West Melton Nursery & Kindergarten

We've had a lovely time preparing for Christmas. Some of our tamariki were lucky enough to visit The Gingerbread Christmas House on Monday, what a wonderful magical time they had.

The Nursery tamariki engaged in creative learning experiences that fostered self-expression, refined their fine motor skills, and produced vibrant artworks. Many of these artworks are showcased throughout the Nursery, adding to the festive spirit of Christmas. Participation in these activities enabled learners to explore and learn collaboratively with their peers.

The Nursery tamariki enjoyed cup week as much as the rest of Canterbury. We were able to create our own lovely hats, adorned with feathers, during an art experience, we participated in horse riding, horse races and used the plastic horses in the sensory tray. These learning experiences provided opportunities for extension of Early Literacy and Numeracy skills.

Our Kindy friends joined the Learning Centre yesterday and went on an adventure to the local school to watch the Pet Day Pet Parade. We saw some really cool animals and familiar faces from the school community. We felt very lucky to be invited to this special event.

In the Nursery we have celebrated Diwali, the festival of light. This festival takes place between October and November, symbolising the spiritual victory of light over darkness. The tamariki were enthusiastic about creating Rangoli sun catchers and colourful Diya lamps to decorate the Nursery. Participation in these experiences provided the tamariki the opportunity to learn more about the stories and symbols of another culture, while developing their communication and early numeracy skills as well as their social competencies.

It has been a very busy month in the Kindy! Our current focus has been on weather and the changes that Spring brings to our environment. We have created many masterpieces, danced in the rain and created our very own rain clouds. We have also had mini focuses on Halloween and Diwali.

Happy Halloween from the Learning Centre 👻

The Nursery tamariki have taken an interest in caring for the dolls. A 'picnic' in the sunshine provided an enjoyable opportunity for all to engage. The dolls were very well taken care of with lots of ‘healthy treats’ being shared. This imaginative play opportunity showcased the tamariki’s developing social skills. The kaiako are using this new interest to foster Tuakana-teina relationships and encourage responsible behavior.

The tamariki in the Nursery combined Te Wiki o te Reo Māori week with Spring. We had lots of fun participating in the experiences where we had many opportunities to learn and use Te Reo words and phrases while creating our new Spring display.

The Nursery tamariki embarked on a journey of sensory exploration while they prepared for Father’s Day. We explored and discussed the textures, colours and smells of the lemons, rosemary and pinecones we used to make fire starters for the Nursery Dads.
Happy Father’s Day.

The child learns through active exploration of the environment.
Ko te whakatipuranga tēnei o te mana rangahau, me ngā mātauranga katoa e pā ana ki te aotūroa me te taiao

Wow, what an awesome few weeks the Learning Centre Tamariki have had! We have been exploring and replicating some of the different sporting events happening in Paris for the Olympics, created our own medals and gave the different events a good go. We have also been celebrating the successes of our awesome Olympians!
We have begun our new focus around Weather and created a rainbow and a variety of weather clouds that are displayed on our walls. We have also created a sun with paper mache, and drawn our own versions of the different weather that we have seen over the past few weeks. Unfortunately our igloo, which had been created, started to 'melt' in the warmer weather and we dis-assembled it for safety reasons!
The best event that has happened for us - centre wide - was our Grandparents Day! What an awesome turn out! I believe there were more adults than tamariki, but that didn't stop the tamariki shining, they took great pride in showing their Grandparents, and some Great-Grandparents what we do here, some of those visiting in the Learning Centre joined in with our yoga poses that we do at morning mat time! It was awesome to see, so a huge Thank You to our wonderful Grandparents for joining us, and an even bigger thank you to our awesome tamariki for being so welcoming! Ka pai tō mahi!