The Jays Day Care Nursery, Pre-School and Outdoor Learning
01752 894437
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Summer Newsletter 2020
The Jays Day Care Nursery • May 11, 2020
Dear Parents/Carers
Welcome to the Summer Newsletter. First and foremost, we would like to say a very big THANK YOU to all our parents for being so understanding and supportive through this extremely difficult time. We would also like to give a big THANK YOU to all our staff too. To those coming into work and carrying on and going above and beyond and to those who are unable to come into work but are keeping in touch with parents and with the team here. Both situations bring
their own challenges. We are missing seeing everyone and can’t wait to see our little ones and staff team back here and get back to being our Jays family
School Leavers & New Starts
We will be saying a very sad farewell to all our school leavers; Joseph, Emily, Flissy, Skylark, Laila, Huw, Rory C, Rory H, Sam, Finley, Jenson, Scarlett, Rufus and Neve.
Hopefully we will see them back at Nursery before heading off to school but if not, we wish them all lots of luck and happiness in their next stage in life and we are sure they will all love and relish their new big adventure. We will miss
each and every one of them greatly. Please do come and visit and also send some photo’s in of your first days at school.
Given the current situation, we are aware that some parents have concerns about the readiness of their child for school. Please keep in mind that you have the right to delay your child’s school start date.
If you don’t think they are quite ready, they are welcome at nursery for another term or for however long you feel they need. They do not need to start school until the 31 December, 31 March or 31 August following their fifth birthday - whichever comes first.
If your child’s fifth birthday is on one of those dates then they reach compulsory school age on that date. Schools should also keep their
place for them.
As well as saying goodbye we are also lucky to welcome some new
children to The Jays; Artie and Marley. We would like to give a
warm Jays welcome to you and your
families. When we get back to
normal, we look forward to getting
to know you much better.
Tea Party - Friday 10th July at 5pm
The Tea Party this year was going to be held on Friday 10th July at 5pm
We have our annual tea party for our leavers presentation and to celebrate the nursery’s birthday. It will be the nursery’s 25th Birthday but is unlikely that this
will go ahead. We will keep you posted. An Olympic theme had been planned but we may have to rethink this as they have been cancelled this year. If we do not go ahead, we will try to do something at a later stage and we will include our school leavers.
Creative Workshop
We have had to suspend Creative Workshop for the time being. The children had been taking part in music, dance and drama sessions and were getting ready to perform
‘Be brave little penguin’. I am sure you have heard some of the songs by now! Apologies for having to cancel the performance due to the Corona Virus restrictions. Hazel
will be back with more fun things to do soon.
2 Year Old Funding
If you are on a low income you may be eligible for 2 year old funding. Please check your eligibility at
30 Hours Funding
If you are entitled to and are planning to use the extended 30 hours funding, we have to verify your 11 digit code by 31st August. (children turning 3 in the summer term). Please bear in mind that some parents have found it can take up to 15 days to receive the code. Devon County have made it clear that if your code isn’t
verified by 31st August you won’t get any funding until January. Please note, we will send the relevant funding forms to you the half term prior to you being eligible for funding.
Tapestry
Please do keep in touch especially with your child’s key worker. If you are unsure about how to add observation and photo’s on Tapestry, please use this link and there is a useful parent tutorial that may be of help to you. Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you are having any problems accessing your account and we will
Tapestry
do our best to help with this.
Beach School & Forest School
Beach School and Forest School were both going well despite the bad weather we were having prior to lock-down. Apologies for having to cancel a couple of sessions but sometimes it is beyond our control.
We will resume these sessions as soon as we are able. We already have a lists of children wanting to take part from September. If you would like your child to take part please email to let us know. We will prioritise the eldest first to ensure that everyone gets to go if they want to before they go onto school. These sessions are open to 3 and 4 year olds. A letter will be sent out with a booking form. If you don’t receive a letter and you think this might be something your child would enjoy
please speak to a member of staff
Summer Clothing
For children that are still attending, just a reminder that as the better weather approaches please could you make sure your child has all of the following items every day and that these are labelled:
- Full change of clothes
- Sunhat
- Jumper
- Lightweight waterproof
- coat (just in case)
- wellies
Could you also make sure that all T-shirts and dresses have a sleeve so
shoulders are covered please.
Please do take a look at Facebook and ‘like’/’share’ and comment on our page. The staff have taken up the challenge are doing an amazing job of posting stories, songs and activities. You can find us here
Emails
We do our best to check emails throughout the day, however, there are occasions when we are with the children beyond 6 0’clock and it has not been possible to get into the office. If anything is urgent and you haven’t had a reply, please do telephone. Whilst we are on a 3 day week the telephones have been diverted so should still be answered but please do leave it to ring longer.
Work In Progress
The children haven’t had much opportunity to enjoy the new preschool playground but I am sure they will continue to have great fun when they return. We are planning to make some changes to our baby toddler play area. Once we know where we are when the current crisis is over we will look at how we can progress this.
Many thanks to all of you who have helped raise money for our outdoor learning space. We have raised £325 so far!
Easyfundraising
If you are not already signed up to help, please do take a look – through easyfundraising you can help us raise funds simply by doing your everyday online shopping with over 3,300 big name retailers like Amazon, Argos, John Lewis, ASOS, Booking.com, eBay, Boden, and M&S.
Every time you shop, we receive a small donation to say ‘thank you’ and it’s completely free too! We want to raise as much as possible
please sign up and help us at
Dates For Your Diary
25th – 29th May
Half Term
Friday 10th July
Tea Party - The Jays 25th Birthday
Party, performance and Leavers Presentation – ON HOLD
Monday 20th July
Last day of Summer Term
Monday 26th August
Bank Holiday – Nursery Closed
Monday 7th September
First day of Autumn Term for Term Time Only Children
Thursday 15th October
Photographer 2pm – 5pm
26th– 30th October
Half term for term time children
IN THE MOMENT PLANNING AND MESSY PLAY
Welcome to the Spring and Summer Newsletter. As we head into the Summer Term it was clear time had run out for our Spring Newsletter so we have amalgamated the two together.
We hope you have all had a lovely summer and made the most of the sunshine although it was a little while ago now.
Welcome to the Summer Term and let us hope for some lovely weather over the coming months! Apologies for the absence of our Spring Newsletter but it has been a very busy time here at the Nursery.
We hope you have all had a lovely summer and made the most of the sunshine although it was a little while ago now.
Welcome to the Summer Term and let us hope for some lovely weather over the coming months!
Welcome back to a new term at The Jays. We hope you all had a lovely Christmas and we hope the year ahead brings some sort of normality. We have had some lovely new children and their families join us. We would like to welcome Jemima, Matthew, Poppy, Austin, James P, Hanna, Arthur, Tommy, Charles, Benjamin and Toby. We hope everyone has settled/settles well and enjoys nursery life. We would also like to welcome some new staff. Danéll has been with us a few weeks and you may already have met her. The children love her already. We would also like to introduce Jack and Heather who you will meet over the coming weeks. We have realised that with the new regime regarding pick-up and drop off it is not quite so easy to introduce new staff. Apologies for this, we will endeavour to introduce them to you at the door once they have settled in. We feel sure they will fit in well with our lovely team of staff. Lydia and Clare are settling into their new role of Deputy to Jacqui and Gill is happily plodding on in her role in the office.
We hope you have all had a lovely summer and made the most of the sunshine. Welcome back to our term time children and those who haven’t attended for a while. For some of you it has been an extended break! We hope you are all well rested and ready to face a new term and the new ‘normal’ here at The Jays.
We put together this video clip for all our children who couldn't come to Nursery/Pre-School during the corona virus pandemic. We hope you like it
‘We are moving from forward planning to In the Moment Planning’. You can see more detail about this on our Home Links page. If you have any queries about this please do not hesitate to contact us.