How our bodies work theme

 Science class at the Norfolk Island Central school science lab

 Using our big gross motor muscles

 A visit to the dentist

The sweetest beetroot relish made by our children.

I got this recipe from Not Quite Nigella who visited Norfolk island in the past year.
Click here for full instructions.

 

This is the recipe

Beetroot Relish

An Original Recipe By Not Quite Nigella

• 500g beetroot, roasted* instructions below
• 1 tablespoon oil
• 1 teaspoon yellow mustard seeds
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 tablespoon oil
• 3/4 cup-1 cup white or brown sugar
• 3/4 cup water
• 1/4 teaspoon allspice
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 4 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
• 2 teaspoons salt

 

We used the freshest just picked beetroot while the natural sugars were quite high.

I added chopped spring onions, coriander and orange zest also freshly picked from the garden.

 While we were making things from the garden, It was time for some science fun.

Have you ever tried a purple cabbage ph experiment?

First boil some purple cabbage leaves, save the coloured water and discard the leaves (or eat them for lunch!)

When the water has cooled, keep in a clear jar or beaker so the children can experience the magic.

 

By adding acids and alkalines found in our kitchen, we were amazed by the water turning a combination of reds/pinks and green/blues.

 

Try these and see what happens to your cabbage water.

lemon juice, egg white, vinegar, baking soda, hydrogen peroxide, salt and hot sauce.

 

Have fun!

 

October Mini News

Minischool October Mini News

October was another bright and busy month for the pre-schoolers and staff up on Prince Phillip drive. We celebrated 4 birthdays, went on many more adventures discovering this wonderful island.

We also dove into history visiting 2 of the 4 museums, walking up and down the flagstaff stairs and going for bushwalks in the National park to enjoy our lunch under the tallest pine tree.
We also visited the supply ships coming to the island which brings our grocery supplies.

 Our favourite outing by far was taking the entire class to sit in the front row of Charlie and the Chocolate factory. Our pre-schoolers were mesmerised from the first moment and were glued to their seats during the whole show. We were very proud of the minischoolers for being so well behaved but especially proud of the NICS staff and children for bringing such an amazing performance together for us to enjoy.

Working through the October school holidays with our preschool vacation care program, we completed some amazing art projects while studying Artists, authors and illustrators Van Gogh, Eric Carle, Shirley Barber and Franz Marc who painted the blue horse. Our sunflowers were spectacular.
 We were lucky to join forces with Baunti Escapes kids club to splatter paint an outdoor dining table. It really was a work of art.

We also has friendship week where we found new ways to be great friends and show kindness to others.

 

 please visit our facebook page https://www.facebook.com/minischoolpreschool

to view our mini newsletter notes from previous months (from May 2013) onwards.

 

I just want to give you a little sample of some of our lunchbox of the week winning ideas.

October

French toast with maple syrup, 3 boiled whalebird eggs, raw cashews, cherry tomatoes, raw cashews, cucumber and tomato cut into small pieces, dates and pretzels, ham sandwich, tinned pears.

A more complete list will be on the blog. We get some really good healthy for ideas as preschool. All of these lunch boxes are also rubbish free. More great food ideas for lunchboxes are in the folder at preschool or on our blog.

 

 

Happy 5th birthday Mr J.R.R

What did we get up to in September 2013?

September at Minischool Educational preschool Norfolk Island.

"My life should be filled with wonder, discoveries, and adventure. Take me outside. Let me get to know and love nature. I will remind you what it's like to see with a child's eyes and open heart." Let's go outside and play on the natural preschool playground!

 

September seems to have been merged in to the recently departed August.

Followed hot on the heels by October, but first we had better go back to all the events and daily adventures that make Minischool so fresh and inspiring for myself and the pre-schoolers.

Starting off with Father’s day, the children painted some very special pictures for their daddies. And then wrote down all of the reasons we love them so much.

While we were enjoying the strawberries, snow peas, cherry tomatoes and oranges in our garden and watching it growing bigger, we embraced the spring theme in our butterfly corner garden waiting for the first monarch caterpillar to appear on the plants specifically for them. Our worm café keeps us interested watching them devour all sorts of natural products from paper to eggshells. The worms give us great worm juice to put back into the garden so we are grateful to them. Our giant sunflowers are fascinating especially when the bees visit or a smiley face appears in the disk florets (center part of the sunflower). We are looking forward to seed saving these giants to share among our families, so everyone can have some to grow & enjoy.

Thank you to Admin for grading Prince Phillip drive, the roadwork equipment kept our boys (and the girls) entertained in its various stages of completion. I think our favourite was the rumbling grumbling roller that flattened the road and made us vibrate while standing on the side, it was almost like and earthquake one 4 year old commented.

When the road was completed, we headed for a picnic morning tea down the hill at Cockpit waterfall to read a story on the footbridge followed by some gutsy grass hill running. We are still unsuccessful in finding any geocaches that are reported to be in that area. I am hoping that if any locals can help us with finding geocaches on the island, could they please contact us as we would love to be involved in possibly hiding some in the future as well.

 At the Athletics carnival we made pom poms in our team colours and headed to the school oval to support our brothers, sisters, friends and former Montessori Kinderhaus pupils. It was fun to watch them racing and gave more encouragement to our children who are commencing kindergarten in 2014. The hit of the day though wasn’t the lolly scramble; it was the school playground slide!

Our school holidays gave us some extra pre-schoolers and ‘helpers’ while having time off from their school. This was a good opportunity to have an emergency services week. We did our preschool homework learning the correct numbers to call in case of an emergency and enjoyed the role play of acting our different scenes.

The fun part was the visit to the Emergency services shed and the ride on the fire engines up and down the runway. We loved the uniforms and learning to stop drop and roll if on fire. Our local firemen were so awesome I am sure everyone went home and begged their parents to work on an evacuation plan for their house.

A few days later we visited the Norfolk Island Police station with our specially self-made constable badges and spent time in the jail cell. I think a few of our children had a bit too much fun in there dancing to the cameras and in the back of the paddy wagon. Thanks to our local police, especially Shaun and Tim for spoiling the minischoolers.

We had a great time (not sure if we were meant to have that much fun) J  Back at preschool, the 5 year old forensic team were fingerprinting all the children for their scrapbooks. Great work everyone.

We did manage to fit lots of preschool work in. There was writing letters and numbers, math equations, blended sounds, mapping and geography puzzles and so much more.

September was a busy month for birthdays too. We managed to celebrate 4 times by making our own cakes (mine was rainbow!) having a dance party, making a group card and party games.

In the middle of the month we celebrated dress like a pirate day as a fundraiser for childhood cancer. All of our children and staff dressed for the occasion at the school library as we found plenty of books to help us ‘yo-ho-ho’ and ‘ahoy there me hearties’ for the day. Thanks to all of our families for donating a gold dubloon or two to this worthwhile cause.

Minischool thanks its families for the support throughout the year.

We are constantly striving to make every day learning fun and encouraging while we learn about ourselves, our place in the community and the world we live in.

♥Cristina

Happy 5th Birthday to Mr M.

Happy 3rd Birthday Mr O.