Hatch Warren Under Fives Preschool

It’s nearly time to say goodbye to our big children leaving for school. It’s been a busy year full of adventures at Hatch Warren Under Fives and we’ve loved watching our children have fun and gain confidence. It’s extremely rewarding to see our little ones grow and progress, and we’re very proud of all of them.

Over the last few weeks many of the children have been making visits to their new “big” schools. They’ve been chatting about their new schools and new teachers and playing “schools” in role-play. It’s exciting times but we should remember that change is difficult for us all. At Hatch Warren Under Fives we do our best to support the children and help them through the transitions into new schools. Research suggests that transitions are central to young children’s development and emotional well being, and the way in which the first transitions are handled could have a significant impact on the child’s capacity to cope with change in the short and long term. At Hatch Warren Under Fives we support the transition process in a range of ways. We help to prepare a child for school by liaising closely with the schools, working with our families, taking the views of the child into account and providing ‘school-like’ experiences. If you have any concerns or worries about your little one starting school please speak to any member of our team. What is very important to remember is that TRANSITION IS A PROCESS NOT A SINGLE EVENT.

When we look back over the year we realise that we have so many people and organisations to thank, our community put so much into our preschool and really help to enhance the children’s’ learning experiences. We’d like to thank Tesco for their “Farm to Fork” experience; Asda for the shopping trip invitation and ongoing support; Sainsburys for all of their amazing food donations to our fundraising events; the St Mark’s lollipop man for visiting the children and teaching them about road safety; the wonderful music lady, Lucy Barclay, who spent an afternoon singing and playing instruments with the children; the Army man for coming in dressed in combat gear – so much fun for to the children; St Kitts Veterinary Group, who made a fantastic visit to us recently to talk about what we do at the vets, they even bought along Dudley the lifelike dog, who was expertly bandaged and given fluids and medicine by the children who were of course appropriately dressed in surgical hats and masks!

Our committee deserve a big thank you too – they’ve put on some brilliant events for parents and children this year including a preschool disco, a Christmas raffle, Easter egg hunts, Teddy Bears picnics, Mother’s Day afternoon teas, Father’s Day bacon butty afternoons and sponsored obstacle courses. And a really big thank you to our parents too for their support and involvement – and of course our fantastic children!

Other exciting news is that Hatch Warren Under Fives has been selected as Co-ops chosen charity – this is great news as they help us fund raise, which is vitally important for our preschool.

We’re looking forward to meeting our new September starters in a few days, we’ll be giving them a little taster of preschool when we have our information and play session on July 10^th.

Then our last big event of the year is our leavers day – we’ll be spending the morning at Beggarwood Park playing and eating ice creams before heading back to preschool to enjoy afternoon tea with families and friends before a big sing-song and graduation ceremony – something we are all looking forward to.

We wish all of our children leaving us this summer lots of luck and every success at school. And wee hope you ALL have a great summer.

For preschool registration enquiries please contact Michelle Tejevo, Head of Preschool, on 01256 322788 or email preschoolmail@aol.com.

Our last PrePlay baby and toddler group of the term will be Friday 14^th July at Hatch Warren Community Centre. 9.15am-10.30am and 10.45am-midday. Suitable from birth – 5 years. £3 per session. No need to book, just turn up and play.

Please also come along and see us at the Hatch Warren Community Centre Summer Festival on July 8th – Hatch Warren Under Fives will be there with lots of fun activities for little ones from 12pm-4pm.

www.hatchwarrenunderfives.co.uk