<![CDATA[Lake Okareka - Preschool Newsletters]]>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 13:11:45 +1200Weebly<![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - Winter 2019]]>Tue, 10 Sep 2019 19:37:48 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-winter-2019The Preschool held our AGM in June and we have a new Chairperson: Carl Iversen. We are fortunate to maintain our existing Board Members and welcome to our newest Board member Sharon Ward. The Preschool reviewed its Philosophy to include teaching practices and values around sustainability. The teaching team, board and parents felt this was an integral part of what we do and aim to achieve appreciation of recycle-reduce-reuse. We have an article in the latest Mokoia Community Association newsletter featuring learning about storm water, drains in our community and looking after our lakes. The community orchard has produced a good crop of feijoas that have been used in cooking and sharing with our community. The children have been learning about caring for our environment, each other and how to keep safe in emergencies such as a fire or earthquake.

We recently held a special morning tea and teddy bear story time to celebrate Matariki. As part of these celebrations the children are sharing how their name was chosen and the family history behind it. We have begun learning about family cultures and linking Maori legends to developing our own art.

Parent’s evening
As part of our Fundraising this year we held our second parent evening to make beeswax kai wraps. This was also a time to create peach and ginger jam from our earlier peaches crop. It’s sure to be delicious. Both the kai wraps and jam will be on sale at this year’s Tarawera Spring Fair.

Playgroup each Tuesday
Our Playgroup is now offered weekly. This is open to families who would like to come and visit the Preschool We ask parents to come in and meet other parent’s who will soon be enrolling children at Preschool. The children are transitioning well into Preschool once they have participated in our Playgroup time. If you know of anyone in the area or would be interested in coming in for a visit feel free to pop in or give us a call soon. Playgroup times are 9.30 -11.30

Hall Bookings
For all hall bookings please contact Debbie at Preschool 362 8606
Please like us on Facebook
www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - December 2017]]>Fri, 01 Dec 2017 00:00:00 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-december-2017​The children have been experiencing maintaining the community garden with the carpet we have had donated by the Curran family. This will certainly keep our hard work of weeding down over the coming months. We are close to achieving our Heart Foundation healthy eating Gold award.

We celebrated Davina’s ten years teaching at Preschool. We held a special morning tea to celebrate. We now have a teaching team who have been teaching together for ten years.
The children have been baking a Christmas cake with Pam Bowyer, the children enjoyed being involved in contributing to our special celebration cake. We will share the cake with everyone after the Nativity Play on Friday 1st December.

Salvation Army food items collection
Our families donated non-perishable food items for this very special cause. The children then presented these to the representative from the Salvation Army who came in after the Nativity play.

Santa’s Visit to Preschool
Santa will visit on Wednesday 6th December and the children will each receive a gift from him and as we celebrate the joy of giving will also have a little something for him and Mrs Claus.

Nativity play – Friday 1st December
This play involved all the children and was a play about the story of Christmas. The play was followed by a picnic dinner at Preschool. The Salvation Army band came along to sing the Christmas carols. Santa of course made an appearance around 7pm for a lolly scramble to give lollies to the children, much to the children’s delight. Thank you to Santa and his support from the Lake Okareka Rural Fire Crew.

For all inquiries please contact office@lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz
See our website www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz
Like us on Facebook

Merri Kirihimete
The Preschool Teaching Team and Board wish you all a very Happy and Safe Christmas
]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - September 2017]]>Tue, 26 Sep 2017 00:00:00 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-september-2017AGM held 19th June
Our new Board Members are Sarah Bray Chairperson, Amanda Mutton HR Chair, Carl Iverson Treasurer, Melanie Loveless Secretary, Sarah Assen and Shelley Barbour and Debbie Hayward as General Board Members.

Movie Night
The children had a movie night here to see their favourite movie Moana. This was very popular social evening where the children could enjoy a picnic tea, treats such as popcorn and seeing their friends.

MIGS Gym
We had a trip to the Gym to experience the equipment and to have fun moving with our friends. This was an opportunity for parents to see what the gym could offer their child in encouraging physical development skills through play in a safe and fun environment.

Grandparents Day at Preschool
We share the invite with Lynmore School for Grandparents to visit Preschool on Friday 8th September. The children are encouraged to introduce their special visitors at Preschool.

Farewell
We will have a farewell for Abbey Garden who graduates to school at the end of the term.

Thank you to Ian Bowyer of Okareka Works for the repairs to our entrance gate and for moving our back fence to eliminate the erosion hazard.

Contact Preschool on 362 8606 or email office@lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz
Like us on Facebook—www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz

Preschool Board and Teaching Team]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - March 2017]]>Wed, 15 Mar 2017 13:33:17 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-march-2017The children enjoyed picking fresh tomatoes from our vegetable garden to make sandwiches with fresh rewena bread. Great to enjoy our own home grown produce.

Penguin and his travels
The Preschool penguin loves to come home and share his time with the children’s whānau. He is used to engage all children within their home environment fostering a home experience between child and family that can be shared at Preschool. We make links to each child’s unique experience of their home and what they like doing. This is fun and enjoyed by the children and with this comes the opportunity for sharing orally the experience as well as reminding everyone of the importance of listening.

Quiz Night
The Preschool Board held a Quiz night on Friday 24th February. This was a great night with the quiz questions, surprise games and a shared supper. The event was a first and it was a fun evening for all. Thanks to Kendall and Sheryl for organising this evening for us.

Dan the puppet man and road safety
Dan and his special road safety show came to Preschool on Thursday 23rd to remind children about taking care around cars, driveways and when near roads. This is a great interactive time for the children and we know the children are enjoying the amusing puppets that Dan shares with them.

Heart of Gold Saint John’s Appeal 3rd – 9th April Children will be asked to support the appeal by wearing something gold and invited to make a gold coin donation.

See our website www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz - like us on Facebook.
For enrolment enquiries please call Debbie on 362 8606.

Teaching team]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - December 2016]]>Mon, 19 Dec 2016 16:10:21 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-december-2016The children have been experiencing maintaining the community garden with the carpet we have had donated by the Curran family. This will certainly keep our hard work of weeding down over the coming months. The children have been planting flowers around the vegetable plants to keep away pests.

Congratulations to us all for achieving Preschool’s Silver Whānau Healthy Heart Award with the Heart Foundation. We are now working towards our Gold Award.

The children have been baking a Christmas cake with Sandra Goodwin, they enjoyed being involved in contributing to our special celebration cake. Sandra will soon come back to ice the cake with the children. Pam Bowyer will also come in shortly to bake a Christmas chocolate cake with the children. Thanks Sandra and Pam.

Nativity play – Friday 9th December
This play will involve all the children and will be a play about the story of Christmas. We ask that all children attend on the night of the play and will require them to come in from 5.30pm. The play will get started at 6pm. Come along and bring your picnic dinner. The Salvation Army band is coming along to sing the Christmas carols. Santa does make an appearance on the fire truck around 7pm for a lolly scramble and everyone is welcome.

Salvation Army food items collection
We do ask our families to donate non-perishable food items for this very special cause. The children will then present these to the representative from the Salvation Army who comes in after the Nativity play.

Santa’s Visit to Preschool
Santa will visit on Monday 12th December. We ask that prior to this date all children have a named and wrapped book that we can put away for Santa’s visit. The children will have the opportunity to meet Santa personally on this day.

The importance of Physical play - See this link we have received from Kirsty at Sport Bay of Plenty http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/parenting

Healthy Food Idea - Bliss Balls (Mandy Trass)
Thanks to Mandy Trass who shared this recipe during parent help duty.
1 cup rolled oats 1 tablespoon cinnamon
½ cup ground linseeds ½ cup sunflower seeds
2 cups pitted dates 1 carrot peeled and coarsely grated
230- 240g can chunk or crushed pineapple, very well drained
1 cup shredded dried coconut, plus ½ cup extra to roll

Combine the oats, linseeds, sunflower seeds and cinnamon in a food processor and blend to a fine powder. Add all remaining ingredients except coating coconut and whizz for a minute. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and pulse until the mixture is evenly combined and sticks together. Use your hands to shape tablespoon sized ball amounts. Roll balls in the extra coconut to coat. Bliss balls will stay fresh in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week or can be frozen on a tray then stored in a freezer bag or container.

Remember Wednesday 3rd February 2017 is the start of the new term. For all enquiries contact Office@lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz or visit www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz.

Merri Kirihimete - The Preschool teaching team and Board wish you all a very Happy and Safe Christmas.]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - September 2016]]>Tue, 27 Sep 2016 15:16:42 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-september-2016Welcome to our new Board - in June we held our Preschool AGM and appointed our new Board.

Chairpersons Abi Bamforth and Sarah Bray
Deputy Chair Cara Hunt
Treasurer Vanessa Bowyer
Secretary Sheryl Henman
General Board Andrew Aitken and Debbie Hayward

Olympics
The children have experienced the joy of the Olympics and we have watched the highlights of the day in the variety of sporting activities. There has been excitement creating our own medals, bronze, silver and gold. The children experienced art activities such as painting our own kiwis in those special colours, exploring and designing our own flags. There was a lot of fun in participating in physical races such as biking and ball skills where all children took part.

Conservation Week is 12 – 16 September
On Thursday 1st September to celebrate the first day of spring the children went for a walk to the Board Walk at Boyes Beach. This was to explore the newly created walkway with a guided tour from Mike and Sandra Goodwin who shared knowledge of local Dabchicks nesting and the koaro fish. The children enjoyed their visit learning about the environment here in our community. Thanks Mike and Sandra.

Healthy Heart Award
The Preschool have been learning and implementing our daily practices towards the Healthy Heart Award for learning around keeping ourselves healthy and how we can do that with healthy food choices and keeping our bodies active. This goal is part of every day at Preschool and will enable children to make healthy choices.

Lynmore School would like to hear from any parents who are wanting to enroll their children at school in the new term and for term one.

Happy Father’s Day Dads
End of term Friday 23rd September and term four starts on Monday 10th October.

For enquires contact Debbie on 362 8606, office@lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz or visit
​www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz or like us on Facebook.

Teaching Team
Debbie Leslie and Davina]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - June 2016]]>Fri, 24 Jun 2016 09:21:55 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-june-2016Nathan Wallis and the growing Brain evening for parents was held on 23rd May. We hope some of you got to
see Nathan Wallis for his evening presentation. If you did not we will let you know when he is back again next.
Davina and Debbie were fortunate to attend his foundation training day.

Children’s learning
Te whāriki is the early childhood curriculum, the learning we do at Preschool links to the goals within the curriculum. Some of the learning over the last week can be identified by the Te Whāriki goal Belonging Goal 2.

The children have been caring for the environment by gardening, removing the summer growth and preparing the soil for the new plants. They are learning about the natural world and how the seasons evolve
causing changes around them. They are involved in sharing their goals to be involved in making decisions for their own learning. The programme offers children the opportunity to take Preschool’s own penguin home for an overnight stay where children then share their penguin’s experience with the group at mat time. Oral language and being creative are promoted daily at Preschool, they are empowered to tell their own story.

Children are encouraged to share their family and whanau with the group at Preschool. Thomas and Holly’s Grandma Pam Bowyer came to bake with the children.

Fostering Creativity in children and what behaviours we should nurture with Jane Healy. In her book Your Child’s Growing Mind she lists characteristics of creative people. These are some of them:
  • Seeing patterns and relationships
  • Combining things or ideas in new ways
  • Coming to a decision independently and taking action based on it
  • The ability to shift from one idea to another
  • The ability to take a risk
  • Asking ‘what if’ questions and making insightful observations
  • Finding enjoyment in thinking and working alone
  • Having a strong intuition – ‘seeing ‘ the answer to a problem

Nathan Wallis also talked about encouraging children to be creative thinkers with open ended equipment and he shared with us that Lego was a very popular choice for encouraging children’s creativeness.

Thank you to Rotorua Duck Tours for their generosity taking our children out on the lake. We had a fabulous time again.

Farewell to Holly Bowyer who is graduating to school on Wednesday 1st June and Yasmin Skevington who graduates on Thursday 9th June—Happy School Days. Welcome to Gracie Bradley who starts Preschool on Friday 10th June.

Feijoa cake healthy recipe with Pam Bowyer
​
Made by the children and Nana Pam Bowyer, thumbs up Pam!!
Heat oven to 180 degrees, spray and line a 23cm spring form tin.
Ingredients:
½ cup milk
1.5 cups of sugar
1 cup mashed feijoas (about 8)
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
75 g softened butter

Place the above ingredients into a food processor and process until smooth.
In a large bowl sift in:
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt

Pour in the contents of the food processor, mix and pour into a prepared tin. Bake for about 40 minutes until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean. Cool for about 5 minutes in the tin, remove completely and cool on a wire tray. Dust with icing sugar, and serve with yoghurt.

Our family like it with cream cheese icing. Yum.
]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - March 2016]]>Mon, 21 Mar 2016 22:59:34 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-march-2016Welcome back everyone.

Welcome to our new families of Jasper Herbert, Paige Harrison and Lily Brears. Congratulations to Mandy, Rob and the Trass family on the safe arrival of William Joe on Tuesday 23rd February.

Thank you to John Bowyer for keeping our plants watered and cared for over the holidays. We also would like to thank Mike Goodwin for spraying the community garden for weeds and for his great effort again this year of being our friendly Santa with Sandra (Mrs Claus). Thank you to Christian and his family for the kind donation of the animal farm, the children are really enjoying exploring the animals and their transport items too. Thank you to the many families who have shared surplus produce from their home gardens.

Learning at Preschool
Chinese New Year - the children have been learning about The Chinese New Year and how this is celebrated. Together they have created their own Chinese Dragon. They also celebrated with food, fresh vegetables home grown at Preschool, tasty stir fried vegetables Chinese style were tasted and enjoyed by the children at the extended session. Some of the children were lucky to see the Chinese celebrations at the night market. The children have shared their interests which are now on the door for you to view. We ask all parents to offer how we could include something of your family’s culture this term.

We are learning about keeping ourselves sun-smart, being careful around driveways and revisiting safe rules while at Preschool. We have reminded the children of 5 rules that everybody needs to know:
​
1 Walking feet
2 Gentle hands
3 Inside voices
4 Listen to the teacher
5 Eyes on the teacher (mat times)

Like us on Facebook
Visit our website www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - December 2015]]>Fri, 18 Dec 2015 05:25:38 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-december-2015Welcome to new families Lucie Bradley, Mum and Dad Tony and Jess. Ariadne and Mum and Dad Anna and Ignatios, Olive Trass who joins big brother Harrison. At the end of the term we will have a farewell to Joseph Bowyer who is graduating to school. Happy School days Joseph.

Thank you to Katie Hoy photography for the lovely fun family photos and her kind donation for Preschool. We are going to purchase two new runner bikes and another children‘s camera. Thanks also to everyone who supported the social evening for new families and also to celebrate Debbie‘s ten years at Preschool. We had a delicious pot luck dinner/BBQ with delicious sausages from the Redwood Butchery.

Learning at Preschool—The children have been experiencing fun creating many Christmas art creations using a variety of art techniques. The hall had many displays of art and of course a Christmas tree. The children enjoyed baking the cakes again for the community. This is always a time to experience the importance around
giving and the children had the invitation to donate to the Salvation Army appeal for families again this year. Then of course we have rehearsed the Nativity songs and play which was performed on Friday 27 November was another great event. The children did a superb performance and all were stars. Thank you to LOCA Committee for another great Christmas celebration and of course to Santa making another great appearance. Santa also visited us on Friday 4th as shown below.

Recycling and Cardboard—We will not be continuing the paper and cardboard recycling at Preschool from the end of December. We thank you for support. Preschool will continue practices of recycling to care for the environment.

We close for our Christmas break on Friday 11th and reopen on Tuesday 2nd February. Enrolment enquiries can be made to office@lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz or visit our website on www.lakeokarekpreschool.co.nz

Merri Kirihimete—On behalf of the Teachers and Board of Lake Okareka Preschool we wish you a very happy and safe Christmas.]]><![CDATA[Lake Okareka Preschool - September 2015]]>Tue, 22 Sep 2015 23:57:08 GMThttp://www.lakeokareka.org/preschool-newsletters/lake-okareka-preschool-september-2015Learning this month at Preschool

We have been given some lovely woolen blankets for the children to sew their own designs from a drawing to an item of their choice. We have had a scarf, house, pillows, hat and many others.

The children have made their own Father’s Day cards featuring underpants to follow on from our recent alien
underpants story books.

Outside play has included confidence courses designed with the children themselves, as children challenge their own developing physical skills. We have also enjoyed carpentry with our own designs and other fun activities such as gloop and baking too. Spring has come and the children are now learning about spring time and what the change of season means to the world around us.

Hall
The hall has recently had a clean of the outside and gutters. Our new grass by the log cabin has established itself now and looks great.

Preschool has now earned the certificate for being a breast feeding friendly environment, after we have included resources to our parent information packs, supporting new mums and recognising areas within the preschool for mums to be with baby.

Nutrition evening with Jasmin Jackson of the Heart Foundation
On Tuesday 1st September we held a parent evening to hear more about healthy food for preschoolers and what to look for on food labels. This was a beneficial evening for us all and we were pleased to have our new computer screen to view Jasmin’s presentation. The Nutrition evening was so popular we may have another evening with Jasmin soon. We are well on our way to achieving the Heart Foundation Heart Award.

Recycling paper and cardboard
We appreciate all your donations of paper and cardboard reducing the carbon footprint. Our bin is emptied on Thursday’s and we appreciate support from our community.

We are now taking enrolments for term four and would like to hear from any parents who may be interested in coming in for an information pack and to find out about any available spaces.

We also have a Wednesday playgroup for those parents wanting to visit with their child and to find out more of what we offer. Call 362 8606 www.lakeokarekapreschool.co.nz or like us on Facebook.

Teaching team—Debbie, Leslie and Davina]]>