Little Bee Newsletter

December 2022

"We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!"

We can’t believe it is December already and we are nearing the end of another year.  We would like to take this opportunity, on behalf of all the educators, to thank you for such a fantastic year! We are truly lucky to have such supportive families that embrace all the fun and learning that happens at Little Bee.

 

Children… if you will be leaving us soon – we wish you all the best for your next adventure!  If you are here again next year – we can’t wait for the learning journey we will all continue on!!!  If families are planning holidays over the Christmas period—we much appreciate you letting us know, as this can help us to manage our ordering of supplies, staffing and allow extras to have holidays. We wish everyone safe travels and a relaxing sunny time with their friends and families!!

We will be CLOSED on Monday 26th December, Tuesday 27th December, Monday 2nd January. All other days we will be open our normal operating hours. Thank you. 

Little Bee Howrah would like to say to say a huge thank-you to families who attended our end of year celebration! Everyone had a wonderful time, it was so nice catching up with so many families and having time for a longer mingle and chat!

Little Bee Airport's end of year celebration BBQ is coming up on Monday 19th December.

We warmly invite all families to join us for a sausage sizzle at Lewis Park, Seven Mile Beach from 5.30 p.m. - 7.30 p.m. Last year we were washed out in the rain, but hopefully the weather will be kind to us this year.

 

We hope there will be a surprise visit from the man in red!!!!

 Invitations are in your Family Communication trays, please RSVP by 14th December for catering purposes.

We can not wait to see you there!

At Little Bee Airport ....

Children transitioning in January and February 2023. 

Many of the children will be transitioning during January or February with their friends to the next room.  For children transitioning in January, transition packs will be coming out to you in December (children transitioning in February will receive their packs at the beginning of January) with information on the room and some parts for you to fill in and return to us.  Please fill in the relevant details and return to our educators.  This information supports us to support your child with a positive transition.

 

Each child has an allocated, regular day, possibly two from the second week of December where they visit the next room with a small group.

During each visit, the same small group of children are accompanied by an educator from their current room, who are also transitioning to the new room in January. 

Visits will run between 9.30-11 each morning.

The exact same thing will occur during January for our February movers. 

At this time, educators will plan a variety of fun and creative small group activities so the children can remember the time as a really positive experience.  

COVID - 19 Update!

We ask families to continue to remain diligent with your COVID -19 testing, and stay home when unwell. We are extremely grateful to families for your continued support in keeping everybody safe and healthy as we head towards Christmas!

Parent/Educator Conversations!

Bookings are now closed.

We would like to give a massive, massive thank-you to our families who have booked a parent/educator phone conversation! 

This gives us all a wonderful opportunity to share each child's hard work and give families a further insight into our 'inquiry-based projects'.

 

We are so grateful so many families will be able to share their child's journey and hear about all the wonders of their learning next week. All projects have now been sent before your allocated conversation time, so if you wish to, you can read over it before we chat. Please let us know if you have any problems accessing it.

 

For those of you who were unable to attend a phone interview, your child's learning journey will be in their profile book late December.  You are very welcome to have a look at any time, please just ask an educator, alternatively we can email it to you for you to share with your family!

Permanent educator teams for 2023

Howrah:

Sally, Katherine, Megan, Sofie

 

Airport: 

Baby Bees: Adriana, Emily, and Nadine

Honey Bees: Mel, Allie, Abbie, Theresa

Bumble Bees: Bec E, Anna, Taiya

Busy Bees: Maree, Lucy, Bec O, Nat and Toni Maree

Queen Bees: Bron, Pauline, Kate B

 

*Please note our casual educators are not listed here as we are still allocating their positions.

What’s been happening at Little Bee …

 

Little Bee Howrah

As the year draws to a close, we spent the start of November discussing how we can say thank you and offer our gratitude to those who made this year so special. We thought what better way than an 'end of year party', with our nearest and dearest, and those in the community who we met throughout our journey of exploring our community. We are so thankful to those who came and helped us celebrate what has been a fantastic year.

Marcus has been busy around the centre freshening up the paint, and giving our cubby house a very much needed lick of paint, ready to create a blank canvas for the children to decorate. We look forward to seeing the creative juices flow as the children create a new look for the cubby.  

 

And at Little Bee Airport ...

Baby Bees

The end of the year is approaching, and we have noticed how our children have become so confident and comfortable in their environments here at Little Bee. As they grow, they seek for more challenging experiences, where their new acquired skills can be tested and honed.

Throughout the month of November, our little explorers have had great time playing in the big playground. The features found in the big playground can pose a sense of novelty and great challenge at times. Our children loved going on the big slide (and climbing up the tyres to get there), exploring the big boat, and paying a visit to the other rooms. They are such active and involved learners, exercising their sense of agency, taking risks and ownership of their choices and stretching their social skills as they engage with the older children.  The Baby Bees have also been showing increased complex movement through dance and music actions.

We also offered them a myriad of recycled items aimed to build on their creativity and fine motor skills. They especially loved placing objects inside other vessels, such as: pegs inside of a plastic bottle, as well as unwrapping boxes covered in newspaper.

A feeling of Summer could be sensed in many warm and sunny days we had. Thus, the children have thoroughly enjoyed engaging in many water-play experiences which help build their confidence up around water.

A lot of our baby bees have shown interest in role play with the baby dolls. They have given the babies a bath, wrapped them in a blanket and put them to sleep with gentle pats.   

Honey Bees

As our programming comes to an end for the year, we reflect on our journey to find out how open-ended play enhances our creative expression and how environments can extend imaginative play.

The Bumble Bee children have been extremely creative throughout the year with a multitude of experiences ranging from pouring “tea” for their Tea Parties”, cooking experiences, construction, and arts and role play in a variety of different environments, just to name a few. These experiences have seen all our children grow and blossom in all areas of their development as well as strengthening their friendships.

During November we drew our friends though a perspex divider using both paint and then whiteboard makers and the difference in the children’s drawings were very noticeable. Of the mediums used, the children found that with the markers enabled them to obtain more detail.  We also explored child led experiences, following on from the children’s imaginations and interests. One of these led us to being very lucky to have 'Becky Raptor' come for a visit, as so many of our children love dinosaurs!

We look forward to starting our Christmas art and craft, ready to decorate our room.  

Bumble Bees

As our programming comes to an end for the year, we reflect on our journey to find out how open-ended play enhances our creative expression and how our environments can extend our imaginative play.

The Bumble Bee children have been extremely creative throughout the year with a multitude of experiences ranging from pouring ‘tea’ for ‘tea parties’, cooking experiences, construction, arts and role play, just to name a few. These experiences have seen the children grow and blossom in all areas of their development, as well as strengthening their friendships.

During November we drew our friends though a perspex divider, using both paint and then whiteboard makers and the difference in the children’s drawings were very noticeable. We saw that the markers were easier for us to obtain more detail.   We also explored child-led experiences, following on from the children’s imaginations and interests. One of these led us to being very lucky to have ‘Becky Raptor’ come for a visit as so many of the children love dinosaurs!

We look forward to starting our Christmas art and craft to decorate our room!! 

Busy Bees:

 As we finish up the projects for the year, we go out in style! The children have had a very busy month getting very 'hands on' and crafty. We had the opportunity to make tie-dye t-shirts this month and explore a different form of art. Using white t-shirts, the children used fine motor skills to twist the t-shirt into a tight spiral and then spray bottles to cover the t-shirt in dye. The children explored ways to twist the t-shirts, placing the rubber bands in different places to make a variety of patterns and observed how the process impacted the end result of the markings.  The children have also been making their “homes” and now it is time to decorate and celebrate their achievements. With the help of loose parts, the children have loved exploring and imagining what they could do. They have loved working with real life tools and have learnt how to use them the right way.

 

As we look back to the start of our projects, we think about our two research questions of: "How do we creatively express ourselves through loose parts exploration?" and “How do we enquire STEAM skills through open-ended play?”. The children had many ideas and have loved being fully involved in all aspects of the project. Educators have loved seeing the children achieving a final product that they worked so hard on. These projects have been through a process of planning, trial and error, problem solving, independent learning and collaboration. Accomplishments or achievements are the building blocks that enable children to construct a sense of success in themselves. Through achievement, one develops positive self-esteem, feeling of acceptance, competence and self-worth. This behaviour develops early in childhood and can have a tremendous impact on a child’s later achievements and learning behaviours. (myreadables.com/why-sense-of-achievement-matter-most).

 

Queen Bees:

 As our 2022 project's come to an end, we reflect on our learning and the positive impact we have had on our environment.

Our journey of sustainability saw us researching and investigating ways to care for and improve our environment. We focused on the concepts of reusing, recycling, reducing, and the impact that rubbish has on the earth and ocean, as well as plastic pollution.  With many hands on, play based learning experiences we have all gained a greater understanding of how humans must interact with the environment in a way that cares for our planet.  This is so humans and animals can continue to live with enough resources left for future generations.  Along the way it was great to witness the children embrace the concept of zero littering.  We learnt that litter ends up in our water ways, therefore harming animal life along with us. This month, the children created new items from old. We concluded with making our own environment more healthy and cheerful as we chose to plant vegetable seeds that Albie brought along for us and a new herb garden in the playground.

We introduced ‘Responsible person tags’ of ‘Chicken Checkers’, ‘Toy Retrievers’, ‘Plant Protectors’, and ‘Rubbish Rangers’.

This gives the children a great sense of responsibility, which in turn promotes a sense of belonging.  The children partnered up to form and build connections with other peers.  Working together, we continue our sustainability practices and having watchful eyes to spread awareness to others.

The children have also developed a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of humans, insects, and plant life on earth.  We have role played the life of insects, bees and through these scenarios the children are developing empathy for vulnerable creatures. They are becoming aware of how each individual person, no matter how young, can have a positive impact on their immediate environment. Along the way the children have gained valuable cognitive and critical thinking skills, such as: mathematical concepts and spatial awareness, as they problem solved on how to create water.

Staffing changes......

They say bad news comes in threes; we sadly have three Little Bee educators leaving us...

 

Selene, Linda and Alice are heading off to new adventures!

 They have been wonderful, long standing employees who will be sadly missed by families, children and educators!

 

Selene (Little Bee Airport) is finishing up after 13.5 years at Little Bee. We thank her for everything she has done for Little Bee (in and outside of the building) during all these years and wish her the most amazing adventures and all the luck in the world for the next chapter of her journey with her family. Thankyou, Selene!

Selene’s last day with us will be Thursday the 29th of December.

 

We say farewell to Linda (Little Bee Airport) who is retiring also after 13 years with us! Linda looks forward to her retirement, beginning January 2023. We thanks Linda for her many wonderful years of service and wish her an amazing adventure for the next chapter of her journey! Thankyou Linda!

Linda's final day will be Thursday the 22nd of December.

 

Alice (Little Bee Howrah) is heading to a new career in the police force. We thank Alice for everything she has done for Little Bee over the past 5 years with her many hats, within the Centre and out in the community during her role as Director and since returning from maternity leave. We wish Alice amazing adventures with her new journey and beyond!!! Thankyou, Alice!

Alice’s last day will be Friday the 2nd of December.  

Our Christmas Fundraiser!

This Christmas at Little Bee we continue to offer support for under-privileged children living in our Community.  We are donating to the Hobart City Mission Christmas Appeal. 

 

We continue to encourage our families to donate a special gift (book, craft items, toy, etc.), unwrapped please if you can!  It is sure to be so well received by those children less fortunate than us. 

 

We believe this will be a wonderful teaching opportunity for us to reinforce the concept of giving, with some children even using their own pocket money to buy presents!

 

All gifts must be under the tree by midday Friday 9th December, ready for us to deliver.

 

We hope to build a fantastic stack of gifts to support children in our community. Thanks in advance for your support and generosity.

Airport families, if you haven't already, please check your Family Communication Tray to find your child's enrolment information for next year! 

Howrah families yours will be in your tray early December.

If you are changing days, please sign and return the confirmation slip in your tray. 

Thank-you to all families who have already returned this information.

Information for Review

We are currently reviewing the following policies and/or procedures:

* Little Bee Human Resources Manual

 

If you would like to have input reviewing this document it would be greatly appreciated, just let us know and we will forward copies to you. Please compose any suggestions you would like to make and place them, either in the suggestions box (at reception) or via email to: littlebee@littlebee.net.au.

 

Information for families

These are the links from recognised authorities we are promoting this month:

  • dhhs.tas.gov.au/mwew/families

  • www.hobartcitymission.org.au/

Other readings can be found on the internet from recognised sites, such as: kidsafe.com.au, rch.org.au, acecqa.gov.au, deewr.gov.au and kidswithasthma.com.au, healthinsite.gov.au

 

Opportunities for Family Involvement

Committee meetings are held on a bi-monthly basis. They are to reflect on our current practices, work on our Centre’s Quality Improvement Plan and continue to maintain the highest standard of, education and care possible.

Our professional learning sessions are being held in small teams to deliver Trust based Relationship Intervention (TBRI) to educators and learning will continue throughout 2023 (dates to be confirmed). 

All families are invited to join our Family and Friends Committee, your ideas and opinions are greatly valued and appreciated.

Families are also welcomed to participate daily in Workplace health and safety checks and/or compliance reviews. Please see one of our staff members if you are interested.

We acknowledge and pay respect to the Elders past, present and future. The Traditional Custodians of Lutruwita (Tasmania) and pay homage to the traditional owners of the land our centres stand on, the Moomairemener people.

5 Llanherne Drive, Cambridge Tas 7170
03 62 48 5994

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