What’s been happening at OSHC

Last week, we held the “OSHC Royal Show” for those children who attended on the student free/school closure days. The children started the show off by decorating Show bags and designing outfits for their Fashion Parade. We rolled out the golden runway and the children showed off their outfits. Even Buster the cat had a stroll down the catwalk. We had cupcake hats, newspaper dresses, Batman and even Captain Underpants made an appearance.

The children were then given some ‘Show money’ to spend on sideshow alley. It was a great opportunity for children to practice their math skills and also to learn that if you want more money, you have to ‘earn it’. They took turns managing the stalls and some enterprising young children, earnt their money by doing extra chores.

No Show is complete without a farmyard nursery, and Penny the rabbit was very happy to have the children spend time with her for pats and treats.

One of the highlights was the cake decorating competition. There were lots of wonderful entries, with our winner designing a rainbow and then decorating with flowers and sprinkles.

The Show ended with our animal judging, the children dressing up the toy animals and putting them through their paces. We even had a few doing flips and tricks.

Overall it was a great opportunity for the children to develop communication skills, experience ‘the Show’, work as a team and just have lots of fun!

Vacation Care News

Last week we received our craft order all ready for Vacation Care. The children were keen on helping me unpack it, so they could get a sneak peek at all the scratch art activities we have and the beautiful ceramic items they will be able to decorate.

You may remember from your childhood days colouring in with crayons, painting over in black paint and scratching out patterns with a stick, knife or razor blade. Fortunately we don’t use razor blades and knives anymore, but do have specially designed sticks for the children to use. We will be creating our own scratch art paper, but have also got dragons, bookmarks, cards, masks, flowers, door hangers, photo frames and more for the children to design and create.

We also have some beautiful ceramic items that the children will be able to decorate/design. They will be able to choose from mugs, money boxes, tea-light holders, bowls, plates, vases, pots and more to create a design of their choice and to take home to keep. We have specially designed pens to decorate with, which will allow the children to have more control of their designs than paint would.

Is your child feeling adventurous? Book them in to our excursion to Morialta Conservation Park to be among the first to explore possibly the world’s biggest Nature Playground! Only just opened the playground is designed to fit in with the natural environment, respect the traditional owners and push children to their limits in a safe and supportive setting. We will be spending the day at the Conservation Park, where children will have the opportunity to play on the playground, build cubbies, look for tadpoles and yabbies in the creek and explore the park. Even the educators are excited about this excursion.

Last newsletter I said I may have some news regarding the January 2018 holidays. Well I can let you in on a bit of a surprise. Our Educators are currently making plans for an OSHC sleepover. The location and details are still to be decided, but our last one (the Zoo Snooze in January 2016) was so successful that we are keen to have another one. I will let you know more details after the October holidays.

If you would like to book a day or two, or even the whole October holidays, please contact us on 0499 228 039 or email oshc.director286@schools.sa.edu or complete the booking form and return to OSHC or the Front Office.

Did You Know?

Did you know that OSHC is required to develop a curriculum (program) and document each child’s progress for every individual child that attends?

This is essentially what Quality Area 1: Educational program and practice means. You may remember from last newsletter that I mentioned Hackham East Primary School OSHC received Exceeding Expectations in this area. This means that not only are we doing what is required, but we go above and beyond. So what does this all mean and why should you care?

Just like schools, OSHC has a national curriculum called “My Time, Our Place”. For those of you familiar with childcare, you may have heard of the “Early Years Learning Framework”, which essentially is the same, but at a younger developmental level. We are required to program using the five outcomes of this as our core.

We are also required to document and report to parents on each individual child’s progress, just like schools do. The difference is our reports must be ongoing (not just at specific times) and we have more flexibility in what they look like.

So What Does All This Look Like and Mean at Hackham East OSHC?

To start with our program is child focussed, so in order to encourage children to be autonomous (able to do things themselves without help) we have them design our program. Every few weeks I give the children a blank program and they write/draw their ideas. We also have other ways of getting their input, through our Ideas Book, during Vacation Care I have a memo on the OSHC phone that the children will tell me all their ideas and I continually add until the end of the holidays (this is why they all like sitting up the back of the bus on excursions, so they can tell me what we should do next holidays) and we have the OSHC Daily Diary, the children can add their ideas/thoughts/feelings to.

All of these ideas are collated together and I sift through them, taking into account parent’s wishes, safety, practicality, costs, resources, critical reflections staff have made on previous activities, child observations, child interests, child needs and the My Time Our Place outcomes. This then becomes our program for Before/After School or Vacation Care.

As the program is rolled out, Educators critically reflect after each activity and make notes about what worked, what went wrong, how could we extend that activity and so on. We also record and document observations in the form of photos, samples of work, observations/learning stories etc. Every child has a folder which we collect all this information in. Most children know where theirs is, but if you are unsure, just ask an educator and they will be more than happy to show you. All of this is then used to create the next program.

You might be thinking, this sounds great but why should I care, I just want my child to have fun and make friends. And that is exactly why we do all this planning and recording. OSHC is about socialising and having fun. Our curriculum has five outcomes, based on this.

“Children have a strong sense of identity”
“Children are connected with and contribute to their world”
“Children have a strong sense of wellbeing”
“Children are confident and involved learners”
“Children are effective communicators”

You may have noticed the outcomes on our programs. They remind Educators to focus on that outcome during the activity. For example, the children may be doing an art activity, but the outcome is no. 5 “Children are effective communicators”, so Educators will role model following instruction manuals or good manners, such as please and thank you, or focus on how to hold a conversation, or how to share/take turns. All of these skills are needed in order for children to socialise with their peers and also allow the children to have fun.

You still might not be too fussed by why and how we do all of this, but the one wonderful thing that comes out of it all, is at the end of the year, every child will have a book created with all their photos, observations/learning stories and some of their artwork collected throughout the year and gifted to you. For the Educators, seeing the families receive this and the joy it brings is worth all the hard work we put in.

If you would like to keep up to date on all things OSHC, follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/HackhamEastOSHC/ and

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hackhameastoshc/.

Jacky Smith, OSHC Director

Childhood Immunisation Education Campaign