Monkey Puzzle Angel

Newsletter December 2020

Office News

Dear parents

We did it we made it to the end of 2020!

Thank you

2020 hasn’t been what any of us had imagined or planned for but we stood together through it all as a family!!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all our wonderful children, parents and team who without them none of this would have been possible,

Thank you to our parents for their continued support throughout as we navigated each stage of this pandemic.

Thank you to our wonderful children who put a smile on our face every single day and can still see the joy in the world.

Thank you to our amazing MPA team who have given 100% and gone above and beyond for Monkey Puzzle Angel every day!

We hope you all enjoy a well deserved rest and a Merry Christmas!

Here’s to 2021

Love from everyone at MPA

xx

Staff News

We had our final Team Meeting of the year where we awarded our end of year certificates. Although this year has been hard we have still seen some fantastic professional development from all the team. Please join us in congratulating the whole team on another fantastic year. Please see below for our 2020 winners:

Employee of the Year (voted by the team): Martina Lennon- Baby Room

Butterfly Award: Aga Wendykowska- Pre-School

Polished Diamonds- Robyn Hugh-BR, Robyn Little- TR and Sheena Etheve- Ps

Activity Queens- Toddler Room

Explosive Impact- Luna Serratore

Thank you for all your support over 2020- we really hope 2021 brings a little more joy and laughter 🙂

Welcome

We are incredibly pleased to announce Josie has joined our MPA family, she will be based in our baby room full time. She is very excited to get to know all our wonderful babies.

Discoverers

Christmas cheer is all around! The activity was set up using tinsel, a Christmas tree and cloud dough using colours associated with Christmas. This activity went down a real treat and the babies gravitated towards it, fascinated by the colours and resources. The following learning intentions were filling and emptying using containers(Maths), explores and experiments with a range of materials – engaging in sensory exploration (Expressive Art and Design) and enjoys the sensory experience of making marks in damp sand, paste or paint (Physical development).

Garden play was a blast where the babies developed themselves physically achieving the following learning intentions – climbing on low level furniture, emptying and filling containers with mud and engaging in cooperative play with balls

Christmas scents during water play. Oranges, cranberries, Brussel sprouts and cinnamon sticks were put in water trays with some ginger scented water. The babies loved to taste the oranges and cranberries and they especially enjoying tasting the water itself. They were also given some bowls and spoons to help their fine motor skills. Jack did very well scooping up the cranberries with a spoon while James preferred to use a bowl to scoop up the food.

We have had lots of fun exploring the fun winter wonderland activity. This was done using foam, paint, coloured tissue paper and stars to create a winter themed sensory tray for the babies to explore. They had fun squeezing the foam and using the cups to feel the texture by pushing the foam into it. As you can see from the photos Raphael really enjoyed getting messy with the activity where as Jack wasn’t too sure !!!!

Explorers

We made some sensory Christmas bottles – the children were excited to get stuck into making one of their own to take home for Christmas.

We made some Christmas decorations for our toddlers to hang in their tree at home, we some fantastic artist skills. Well done !

We started off by colouring our own candy canes using crayons , we played some Christmas carols to get the children in the Christmas spirit . The explorers got their ands sticky and helped Adriana make some blue play dough, the children helped pour four, oil and water together as well as paint.

The children had the opportunity to play in purple water play, where the were able to explore the use of water through filling and emptying containers, floating, and sinking and observing how the water fell.

Inventors

Preschool worked on their letters and numbers, recognising letters on the board, in books and forming them on paper. Preschool also formed numbers on the chalk board.

We made some playdough and worked on our 2D shapes. Preschool also had a special Christmas dinner party in the role play area.

We continued to do activities about Christmas and the winter season. This morning preschool children took part in some arts and crafts where they made a Christmas tree and decorated it. In the garden we played some games such as ‘What’s the time Mr wolf’, ‘stuck in the mud’ and we also played some football. The preschool children made some snowmen and took part in some messy play where they played with winter animals and snow.

They made their own personalised calendars and Christmas bags, which they decorated themselves. They also made their name out of letters on a Christmas tree. They also made some lovely Christmas stockings. They moreover did lots of Christmas role play activities and rehearsed their Christmas song.