Mangere Bridge Kindergarten Community Blog: kindergarten

Showing posts with label kindergarten. Show all posts

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Ambury Farm Day: an annual community celebration

Each year the Mangere Bridge community comes together at the farm to celebrate this great regional farm park.
This year again we fed the volunteers as they came off their shifts and took time out to eat and relax. Our helpers from kindergarten were poised and ready to keep the volunteers watered and fed.

Our team was co-ordinated by the teaching team (including Jemma) and the lovely Janine.

We also had a sit-down tent for weary families where we sold Juicies.

We had a display too of the great things that happened at our kindergarten over the year.
It was a fun day attended by 38,000 people. It is a fab opportunity to show off our Mangere Bridge community at this amazing resource - the Ambury Regional Farm Park.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Today were lucky enough to benefit from "Closed for good"

What luck we were able to have "Closed for good" workers here from the BNZ.
A huge pile of bark greeted them when they arrived this morning and Natalie, Jessie and Marie set to and dug, wheelbarrowed and spread the bark on the playground for our refurbished safe fall area.
It was hard work and took most of the morning and we really appreciated their hard work. The children pitched in too ( and so did the school buddies when they arrived too).

Sharon and Andrea took on the huge task of painting along the front of the building and then painting the lockers too. When the bark was finished they were joined by the bark movers and before we knew it the job was done.
It looks fantastic and we now have a beautiful bark area, clean painted frontage and lockers.

THANK YOU SO MUCH "BNZ CLOSED FOR GOOD". We think you did a really really great job.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Ambury Farm Day 2009

It's spring again and with spring comes Ambury Farm day at our farm. Yesterday we were at the farm - where there was pony rides, tractor rides, wood chopping, sheep shearing, cow milking, live bands and much more...

...Including our Kindergarten sausage sizzle - one of our big fundraisers for the year. We barbecued all day long and sold lots of sausages, lollies and drinks. Thank-you to everyone who helped and supported this Kindergarten fundraiser - it was a very successful fundraiser and way of showcasing the Kindergarten in the community.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

On Vacation... more pics

On vacation... at Jemma's house

Hi everyone, we are all safe and sound on holiday : ) we are having a great time, getting lots of cuddles and we have grown so much... you will be amazed! See you soon. We miss you.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

They've arrived!!! 4 new babies

Well what a surprise, our Biscuit has had 4 beautiful new babies.

She was looking fatter but when Carol came on Sunday at 5p.m. there was no sign that she was about to give birth. When we arrived in the morning on Monday there they were!!

They are just perfect - covered in fur, one white, two biscuit coloured and one white and stone coloured. They are perfectly formed, running about and very capable, just like our children.

Stoney coloured baby...

We spent the day yesterday popping back to the cage just to watch, they are very very cute and the children are waiting to be able to have a cuddle. No names yet...

The twins...

The white one...

Check back here for more... as they grow!

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

More adventures of our babies

Our babies are getting more adventurous now...

look at them hopping around...

Crossing the Border

We are so excited - our Book "Crossing the Border" is in print and is available from NZCER Press. We celebrated with a launch on August 2nd with our kindergarten families and community as well as the wider educational community who have been so supportive through this long research process.

We would like to acknowledge the following people for their support for our book:

The Centre of Innovation project outlined in this book took place over three years and the resultant research ethos and testing of innovative ideas has become part of the culture of Mangere Bridge Kindergarten. Initially the inspiration was to create an environment for successful transitions for our children and families and the more we learnt the more possibilities we could see. We built our research on earlier learning from work with the Strengthening Education In Mangere and Otara Project (SEMO) and with Educational Leadership Project (Ltd) and are indebted to Wendy Lee for her dedication to research in early childhood education. We are also grateful to Sue Dockett and Bob Perry for their inspiring work around transition to school in Australia.

The teaching team Carol, Pat and Jemma would like to say a huge thank you to the Centre of Innovation (COI) programme which gave us the opportunity to research in depth our innovations around transition to school and to work so closely with Margaret and Sally, co-authors of this book. We have grown enormously as researchers and academics nurtured by their outstanding support. We also appreciate the friendship and collegial support of the centres of Round Three COI; Botany Downs kindergarten (especially Bronwyn, conference buddy and critical friend), Greerton Early Childhood centres, Wadestown Kindergarten and Bush Street Kindergarten, Rangiora who became our Hui buddies; and in particular Anne Meade for her dedication to children’s learning. Roskill South Kindergarten (Round one, COI) led the way for us and we are extremely grateful to Karen for supporting us in our application and on our journey.

Transition in all its forms continues to have a life of its own at Mangere Bridge kindergarten. The research has continued well beyond the initial COI project and the teaching team has recently initiated a relationship with another school, across the bridge, extending our transition relationships outside of our own community.

The school buddies have a special place in our acknowledgements as without their friendships with the kindergarten children one whole chapter would not have been possible.

Our long journey has sometimes taken our attention away from home and we would like to thank all of our families for being so supportive over this time.

Also the teaching team would like to thank the Auckland Kindergarten Association for their support; past teaching team members Kathy, Frances and Sarah; Alexandra and then Avis who so ably replaced us whenever we needed a reliever; Ann Hatherly from CORE Education; Nola Harvey from the University of Auckland for support in dissemination and the Faculty of Education Research Committee at the University of Waikato for overseeing ethical approvals. Our original administrator, Stephanie, was so enthusiastic about the idea of this journey, and our current administrator, Ingrid, continues this tradition; thank you both.

All the authors believe the strategies, philosophies, and pedagogies contained within this book are not only limited or relevant to a single transition from early childhood to primary but rather can be applied to transitions throughout education. Within the research we identified the importance and interconnectedness of relationships: relationships with the children and families, with the schools, with the local community and into the wider education community.

This book is the result of those relationships. We are all indebted to the children and families of the Mangere Bridge community who trusted us and have unstintingly contributed their enthusiasm and commitment to the project. We wish to acknowledge all those who have contributed time, energy, enthusiasm and feedback to the research, especially the teachers and community of the local schools, Mangere Bridge School and Waterlea Primary School. Warm thanks go, too, to Aline-Wendy for her contribution in writing the foreword.

The transition research continues

Several of our projects are still in action and form an integral part of our transition partnership with teachers, children and families. We have continued the buddy project and it is now three years old. We have had fabulously positive feedback from parents and the new entrant teachers.

We are still active reporting on transition experiences and research at workshops and dissemination opportunities Our book is now in print. It is the culmination of a very long transition journey and a huge workload.

Our four research articles have been published in:

Early Childhood Folio number 13: 2009.

The second article Google "International Journal of Transitions in Childhood Vol 3 2009" and you will find it there.

The third article has been published in "Dispersing Waves: Innovation in early childhood education" 2010. A. Meade Editor. This is the final COI publication.

Another article recently published in Early Childhood Folio:

Transition portfolios: Another tool in the transition kete. Vol18 (2).

To contact us for further information you can email us at mangerebridge@aka.org.nz

The importance of reading

A. Some interesting facts from a recent conference
Boys will speak 7000 words a day, girls will speak 20,000
If a child knows 8 Nursery rhymes by the time they are 4 - they are the best readers
It takes 1000 stories read aloud before a child learns to read a book alone
Series books are the "trainer wheels" of reading - supported practice that is not too hard but are fun to read.
Students who have the biggest vocab are the best readers
Fantastically fun book list
Don't open this book
Down the back of the chair
Harry and the Dinosaurs
Kiss Kiss Yuck Yuck
George and the dragon
My Friend Bear
The Pirate's Feast
The Tale of the little Mole who knew it was none of his business
Watch out Big Bros' coming
Where's my Teddy