STAFF
We are sad to report that after many years at PlayAway, Adam has left nursery. We know that the children and staff will miss him tremendously and hope you will join us in wishing him all the best for the future.
A big welcome to Grace Cook who has joined our pre-school team. Grace has a degree in Sociology and Education and we look forward to her sharing all her knowledge with us and bringing exciting new ideas to our pre-school.

EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH
To our employee of the month for February SUE
For always keeping me so well informed, and for being the most enthusiastic singer!!

BABIES
To our parents, we wish you all lots of joy and happiness with your new babies.

TOP TIPS FOR TALKING

MARCH – Make sure your child is listening to you before you start to talk

APRIL – Provide interesting activities and opportunities to promote talking.

SAINSBURY’S ACTIVE KIDS VOUCHERS
Please note that we are now collecting these vouchers. If you would like to contribute to this there is a box on the desk by the front door for you to pop them into. The more we collect the more resources we can get so your help and shopping trips are much appreciated.

DOWN SYNDROME DAY
Thank you everyone who contributed towards this and supported our CRAZY HAIR DAY!! We raised £50 for the Bradford Down Syndrome Group.

NURSERY TRIP 2011: Thornton Hall Farm Country Park
Please make a note in your diaries that our nursery trip this year will be on Friday 24 June. All families are welcome to join us. A letter will be sent out soon giving more details.

GOLD AWARD FOR ACHIEVING EXCELLENCE

AWARDS

We are proud to announce that we have received our GOLD award for Achieving Excellence – The North Yorkshire Quality Assurance Scheme. Well done to the Staff Team for their hard work and dedication towards working through all 8 modules. A job well done everyone!!!

SUN PROTECTION
We do provide Asda factor 30 Sensitive Sun cream for the children. If you would prefer to use anything different please bring your own in which will be kept for your child.
Please also ensure children are dressed appropriately for warmer weather and that their shoulders are covered. A copy of our policy will be forwarded to you shortly via parentmail.

CHATTERBOXES
PLEASE COULD I REMIND YOU ABOUT YOUR CHILD’S CHATTERBOX. THIS IS A GOOD WAY TO DEVELOP CONFIDENCE AND COMMUNICATION SKILLS AND CELEBRATE INDIVIDUAL FAMILIES. IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO KNOW MORE PLEASE SPEAK TO A MEMBER OF STAFF AND THEY WILL SHOW YOU AN EXAMPLE.

We are proud to announce that PlayAway is now officially a part of the TinyTalk baby signing Accredited Nursery Programme. Our enthusiastic and dedicated team of staff have recently completed intensive training with a TinyTalk professional, and they can now engage in their own signing talk with the littlest ones at PlayAway! What’s more we invited our parents to the nursery for a taster session to enable them to understand the benefits and to sign with their own babies at home. We are also supporting any parents that would like to learn more by lending out DVDs to those that would like them.

Research has shown that using signs can help develop your baby’s language skills: Babies taught baby signs often learn to speak sooner and have richer vocabularies than non-signing babies. We believe that baby signing is a great way to communicate with babies before they learn to talk, and our staff are now using a range of everyday signs with the children at the nursery on a day-to-day basis. We will record the children’s baby signing achievements and report regularly on the new skills they are developing. We have also introduced a ‘Sign of the Week’ within our baby and toddler rooms and our room displays helps parents learn the sign so they can sign with their child at home.

Here are a few of the benefits of signing with your baby:

• Knowing what your baby is thinking about, how they are feeling or what they are wanting
• Giving your baby a means to express themselves, months (if not a full year) ahead of words being spoken
• Enhancing interactions between your baby and you
• Boosting your baby’s self-esteem
• Alleviating frustrations that come from not understanding each other
• Introducing language to your baby, which then gives them the confidence to speak
• Giving them a great foundation in speech and language in the pre-school years

If you would like to know more about the new PlayAway baby signing initiative, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

In other news….PlayAway recently held a farewell graduation picnic involving the whole nursery for our pre-schoolers on the stray at the front of the nursery. We had a little graduation ceremony where the children wore mini graduation gowns and were given certificates and a keepsake book of their nursery friends’ handprints. Lots of fun was definitely had by all even though it is always sad to say goodbye to our little (big) ones!

The children and staff at PlayAway also very much enjoyed a ‘People Who Help Us’ month at nursery where parents came in to talk to the children about their professions. We had a fireman, policewoman, paramedic, nurse and dance teacher. The children had fun trying on a fireman’s outfit, learning about batons & handcuffs having a go at street dancing and finding out about all the medical equipment the paramedics have in their ambulance. Perhaps most importantly the children learned all about using ‘999’ and what to say.

Staffing Changes

As from the 23 August we are having a staff change around. I apologise for the short notice but we can assure you that the changes will not affect the children as we want to keep any disruption to their routine to a minimum. Many of the children will be moving sections too and will have new key people.

We want to say Goodbye to Gemma as she makes a career move to Woodlands. We will all miss Gemma so much as she has an amazing knowledge and understanding of the curriculum and child development, but she has been able to share this with all of us and now has the opportunity to impart her knowledge to the staff at Woodlands. We wish her lots of luck in the future and know her move will continue to strengthen our relationships with our sister nursery.

Congratulations to Aimee who will be stepping up into the team leader role in pre-school. Aimee is an enthusiastic member of our staff team who is able to motivate the children and get them excited about learning. We look forward to her new and refreshing ideas. We know she will do a great job. Aimee has been with PlayAway since 2006 with a short break away to be a nanny.

Claire will be leaving us on Friday to further her education to become a teacher. Claire has been a refreshing addition to the pre-school team and we will definitely miss her happy face and cheery smile every day. We wish her the best of luck and know there will be many happy children in future with her as their teacher. Sarah has also left us to return to her home town. As Sarah’s move happened rather quickly you would not have had the chance to say goodbye, but we wish her well in her new venture. Sarah Ponsford, who worked with us during the holidays has now also left for a long holiday to America and then to follow her teaching career. Good luck to her wherever her career may take her.

We are very excited to welcome Chloe Kendall and Kate Sturges who will be joining our baby room. Both Chloe and Kate have a level 3 qualification and have many years experience working with children of all ages. We look forward to sharing the new ideas and input they will have into our babies’ learning and development.

Sam will be leaving the baby room to move to the toddler section and Steph will be leaving toddlers to move to pre-school. I know both carers are excited about their moves and we wish them well as they learn the ropes and work with their new teams. Stuart Witham has been working for us during the holidays and as he will be returning to college in September to complete his apprenticeship he will continue to work for us at the end of the day. Stuart has already displayed a keen interest in working with children of all ages and has developed good relationships with the children.

We are very excited to be introducing the PHUNKY FOODS programme from September. This is aimed at being healthy and learning about good food, eating and living habits. There is a website that parents can access that gives advice and information about meals, weaning, quantities and exciting child friendly recipes. The address is www.phunkyfoods.co.uk. You do not need to register, but click on the strawberry that says ‘Parents Section’ and you can access their information. We would appreciate any feedback that you may have about the programme or the website.

Well Done to Carlie who is our Employee of the Month for July. Carlie has been so enthusiastic about the Tiny Talk baby signing and has created a wonderful display in the Toddler room. Keep up the good work J

As another school year ends, so too does another era at Woodlands Day Nursery. Every August we say goodbye to some of our most familiar young faces, and even as the years go by it never gets any easier. However, as always our sadness is mixed with excitement for the children as they prepare for the next exciting step in their lives – starting school!

Woodlands Day Nursery

woodlands day nursery

In order to mark the occasion in style, we recently held a Graduation Ceremony at Woodlands Day Nursery for all our school-age children and their parents. Our children wore a cap and gown in true graduation style, and each child was presented with a graduation certificate. The grad party was great fun rather than being anything formal, and the children all enjoyed games and food. Everyone had a great – if slightly emotional - time and it was a perfect celebration of how far the children have come since they started with us at Woodlands. We are proud of the work we do with our pre-schoolers, and they leave Woodlands confident, happy, and well prepared for school life.

outdoor fun and education

Thanks to all our lovely parents and the school-age children who have now left us – It’s been wonderful being a part of your all-important early years. We wish you all many fun, happy and healthy school years, and a bright future ahead. Please keep in touch!

In other news….  The children at Woodlands Day Nursery enjoyed learning all about road safety thanks to a visit from a local community Police Officer recently. We also had a nursery mummy come in to tell the children all about her religion (Sikh) and they loved having their hands & feet painted with henna!

On Wednesday 4th August both Woodlands & PlayAway Nurseries enjoyed a fab day at the National Play Day event at the Valley Gardens in Harrogate. We talked to lots of parents about the great things we do at the nursery, as well as handing out balloons, making fruit kebabs, and creating handprint pictures with the children.

To celebrate its 20 years of excellence, Funcare are inviting children, parents and staff past and present to join them for a Fun Day at Woodlands Day Nursery on 23rd May.

They’ll be a bouncy castle (be careful on there, you dads!), ice cream, face painting and all manner of fun things as we celebrate not just 20 years of our existence, but 20 years of success and outstanding work.

To reflect the levels of excellence and we’ve achieved and maintained over 20 years, North Yorkshire County Council will be presenting us with a plaque to designate our nursery as the official childcare provider for Harrogate Town Children’s Centre.  The nursery and the children’s centre on Wetherby Road  work closely together to provide high quality services for local parents and carers.

We would really, really love for as many children, parents and staff past and present to join us for this special occasion, as it’ as much about all you who’ve attended or sent your children to our nurseries over the years as it is about us: we think of you all as being part of part of our big family, and we would love for all or as many members of that family to be here with us on our special day. It’ll be great to see how some of the older ones have turned out!

We’ll be promoting the Fun Day in the Harrogate Advertiser leading up to the event, and hopefully the kind people there will be writing a feature about the big event, too.

Fun Day at Woodlands Nursery, Wetherby Road, Harrogate on 23rd May, 1pm to 5pm

Play Away Nursery, part of the Funcare Ltd group of Harrogate Nurseries, will be taking part in this year’s Toddle Waddle, the annual fundraiser for The Meningitis Trust, with the toddlers themselves raising funds for what is a very important cause.

Taking place on 15th May, The Toddle Waddle is a fun way for under-5s to help to raise awareness of meningitis with their very own sponsored walk through Harrogate’s wonderful Valley Gardens.

Although meningitis can affect anyone, of any age, at any time, over half of the reported cases are in children under the age of 5. Toddle Waddle was created to engage this age group and their parents, grandparents, nursery teachers and child minders – thus spreading awareness of the disease and its signs and symptoms where it is needed.

The under-5s are an ‘at risk’ group for the disease, with meningitis killing more of this age group than any other infectious disease in the UK. It’s not hard to see why it’s also the disease that parents fear the most.

Toddle Waddle organiser Steve Williams of The Meningitis Trust says: “Over the last eight years, this event has raised £2million for the Trust. With no Government funding, we rely on voluntary donations to continue our work. Events such as Toddle Waddle are essential to raising these funds. Toddle Waddle not only raises vital funds to help in the fight against meningitis, but it also promotes important awareness of the disease.”

Though the purpose of the event is to raise money for a very serious cause, the Toddle Waddle itself is a fun event for all the family, with toddlers and other under-5s waddling alongside their parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters in a party atmosphere.

For more details, please email playaway@funcareltd.co.uk

It can be a nightmare getting kids to clean their teeth – do you remember your parents tearing their hair out trying to get you to clean yours?

Parents need a hand in trying to encourage kids to look after their teeth, which is why Harrogate’s Woodlands Day Nursery has signed up to the national ‘Stop the Rot’ campaign, a fun way of teaching children about eating healthily and of encouraging them to clean their teeth throughout the day to help fight tooth decay.

According to Stop the Rot founder Graham Wilding, nearly half of the UK’s five year-olds suffer from tooth decay, with the majority of these problems caused by refined sugar (sucrose) found in so many foods and by children’s reluctance to clean their teeth. So, in line with the Stop the Rot campaign, Woodlands Day Nursery has committed to:

1)    Sack the sugar
2)    Beat the sweets
3)    Let’s get brushing

Sack the sugar

Quite often, if food and drinks packaging says ‘carbohydrates’ then the chances are it contains sucrose. So, Woodlands Day Nursery are trying to limit the children’s sugar intake by selecting foods with the least sucrose content, and making those foods fun. Deputy Manager Amanda Hadley says: “It’s easy to make healthy tooth-friendly foods fun. By including children in activities about different foods, we encourage them to try things they would normally turn their nose up at. Our message to parents and carers would be to keep trying with new foods - our children at nursery eat really healthy balanced meals every day and they love it!”

Beat the sweets

We once gave one of our cats catnip as a way of rewarding him for being such nice, gentle chap – big mistake! Not sure where that nice, gentle chap got to during the 5 minutes that he had the catnip in his clutches, but he absolutely nailed us when we tried to take it off him! 10 minutes later, once he’d recovered from the effects of the catnip, he was back to his old unique self again, sitting peaceably with the birds and saving moths and butterflies from danger.

It can be that way with children and sweets sometimes. Children become addicted to sweets not just because they taste sweet but also because they are associated with comfort and reward. They also get addicted to the “high” of the energy rush that can cause disruptive behavioural problems. So, again, the staff at Woodlands Day Nursery are very careful in regards to the number of sweets children are given and when they get them.

Let’s get brushing

The earlier good brushing habits can be put in place the better, so Woodlands Day Nursery have created games and play themes around toothbrushes and toothpaste, whilst each child attending Woodlands Day Nursery has been bringing in their own tooth brush and having a go at brushing every day after their lunch.

By implementing these 3 key things as part of the Stop the Rot campaign, Woodlands Day Nursery are assisting parents and carers in what can be the very difficult task of getting children into the habit of looking after their teeth from an early age in the hope that they won’t have problems with their teeth later. By working together, Woodlands Day Nursery, parents, carers and, above all, the children can Stop the Rot and enjoy a lifetime free from dental issues.

funcare nursery harrogate supports children in need

The children and staff of PlayAway & Woodlands Day Nurseries are excited about Children in Need this Friday November 20th.  Children will be dressing up in their pyjamas and bringing their teddy bears at PlayAway Day Nursery.  At Woodlands team leader Emily will be spending the whole day in song.  She is being sponsored to sing instead of talk for the whole day, entertaining the children and of course staff and parents!