FAIRFIELD PARENT NEWSLETTER AUTUMN TERM 2024

A big warm welcome back to all our families after the summer break and to all the new families who have joined us, we hope you have enjoyed spending time with your loved ones enjoying lots of fun adventures. We said good bye to our preschool children as they start their next educational mile stone in reception class. As we start to wrap up warmer and the nights turning dark, we are excited to begin learning about the new season and explore all that Autumn has to offer us. We embrace playing outdoors in the garden focusing on children and staffs wellbeing, seeing changes in habitats at behaviours of our wildlife and looking for frost glistening on spiders webs. We are noticing changes in colours as the leaves turn and fall from the trees, and plants turning back to the ground as their flowering comes to an end.

We look forward to seeing you enjoying our Stay and Play sessions and meeting with you at parents evenings.

Learning focus at the moment

Throughout the Autumn term we will be focusing our learning on the changes this season brings, we will be exploring colours in the garden whilst we see the leaves tumbling to the ground, we investigate mathematical concepts as we make autumn soup in the mud kitchen using natural objects we find in the garden on many of our scavenger hunts. We will look closely at the wildlife in the garden and see how they prepare themselves for the colder months, especially our resident squirrels as they scurry around the flower beds hiding nuts and making nests. We will encourage our children to connect with nature through a variety of media and materials both part of group sessions and during child led play, we will use natural objects to create masterpieces and learn new songs to expand our increasing vocabulary.

PRE SCHOOL

Our oldest children have been settling into their new routine and enjoying the independence that preschool offers them. We have been concentrating on “getting to know you whilst building the power of positivity” and covering the topic “all about me” the children are spending time in their keyperson group during registration to get to know each other’s names, talk about their families and have taken part in a variety of forest school activities creating their families out of nature and using STEM to create their own houses using lolly pop sticks and string. We have been encouraging more independence skills such as getting our outdoor clothing on independently and doing intricate fine motor movements when fastening zips. As we become older we have different rules and boundaries which children beginning to embed during their play and routines. During our weekly letters and sounds session we have been tuning in to sounds of the environment and recognising noises from all aspects of the home and in the world. The children look forward to making scrumptious recipes each week with the keyperson.

TODDLERS

A warm welcome to our new children starting in our toddler room, and as we have a lot of children getting to know the team and the nursery environment we have been focusing on “all about me” getting the children used to the new routines and boundaries, investigating all the different areas of the room and in the garden. The toddlers have been joining in circle times with their new friends to help them learn each other’s names and individual uniqueness of each child. Our toddlers will also be exploring numbers and rhyme in lots of their activities over the coming months, we will be using numbers in all aspects of play, when making current buns in the bakers shop home corner and counting frogs on lily pads in the water tray. We will be using the language we have been learning in songs to communicate with each other as we begin to play together and make friends. Our toddlers will be gaining more independence as we start to using the bathroom to wash our hands and begin toilet training, and becoming helpers at meal times distributing utensils and cups on the tables.

BABIES

Welcome to all our new babies who have joined our Fairfield Family over the last few months, it’s been lovely getting to know you all during your settling sessions with your baby. As they make the big step into nursery life we are extremely proud of how well they have all settled and started to make strong attachments to their key person, providing a safe and loving environment for them to be confident lifelong learners. As our babies become more confident we will be encouraging lots of sensory pay to celebrate events and festivals over the Autumn term, we will have lots of stay and play sessions which we are excited to see our new families attend to take enjoy a small part of our busy nursery day together.

Diary Dates

STAY AND PLAY

October Stay and Play

Wednesday 30^th – Preschool (2pm-3pm)

Monday 28th - Toddlers (2pm-3pm)

Thursday 31^st – Babies (9.30-10.30)

November Stay and Play

Wednesday 13^th – Preschool (10.30-11.30)

Tuesday 19^th – Toddlers (10.30-11.30)

Tuesday 19^th – Babies (2.30-3.30)

Tuesday 29^th October – Staff training Day

At Portland nurseries we believe that for us to provide your children with the best possible experiences whilst in our care it is mandatory to keep staff training up to date and refreshed regularly. With this, we hold two training days a year where we close the nursery to allow us the time to ensure knowledge and skills are up to date with current practice guidelines.

We appreciate your co-operation and understanding when it comes to closing the nursery for our staff training days.

Thursday 25th December– 1st January 2025 - Christmas Holiday

(Nurseries reopen 2nd January 2025)

Term dates

Monday 2nd September – Autumn term starts

Monday 28^th October – Term time only children break up for half term week.

Monday 5th November – Term time children return

Monday 22^nd December Term time children break up for Christmas holidays.

Staff News

Congratulations to Kirsty and her family on the birth of their beautiful baby girl, welcome to the world Nolah Jones!

Welcome to the team Zelayhuma our new apprentice, Zelayhuma will be working alongside our preschool children.

Big welcome back to Tina Cockshott, a much loved member of the Toddler team, we are glad to have you back!

Further Information

Mobile Phones

Please can I remind parents that the use of mobile phones on nursery premises is strictly prohibited, you must not take any photographs or videos at nursery or at any nursery events. Using your mobile phone breaks the statutory welfare requirements and is also a breach of safeguarding policies to which we must adhere.

Reminder

Please can you all provide wellies for your child with their name inside. Also can we ask that you check your child’s wellies still fit them, if you need to bring new ones please can we ask that you dispose of the old ones.

Payment Reminder

Quite a few payments are coming in after 1^st of the month. Just a reminder that all payments must reach our bank account before the 1^st of each month this includes all childcare vouchers, Tax Free Childcare Payments and Bank Transfers. Any parents paying by SLC with need to pay their monthly top up amount by 1^st also. Please note that payments usually take 3-4 business days to reach our account.

Any payments received after 1^st of the month will incur a £20 late payment charge and continued failure to pay will be charged at a daily rate of 8% of the outstanding debt.