Trinket Box Newsletter › admin › resources › spring... · Take a peek at these captured moments..... L E A R N I N G I S FUN ! ... concerns please do not hesitate to speak to

W/c 26th January –

Australia Week. Bring

in items of interest in

connection with

Australia.

Thursday 29th

January morning—

Tiny Tales

Friday 30th January

afternoon—Tiny Tales

W/c 16th February—

half term holiday

ADVANCE WARNING

Friday 6th March-

closed for staff

training

30th March-10th

April incl. Easter

holidays

Trinket Box Newsletter

Spring 1

TRINKET BOX ANTICS! DATES FOR THE DIARY

Do you ever ask your child what they have been doing at pre-school and get faced with

‘nothing’ as the reply or a shrug......well we thought we would give you a bit of inside

information! FUN is the name of the game and we pride ourselves in giving your child a

brilliant start to their learning experience. Take a peek at these captured moments.........

L

E

A

R

N

I

N

G

I

S

FUN !

BUILDING WORK DISRUPTION

Some of you may be aware that the school is being expanded to accommodate an extra

class in each year group. This will cause some disruption to the school site and we will

have to adapt during this period.

We will give you updates as we receive them from the school but we do know that work is

due to commence on Monday 9th February, starting with the dismantling of the green

building adjacent to the pre-school. We may have to re-route our entry and exit routes

plus have a reduced garden area whilst this is being carried out. Please be rest assured

that your children will be kept safe at all times whilst this disruption occurs.

However there is an up side to every challenge and we know that the children will be

fascinated by the construction work and many new role play situations will be borne!

Budding Bob the Builders get ready!

Nominations are very welcome if you would like to nominate a staff member for going over and

above their job role

Staff Member of the Month—If you feel that a member of staff has gone over and above the norm please

nominate them for ’Staff Member of the Month’. Your input DOES count. ALL nominations are read by the com-

mittee and shared. Nominations can be made to Natalie, Annabel or a Committee member verbally or by nomina-

tion slip (available in the foyer) or by emailing on [email protected] or [email protected].

STAFF NOMINATIONS

Allergy Advice/Help Following a change to regulations from December 2014, food labelling will be

clearer. Packaging will help provide allergen information in a clearer and more

consistent way. For example, any of the 14 allergens that are on the regula-

tory list will be emphasised on the label of a pre-packaged food if they are

used as ingredients. The 14 allergens are:

eggs

milk

fish

crustaceans (for example crab, lobster, crayfish, shrimp, prawn)

molluscs (for example mussels, oysters, squid)

peanuts

tree nuts (almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, cashews, pecans, brazils, pista-

chios, macadamia nuts or Queensland nuts)

sesame seeds

cereals containing gluten (wheat (such as spelt, Khorasan wheat/Kamut),

rye, barley, oats, or their hybridised strains).

soya

celery and celeriac

mustard

lupin

sulphur dioxide and sulphites (at concentration of more than ten parts per

million)

Therefore we will be displaying all allergens present in any snacks we serve or

foods we use for cookery or sensory experiences on the front door/window.

Tiny Tales Return!

We trialled a small

company who offer

interactive storytelling

sessions last term and

the children loved it. We

will be having them visit

every half term,

different days each

time so all children can

enjoy this experience.

They involve an element

of drama and use

puppets and props in

their

storytelling

adventure.

MOVING THROUGH THE TERM WITH MAKATON!

We are re-capping on all our signs learnt in the Autumn term to embed the children’s knowledge.

REMINDER RE HOME TIMES

At Trinket Box we offer a variety of times for entry and exit, enabling parents to access their

15 hours 3 year funding over 2 and a half days if they so wish. Please ENSURE that if your

child is attending 9am-3pm, that you are punctual to collect. Collections after

the infant school comes out is not acceptable. Home times are 3pm and 3.30pm

in the afternoon to avoid disruption for other children who are here until

3.30pm.

Seeing Your Child’s Learning Journey

As you know our job is to monitor your child’s development whilst they

are at Trinket Box. We do this by observing your child at play and

comparing their achievements with the developmental norms for their

age.

As you can appreciate, all children are unique so if you have any

concerns please do not hesitate to speak to staff for advice. We have

100+ children enrolled each year and we are used to them all being very

different, so please do not worry but ask away as there is no such thing as a silly

question!

We use a software programme called Target Tracker to showcase your child’s

learning and we hope that you enjoyed receiving the end of year report. We feel

that of course you want to know how they are progressing but sometimes a photo

can equally portray their abilities and enjoyment. Reports will be produced twice

per year in December and July. We are also in the process of burning the

learning journey to disc for you to keep. This will show you the actual learning

journey plus any photo and video footage. As this record may contain images of

other children we require you to sign for your child’s disc to confirm that none of

the images containing other children or pre-school staff will be put on any social

networking site. Failure to comply would be a serious breach of

data protection.

A supply of the slips to be signed will be in the foyer-a signed

slip will be exchanged for your child’s disc. These will be available

from next Monday 26th January.

REMINDERS

T-TOWELS TO PURCHASE

We still have t-towels for sale, should you

want any. Prices are:

£4.50 each or 3 for £12.00

SCHOOL PLACE FOR SEPT 2015

I hope that you have all applied for

your child’s school place if they are

starting school this September. If not

you will need to contact Primary School

Admissions at the Council URGENTLY.

RESOURCES WANTED-CAN YOU HELP?

We are on the scrounge for the following

items!

Wicker baskets, hearts, balls

or wooden spheres, cones,

shells, glass nuggets, stones

used for decoration.

Left over wallpaper rolls,

borders.

Left over aggregate, pebbles,

slate, bark, soil.

Ribbons, lace, buttons, material

swatches.

Welcome back to a cold but bright start to the year, we hope you all had a well-rested break with your loved ones.

The Committee’s first meeting of the year had a full packed agenda! Amongst that was updating a few policies. Many of you

will be aware that we have to ensure measures are in place to safeguard and promote children’s welfare. The Committee

maintains a good awareness of the importance of protecting the children and ensuring their health, safety and wellbeing

are our priority. To that end, policies are updated, a trained safeguarding officer sits on the Committee who advises the

rest of the members and supports Natalie who is the safeguarding co-coordinator within Trinket Box. More widely, the

Trinket Box staff considers health, safety, wellbeing and behavioural concerns on a daily basis.

We have been discussing safeguarding more generally in the context of a number of areas that we would like to share with

you and/or ask for your support on:

You will have seen that following changes to the law on food labeling, we are now advising you on the allergen groups

in the snacks and materials your children may encounter at TB. With a number of children having allergies, it is

really important that all lunchboxes and drinks are clearly labeled with your child’s name to ensure they are not

inadvertently given to the wrong child. Similarly, please inform the staff if your child has any known allergens.

With the cold weather upon us, we would like to remind parents to ensure children are suitably clothed with hats,

scarves, gloves and outerwear (labeled!). TB has an all weather outdoors policy, there is much to learn outside re-

gardless of the weather and we want your children to be warm and protected.

Lastly, you will be aware about the proposed building work on the school junior site adjacent to the TB. Annabel,

Natalie and the committee have been involved in discussions with the School and Council. We can assure you that our

key priority is ensuring that the site is made safe during any building work and that the children can continue to

have an outdoor space during this time. TB will keep you advised when we have more information.

The Trinket Box Committee would like to wish you all the very best for 2015! Thank You

LUNCH INGREDIENTS

Due to allergies please avoid NUTS

and EGGS so no peanut butter or

choc hazelnut spread

COMMITTEE FOCUS—SAFETY