Welcome A very warm welcome Luke,

Matthew, Emily, Eiliyah, Max, Rory

and Primrose. It’s lovely to have you

with us and we hope that you will

enjoy being part of the Footprints

Family.

19th October Parents evening. 10 minute

appointments available from 6-8pm

8th November Christmas Photographer from 9am

Dates for the diary….

September 2016

MacMillan coffee morning… A massive thank you to everyone who came

and bought cake at our MacMillan coffee

morning. We had such a lovely time and your

generous donations helped us to raise

£121.09 for this worthy cause. Our beautiful

Peter Rabbit cake was made for us by Zoe

who is a parent from our Tots Room, thank

you Zoe, he looks very proud!

Some new faces…

Viktoria Sirokai Chloe Hall Hope Whiston

Lauren Barber Maggie Kowolska Cassy Stanley

Nikki Sutton

Top Tips for Talking…

Here’s Top Tip number 3…

Please let us know if you have any worries or concerns regarding your child’s speech and we’ll be

happy to help.

this is what we will be mainly focussing on when we talk about “school readiness”.

We will help and encourage your child to write their name, count, hear initial letter

sounds and perhaps even sound words out but before all this we need to make sure

they are confident enough to “have a go”.

We will also be focussing on other skills they will need when they get to school for

example: putting their coat on so they can play outside without relying on the dinner

ladies, putting their shoes and socks on so they can get ready for PE and feel very

proud that they did it “all by themselves” and develop relationships with their peers

so the school playground is a fun place to be

em and encouraging children to “have a go” and this is what we will be mainly

focussing on when we talk about “school readiness”. We will help and encourage

your child to write their name, count, hear initial letter sounds and perhaps even

sound words out but before all this we need to make sure they are confident

enough to “have a go”.

We will also be focussing on other skills they will need when they get to school for

example: putting their coat on so they can play outside without relying on the dinner

ladies, putting their shoes and socks on so they can get ready for PE and feel very

proud that they did it “all by themselves” and develop relationships with their peers

so the school playground is a fun place to be

vvxmnvnmnvmnzv

Emotions and feelings... Whether you’re 3 years old or 33 years old, feelings and emotions can be tricky things to manage

sometimes. Our mood and the way it makes us feel can have a very big impact on our friendships,

our happiness and the way we see ourselves as adults and our children are no different. Being able

to recognise our feelings and the feelings of others is called emotional intelligence and can take a

long time to perfect! Some recent theories linking children’s emotions and moods to music have

been thought to support the development of emotional intelligence and so I thought I’d share some

interesting ideas with you…..

When our children begin to show difficult emotions we often find that we instantly try to distract

them, especially if we’re in the middle of Sainsbury’s. The thinking is, that by rushing children away

from sadness, anger or fear we actually give them negative messages about how they were feeling.

They can begin to doubt themselves and deny themselves opportunities to be sad or angry for fear

that it is unacceptable and unwanted. If we can support children to acknowledge where they are

emotionally, it is thought to help them to move on. Children often don’t have the language to say

how they feel so we need to label these feelings for them. Another child taking the car they were

holding half an hour ago can be very difficult for them and the flood of emotion that takes over often

means they’re unable to make choices about how to behave in that moment. By honouring the

emotion responsible for their behaviour and labelling it as sad or angry we actually add more

behavioural choices to their repertoire.

By listening to and matching a child’s feelings to songs or music of a similar mood, we open up

what is known as a ‘therapeutic moment’ that allows a child to move on from a mood they may have

been stuck in. If we recognise when a child is sad/happy/angry and give them opportunities through

music to express themselves, it gives them permission to feel, rather than battling against their

mood. Happiness is often associated with fast music, upward actions and the colour green.

Sadness links to slow music, downward actions and the colour blue. Anger links to loud music, big

actions and the colour red and scared feelings link to quiet music, small actions and the colour

yellow. Singing songs like ‘If you’re happy and you know it’ but extending the words to include, ‘If

you’re sad and you know it have a cry’ and ‘If you’re angry and you know it stamp your feet.’

You can also use puppets to model a mood and show your child an emotion through the puppet.

Sing the words ‘mood music, mood music what mood are you in?’ Ask them how the puppet might

be feeling and how they know this, then sing ‘Why are you grumpy/sad/scared?’ and accept their

answers as representations of what they might be feeling.

How about this little emotion rap to try at home? The leader models the voice, expression and

action to fit a mood and the followers copy. For example:

Leader: ‘When Mahachagogo’s happy he says…..’

Mmmmmm Use facial expressions and actions to show the mood

Aaaah

Oooooh

Lah lah lah

(follower repeats)

Leader: ‘When Mahachagogo’s sad he says…..’

Booo

Hooo

Wah wah wah

Employee of the Month! As a team, we like to notice the talents and hard work we see in each other everyday. During the

month, when someone sees someone else going the extra mile for a child or family or showing

particular support for another member of their team, we write it down and pop it into a box in our

staff room. At our staff meeting the messages are read aloud to everyone and an employee of the

month is identified.

This month it was Suzie! Suzie has worked extremely hard to manage the Toddler Room whilst

Cassy has been away and we all want to thank her for everything she’s done.

If there’s someone you think should be rewarded please send an email and let me know……