After practicing the song many times, we talked about the things that our family and friends might like to see at the concert. The children decided that a good concert should have singing, dancing, and music, which we all agreed we could achieve.

Firstly, the children chose the character they wanted to act out in the concert. We made a big list, and we needed to make sure that we had the right number of children in each group.
Once our parts were sorted we got busy making the costumes for each character.

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Our End of Year Concert was also a great opportuinty for us to offically open Little Lumsden. Craig Foss our local MP did a wonderful job of doing this offical job for us.

This year the children from Little Lumsden chose to interpret and perform two Wiggles songs for the opening act of ‘A Pukeko in a Ponga Tree’ at our end of year concert.
After practicing their dancing and singing many times, the Little Lumsden children were eager to show our families and friends all their moves and great singing voices. They pointed their fingers, did the twist, stood on one leg, shook their hands, stretched up, stretched down, turned around and put their bears to sleep.

Miss Safiya Roberts had asked if she could do a solo at the concert. She practiced and practiced everyday and on the day of our concert she sounded beautiful.
It was lovely that Safiya felt so confident to want to sing in front of everyone all by herself.
At Lumsden Kindergarten we believe children should be given opportunities to showcase their individual talents.

Maddy then introduced the next item, ‘A Pukeko in a Ponga Tree’ She explained how hard we had been practicing and that ALL the costumes had been made by the chidlren.
Everyone could see their families out in the audience. It was exciting and nervous at the same time.

Children have been able to integrate the different art forms of singing, dance, drama when performing, as well as incorporating their own creativity when making props and costumes for our concert. Children’s sense of belonging is reinforced through participating in the arts and rituals of their own community and kindergarten culture.
Through practicing our commitment – Herenga, confidence – Māia, courage – Hautoa, and creativity – Waihanga-tanga, the children put on a concert that you won’t forget!

To end our concert we asked our famlies to join us on stage. We taught them our Wiggles song ‘Can you Point your Fingers’. It was so much fun.

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After our concert we moved net door to Little Lumsden and had a lovely afternoon tea with everyone.

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A HUGE thank-you to our WONDERFUL families who supported our special day.
Special events always mean so much to EVERYONE; the children involved; the proud parents and it is always special for extended family members to also be part of the occasion.

‘Children’s learning and development are fostered if the well-being of their family and community is supported; and if there is a strong connection and consistency among all aspects of the child’s world.’

The children all had a wonderful time exploring the environment of Little Lumsden and eating Kaye’s fabulous cupcakes which she had provided for morning tea.

Maggie,Christine, Kaye, and Maddy all enjoyed meeting everyone and showing them around. We received lots of lovely and positive feedback about Little Lumsden – thank-you. 

Thank you to all the families who took the time to come and visit Little Lumsden for morning tea to have a look around. We hope you enjoyed your visit as much as we did.

“Honestly though Lumsden Kindergarten, for pre-schoolers to identify the Prime Minister, know his name and be that interested in him to want to say hello, I think it says a great deal to what they have been exposed to and learned at Lumsden I really do mean that. So thank you!”
Kirsty Skidmore, Mum of Evie & Sammy

We decided that we would make Cape Kidnappers in the art room out of some of the boxes and polystyrene that we had. We stuck it all together with staples and cellotape first.
Next we mixed up some glue and tore up newspaper. We used paper mache to make the boxes look like Cape Kidnapppers. We all worked as a team to paint it and when we were finished we thought it looked FANTASTIC!!

We also made Gannets to live on our Cape Kidnappers. We used white feathers, stuffing, wool and different coloured sticks, paper and card. We selected what we wanted to use and then used cellotape and the hot glue gun to put them together.

Some people brought Hawkes Bay things in to share with us.

Some children have made some of the Hawkes Bay things we have been learning about. Rosa and Evie made Splash Planet out of blocks in the mat room. Harriet, Finn, Ed and Safiya made an “Art Deco Spanish Mission building.” Lots of children have enjoyed making Splash Planet in the sandpit too!

Olivia told us that the Art Deco car was different than our own cars because it doesn’t have seat belts and you have to push a button to make it go.
WACKY!

We had so much fun trying on the costumes and playing in the Art Deco car, pretending to drive it and of course tooting the horn.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dhCXGhH2vY

A HUGE thank-you to Sally and Olivia Jackson for sharing their knowledge about Art Deco with everyone at Lumsden which made our study of Hawkes Bay extra special.
Sally even suggested Lumsden could do something for Art Deco month next year. GREAT idea Sally.



Come and join us for morning tea on the 4th November at 10am. 

You will get to preview the new centre, your child can have a play, as well as meet the teachers. 

We would LOVE to see you there.

We all got our lunch boxes and followed the path to Little Lumsden.
Before we sat down to eat, we were able to look inside to see the rooms where our friends Anna, Jamie, Joshua, Charlie S, Jacob, Thomas, and Sammy are going to be moving to in the very near future.

It was lovely that as a Kindergarten we could all come together as a group and have our first meal together at our new centre. It was also very special that our Little Lumsden children could share their new environment with everyone too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_nCdzJ2Yb4

We painted our cardboard

There were lots of different things to choose to put on our I Spy pictures. Some of these included cars, planes, dinosaurs, coins, balls, rattles, numbers and letter, and eyes! There was also a kiwiana plate with lots of New Zealand and Māori things to choose from. These included tiki, pounamu, silver ferns, coru, paua, mārae, pukeko, and New Zealand and Māori flags.
Having both options for the children added a different dynamic to our I Spy pictures, as there are no New Zealand or Māori themes in the I Spy books.

The children selected all their objects and placed them on their cardboard where they wanted them to go. Then it was time to use the hot glue guns to stick everything on. We all needed to practice our safety, as the hot glue guns can be a little warm and sticky, but if we hold them correctly then they are safe to use.

Now that all of the things were glued onto our painted cardboard it was time to write the words to our’ I Spy’ picture. This would help our family and friends know what they needed to look for when they are playing.

They look GREAT!

I Spy books and this art activity offer rich language opportunities for children and helps create exciting literacy rich experiences as well as being a fun and hands on art activity.
The result is a piece of art that can be used as an interactive game with family members and friends and, without even knowing it, children are beginning to learn basic early reading skills.

We went on a smoke alarm hunt at Lumsden which prompted children to have a ‘hunt’ at their own homes to see if they could find smoke alarms and fire extinguishers at their house.

This is what some of the children had to say about the smoke alarms at their house:

 Alexander: “My Dad put the smoke alarms up.  We’ve got four.  There is one in the hallway and in the lounge and I have one beside my bedroom.  My Nana has one too.”

 George: “I have a smoke alarm in the hall and in the lounge.  In my bedroom I have one in the middle to let me know there is a fire in the house.”

 Matthew: “I have eight smoke alarms at my house.  They tell us to get out and stay out.”

 Ben Ryan: “I have got a smoke alarm in my bedroom.  I have got five at my house.”

We have been very impressed with the children’s enthusiasm for this study. It has been great to hear them talking about being firewise and taking what they have learnt about fire safety and fire fighters into their dramatic play.

It has been very valuable learning as now our children are prepared if there is a fire at Lumsden and at home and they are taking some responsibility for their own health and safety’ and are empowered by what they have learnt to keep themselves safe in the event of a fire.

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Something very exciting arrived at Lumsden, two rugby goal posts!! Jo’s husband, Lewis, kindly made the rugby goal posts for us. We were very excited to see them, put them up and practice our kicking skills.  We think we will be as good as Dan Carter soon!

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We were very lucky at Lumsden to have a ‘Rippa’ Rugby coach come in to teach us how to play. Aaron also brought his son Callum, who used to come to Lumsden, to be his assistant coach. Aaron was a FANTASTIC coach and he taught us how to catch and pass the ball, run with the ball and most important of all, how to score tries. We don’t think the parents have had their own coach, so we know that we are going to be able to beat them easy in our Lumsden World Cup.

We practiced ‘Rippa’ Rugby EVERY DAY, just like the All Blacks, so we knew the basics of the game.

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In preparation for our big game of Rippa Rugby, the children and teachers have been learning the Haka to perform before we start playing. This will hopefully intimidate the parents and lead us to victory!
We thought there was no one better to learn from than the professionals, The All Blacks, so at mat-time we set up the big movie screen and watched them perform the mighty haka.

There are some important words and actions that we need to learn in order to perfect the haka: ‘Ka Mate’.

Well the day of the Lumsden ‘Rippa’ Rugby World Cup finally arrived. The children came to Lumsden all dressed in their rugby clothes and ready to play against their family members. Everyone was so excited and we spent the whole morning talking about how much we had been practicing and how much we wanted to beat the parents!

The final score was 12 – 1 to the Lumsden children.

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Everyone had a FANTASTIC time playing rugby today and we are sure it will be a day that is remembered for a long time. Thank you to all the families who came down to join in the fun.