Sun Room

Term 2

Its now the end of term 2 and what a fantastic fun filled term it has been. It's beautiful to see all the children now settled in fully and continuing to make friendships and connections with the other children along with the educators within the room. In the Sun  Room we always strive to create a safe and secure environment for the children, as this will help them feel a sense of belonging. 

Moving into Term 3, I would like to remind everyone to please pack jackets, beanies and spare clothes in your children's bag as we do run an indoor/outdoor program all year round. With these colder months sticking around we ask for children to have coats to keep them nice and warm while outdoors. 

We would now like to do some happy Welcomes and some sad Goodbyes

We would like to welcome Lincoln, Parker, Knox, Kevin, Jordan and Hunter to the Sun Room, they are settling in so well and we love that they are apart of our room. 

We would also like to say goodbye to Harper & Isabella and wish them Goodluck at their new centres.

Autumn Time

With Autumn setting in during this term we introduced this topic to children. Throughout the term we did a few different experiences surrounding Autumn. We started with sensory tubs filled with beautiful Autumn leaves and coloured rice, and gsupplied spoons and mini cups to explore. The children enjoyed putting their hands through the leaves along with picking them up and scrunching them in their hands. Danni, Lesley and the children created a beautiful Autumn window painting a tree and getting the children to paint Autumn leaves. This creation looked absolutely beautiful, which we incorporated this through artwork. Giving the children Autumn coloured paints and letting them use their imagination to create beautiful artwork. The children also got the opportunity to make sun catches using paper plates, clear contact and Autumn coloured cellophane. When making these the children really like the sticky feeling of the contact and enjoyed putting there hands on it and then puling it off laughing. We hope you enjoyed all our artwork that was displayed within the room. 

Term 2 events 

Special Persons/Mothers day morning tea (6th May)

On this day we welcomed our children's special person to join us for a morning tea. After the few years we have had, it was so special being able to have our families back in the centre. The children really enjoyed being able to have some food and a play alongside their special person.

Road Safety Week (16th - 20th May)

On the Tuesday during this week we taught children how to cross the road safely. Along with our kinder friends we walked up to the school crossing where we looked both ways and with the help of our lollypop person Nicole crossed the road safely . Each Kinder child held the hand of a sun room child and it was beautiful to see the older children really caring and helping the younger children. 

Brain Cancer awareness Day (17th May)

For Brain Cancer awareness day, we welcomed children and educators to come to Haven wearing a beanie and donate a gold coin to this special cause that is so close to so many peoples hearts. 

Reconciliation Week (27th May - 3rd June) - Ann-Maree

The theme for Reconciliation week is "Be Brave, Make Change". To achieve more of an understanding of what reconciliation means to us we implemented several experiences and had books on offer too. Our experiences focused on recognising the colours of the Aboriginal flag and the Torres Straight Islander flag, looking at Australian Animals and exploring The Rainbow Serpent. Our other experience was to enhance our feelings of belonging, connectedness and just celebrating that we are all individual but also focusing on the theme of being kind and friendly. I set up a smaller dolls house next to our bigger dolls house, the idea was that we could visit each others houses, that we all belong and were made to feel welcome. We also had conversations about the names of the Australian Animals. 

Each morning as a group we do our Acknowledgment of Country. We reflect on the learning of the colours and the Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander flags. 

I feel we had some very successful learning moments throughout these experiences and stories. We are definitely focusing on the importance and value of all of us being accepted for who we are and that we all have something to contribute to this world.

Big chefs help little Chefs

During term 2 we visited two countries Saudi Arabia and Italy. First we visited Saudi Arabia and focused on Eid-al-Fitr which marks the end of Ramadan, one of the most important events in the Islamic calendar. We made a banana and date smoothie. Smoothies very similar to this are called "Suhooor date smoothie" and this is a very popular breakfast before sunrise during Ramadan as it contains natural sugar and fibre that gives you long lasting energy and keeps you fuller for longer. The children enjoyed making these smoothies, watching the blender mix it up and then drinking them too.

We visited Italy next, for this country we made pizzas with the children. Pizza is a very big part of Italy. Each child got a piece of pita bread and spooned on some tomato paste before adding the toppings of their choice. These were then cooked and enjoyed with our lunch. 

Our Sustainability Rainbow (Caitlyn)

At the beginning of term 2, we set out to complete a rainbow canvas which involved our families who helped collect and brought in bottle lids. We enjoyed this chance to get our families involved and show the children how we can create  artwork from recycled materials. We started by creating an outline then spray painting lids with beautiful rainbow colours and then finally the next step was getting the lids on our canvas. This project used an old canvas which was in the hallway which Lesley re painted white. Over the course of two weeks, we involved the children painting the outlines, gluing lids and then adding some cottons balls for clouds . Our beautiful creation now proudly hangs up on the wall within Sun Room. 

Danni's cooking program (Danni)

This term we have started our cooking program ( Cooking fun with Danni), for our first lesson we started with something a little bit easy, being children cutting up their own fruit for morning tea. We had mandarins, watermelon, banana, kiwi fruit, pineapple and Sultanas and apple 🍎🍊🍉🍌🍍🥝. The children had their own chopping boards and knives, with their own plate and name. Children cut up their fruit with assistance (if it was needed) and then sat down on the mat to enjoy. The children demonstrated great fine motor skills and had a lot of fun. This program is a weekly program which will be on run on a different day each week, however the menu itself will change each month. With the month of June focusing on  fruit cutting, ensuring all children within the room have the opportunity to participate.

Everyone will agree: cooking is an essential life skill that all people should master! But did you know that learning how to cook can also help promote social, mental and physical development in children? Cooking also helps children learn about washing vegetables and fruit, as well as some measuring and counting basics. They might learn some new words too, like 'measure', 'mash' and 'mix' and when old enough children can help with things like setting the table, serving food and cleaning up after meals. 

Cooking with children can be considered a fun learning activity for both young children and their parents. Cooking is one of a few activities that can improve many abilities at once. Children can enhance math, science, language, and life skills through fun cooking experiences. This month was a lot of fun and I’m looking forward to next month the month of July will be ……. Making and decorating sugar cookies

Our visits from the Community

Greg Matthews (May) - Ann-Maree

We were so fortunate today to have Greg Mathews come out and visit us this morning. Greg is an Aborinigal Elder and accomplished artist. We sat in a group and listened to him share his knowledge, experience and stories about his artwork and all about him. He showed us the different artistic techniques he used to make his beautiful paintings and then we were able to collaborate together through our handprints. The children sat beautifully, absolutely enthralled by Greg's storytelling and were so proud of the handprints they made. This experience was a wonderful opportunity to learn more about the Indigenous Culture and to celebrate our community through this connection. We hope this is the start of a wonderful relationships between Greg and Haven. 

Rowville Library Visit (28th April)

On this day we had the lovely Michelle come visit us from Rowville Library. She come into Sun room and spent about half an hour reading some stories to us. Michelle read a variety of different books to us such as normal books, pop up books, puppet books and books we could sing along to. The children enjoyed Michelles visit and there were all so engaged from start to finish. It was so beautiful to watch and we can't wait to welcome Michelle back to our centre during term 3. 

Term 2 focus - Emotions

During term 2 our focus was emotions. Children at this age are learning so much about themselves and there place in this world. Managing and navigating their emotions can be a tricky task at this age and that's the main reason we wanted to focus on this topic and teach them through all sorts of things. We introduced "The Feelings series" books and "The Colour Monster" book into our group times. These went through what each emotion might feel like along with ways to navigate them. The children were really drawn to the colour monster book and the way it paired each emotion with a colour, for example red = angry,  yellow = happy, blue = sad. This is something that the older two rooms go into more detail with when the children are a bit older but its good to touch on it now. We also explored emotions through sensory tubs and playdough too. Making sensory tubs with yellow rice and pictures of happy faces for the children to discover along with play dough emotion cards for the children to make their own faces using the play dough and place different eyes, noses and mouths on to make their faces. 

Our children's biggest interests 

Dinosaurs

One of the childrens biggest interests this term has been dinosaurs. We have had a dinosaur world set up outside which children have been drawn to, picking them up and taking them on adventures around the yard. We have also had the big T-rex down to play with and Ann-Maree set up a dinosaur inquiry table inside which the children absolutely adored, bringing out their imagination and teaching each other the different names of the dinosaurs. T-rex and Bronchisaurous i think were the children's favourites.

Construction

Dinosaurs might have been their biggest interest but construction wasn't far behind. Our construction mat has had big wooden blocks on it along with recycled materials to promote children to use their imagination and creativity skills, creating all sorts of towers with the help of their peers and educators. We also have magnetics and wedgits available at all times. The children have really enjoyed building up the wedgits by placing the biggest one at the bottom and building up until the smallest in at the top. With the magnetics they have enjoyed building houses, tunnels for the cars and stacking all the squares in a big tower. It have been a joy to watch their imagination came out to build their different creations. 

Goodbye Lina and Viktoriya 

A very big Thank you to Viktoriya and Lina, they both are a huge part of our Sun room family and we are very sad to see them leaving. We wish them all the best with their next adventures and hope to continue our friendships with them and hear from them soon about their new journey. We will miss them very much!

Upcoming events in Term 3

• NAIDOC week
• National Pyjama Day
• Big Chefs help Little Chefs
• Danni's Cooking Program
• Jeans for Genes day
• Science Week
• Book Week
• Fathers day/Special persons Day 

We are all looking forward to term 3 with you all 😀

Love Demmi, Ann-Maree, Caitlyn, Danni, Nicole, Lesley, Isabelle ❤️