Term 4 2024 - Trips, fundraising and enjoying our refreshed room.

This term we have enjoyed our room following the refresh over February half term.

We have been on trips to ‘Pets at home’ using the bus on the way back, a walk to the Riverside to see the swans and the train station.

We raised almost £500 with a sponsored scoot and £165 in our Easter Raffle. The sponsored scoot fundraising money is going to be used to add further improvements to our room and the Easter Raffle money will be used to enhance the experiences of the children.

Bath City Football Academy continued with their Friday football sessions, which is great fun and enjoyed by both staff and adults.

Easter crafts have included making Easter cards, an Easter Egg hunt and chocolate Easter nests.

We have also practiced yoga and mindfulness this term.

Pre-school February Half term make over

We had a very busy February half term with a room make over. After lots of fundraising we were able to replace our very tired carpet with some wood effect safety flooring and painted the room is some fresh new colours.

The room now feels brighter, calmer with new defined area’s for mark making, cooking, building and small world, exploring, a calm area with cushions, fairy lights and a much large home corner area.

We are hugely grateful to our committee for the fundraising from raffles, to candy floss stalls and a sky dive for helping to raise the funds for the works. A parent also had a very generously donated the paint, and painters to enable us to give the room afresh coat of paint.

We are currently taking registration forms for September 2024. Registration forms can be accessed on our admissions page Admissions — Oldfield Park Pre-School (oldfieldparkpreschool.org.uk)

Do we have green fingers??

Last week we planted some tomato’s, green beans, sunflowers and a blackberry cane. It’s been great to be able to finally plant somethings in our garden, alongside our herbs and flowers that we planted last term.

We look forward to sharing their progress, and hopefully tasting some delicious tomatoes, and green beans later on in the pre-school year.

Ready, Steady cook!!

We were thrilled to be awarded just under £500 by June Player from the Local Councillor Fund late last year. We used the money to buy a Cooker, a cooker unit and some cooking equipment - rolling pins, spoon’s, scales, baking tins and pastry cutters.

Our children love to cook , we have made fairy cakes, pizza and a birthday cake! The children gain so much from cooking, fine motor skills, number recognition, turn taking, and something yummy at the end.

We plan to continue cooking regularly through the remaining terms and have lots of things planned, from Easter nests to bread in a bag.

A huge thanks to June Player for the donation and we look forward to posting more of our delicious bakes.

Parent testimonies - How well we have settled into Pre-school

It is always great when we receive parental/carer feedback on how well children have settled into Pre-school This year has been challenging in lots of ways, however we continue to be amazed at how well our children have settled either back into Pre-school life or in joining us for the first time.

Below are some comments from our parents on how well their children have both returned and settled into Pre-school.

“Noah has thoroughly enjoyed coming back to Pre-school, having only done a few weeks before lockdown, staff have helped him ease back into a place he absolutely loves going too, that being said we’ve just added an extra day for him to attend! Well done to the staff for making the “new normal” fun and not scary!”- Louise - Noah’s mum

“My son has come on leaps and bounce since starting pre school trying new things and all the new friends he has made. He is a lot calmer in himself so proud of him” Sian, J’s mum

“I had initial concerns around my son starting preschool, he was very attached and not used to being left. The settling in sessions at Oldfield Park preschool was amazing. They made my child feel safe and also I felt relaxed and comfortable leaving him. I couldn’t recommend enough. He comes out at the end of the day happy and that’s all I could ask for. Thanks guys, especially Carron who has the patience of a saint.” - Jenny - J’s mum.

“After 6 months at home I was worried that my son would take a few weeks to settle back in to preschool drop offs especially as I couldn't go in with him but the team were amazing at chatting to him and keeping him calm and engaged so after three mornings with a few tears he now trots in happily chatting away. I can't recommend Oldfield Park Preschool's approach to the last few months highly enough.” Victoria - H’s mum.

“A few months off pre school and like most parents my biggest concern was her returning to those moments of her very first few days. But although the morning routine has changed she skipped in and didn’t look back. This is all down to how confident, happy and settled the whole team have made her feel while she is at Pre school.
Everyone is always smiling, is always welcoming and always have time to speak, no matter how big or small the topic.
It’s also nice to have a group of parents/carers that smile, say hello and chit chat on drops off and pick ups, it’s lovely community and the park outside is an added bonus if your early of have to collect another child ten minutes later.
Thanks Oldfield for making being a Mum that little bit easier” - Sandie - D’s mum

A walk in the rain to see the trains.

Settling in - September 2020

We have been amazed at how well our children have returned to Pre-school following a long break for some of our children.

We are taking our time in welcoming new children into Pre-school - giving each new child the time and space that they need to feel safe and comfortable in their new environment. This we feel is really important given the times that we have been through this year.

We continue to offer the same variety of activities to the children , from playdough, to painting, role-play in the home corner, trains and cars and lots of time outside.

We continue to follow the children’s interest and so far we have looked at spiders and spider webs, and we will be cooking this week.

We encourage regular handwashing and clean the toys at the end of each day.

As we progress though the year, we look forward to where the children take us thought their interests and fascinations.

We made it!!

Wow what a year!

We started the year by moving into our new setting in Oldfield Park Pre-school - we very quickly felt at home and settled in quickly to our new space both inside out out.

The children made the most of the new space and enjoyed the opportunities that it gives us.

Thank you to all at Oldfield Park Infants school for making us feel so welcomed.

Fast forward to the end of March and we are in a very different time - we closed Pre-school at the end of March until June 1st.

On June 1st we welcomed back small groups of children in two ‘Bubble’s with two staff members in each ‘bubble’. We changed how we do things added extra facilities for hand washing and reduced resources to prevent cross contamination - both children and staff rose to the challenge of a new ‘normal’. Taking everything in their stride, adapting and evolving activities as time progressed.

Usually in term 6 we have sports day, end of term leavers event and a fund raising event. These were all cancelled.

To mark the end of this year and to see children that have not returned to Pre-school, yesterday staff spent the morning delivering gift bags and balloons to all of our children at home.

The staff and children were delighted to see each other and the balloons proved to be the biggest success of the day.

We now look forward to September where staff and children unite as one again - we will continue to provide the best care and experiences that we can in these time’s.

We hope everyone have a great summer and can’t wait to say ‘Hello’ to both new and old faces in September.

It's great to be back...

Here are some additions to our pre-school to keep the children safe and enable lots of outside play. We have added a sail to our playground to provide more shade on sunny days, and now have a sink unit for hand washing outside.

The children have been thrilled to be back, with lots of water play outside, lots of chatter around things that they have experienced in ‘Lockdown’ and supporting their emotional wellbeing with some ‘Mindfulness’, we have been practicing the ‘Smiling starfish’.

We look forward to keeping you updated over the coming weeks with our progress in our new ‘normal’.

Return to Pre-school - making it safe for our children

With the recent events of COVID-19 and closing the Pre-school from March 23rd, this week we have re-opened pre-school for children of Key Workers and those who will start school in September.

We have began with two groups of 8 children and two staff currently attending two mornings a week. Whilst this is a reduced timetable for now, when it is safe to do so we will increase our hours and numbers of children who can attend.

We have a rigorous cleaning program in place alongside extra facilities for handwashing and lots of water play.

Children will continue to be offered a wide range of activities and our aim is to support children’s emotional well being as they return and get used to a new ‘normal’

As we move through the rest of this term, we look forward to keeping you updated on our progress.

A cheque from the Co-op community fund

On Saturday 23rd November we went with some children to the Co-op in Oldfield Park to collect a cheque for £2878.45. The money had been raised through being a nominated charity.

We are looking to spend some of the money on taking the children to the Egg Theatre in January and to improve our outdoor area in our new setting.