made their own beach rainbow book at home the night before! They also brought in a picture of a beach rainbow for their teachers – absolute bucket filler!!
Specks of Gold…
