Category: Kids

Vale Village Fun Day

games1It had to had to happen. After 3 years with sunny weather this year we were greeted by torrential downpours as we surveyed Grange park on the morning of the event. Contingency plans were quickly oct-vc-img_1619put in place and we transferred as many activities as possible to the Village Hall. The lingering question was, with the weather being so unpleasant, would anyone come?

At 2pm a steady stream of people headed towards the hall. Whether attracted by the smell of the free barbecue or the desire to get out of the house with active children they came! As people arrived in the car park they were greeted by a petting farm, donkey rides and games. The rain was no barrier to people meeting the animals or queuing for a burger or hot dog. Once inside bouncy castles, soft play, face painting, cakes, a nail bar, oct-vc-img_1627crafts, games and so much more added to the hive of activity. Our aim has always been to bless the village by giving a place where friends could gather, kids play safely and fun could be had in abundance, seemed to be a reality. One of the keys for us as a church is that we pay for everything so families can just relax and enjoy themselves without worrying about the cost. Freely we have received, freely we want to give.

oct-vc-img_1628

 

Plans are already in place for next year’s Vale Village Fun Day. We know it can be great in the rain but we really do want it to be sunny! Maybe we should all start praying now? 🙂

 

 

 

Children’s Corner

Autumn Leaf Hedgehog

oct-hedgehog

This is an easy craft make when the autumn leaves begin to fall.
Draw a hedgehog outline on a piece of paper. Collect different coloured autumn leaves, spiky shaped ones work best. Starting at the top, glue a layer of leaves across the body, making sure the points of the leaves are pointing upwards. Then add a second layer of leaves which slightly overlap the base of the first row. Continue to add layers of leaves until your hedgehog’s body is covered. Add a face and your hedgehog is complete.

 

 

September, Playgroup

Due to the Village Hall having a new kitchen and boiler fitted at the beginning of September, Playgroup will resume on Monday 26th September 9am.
For more information please contact us via the website:wenvoeplaygroup.co.uk or email wenvoeplaygroup@btinternet.com or telephone Monday to Friday between 8:30 and 12noon 02920597494 (a 24 hour answer phone also available).

August Update

As I write this we have just closed for the summer holidays and are looking forward to a relaxing break.

The summer term was a very busy term indeed. Staff had 35 children’s reports to update/write, photograph albums to complete, along with fun things to organise such as our trip, family BBQ and children’s end of term party.

[Picnic time – Bristol Zoo For our trip this summer we visited Bristol Zoo. Parents, Grandparents and children supported the trip and a fun wet day was had by all. Thank you to Emma Wheadon for arranging our coach travel.

 

 

End of Term BBQFor our family BBQ, the sun was shining, and an enjoyable time was had by all. The bouncy castle was great fun for the children (and the big kids) along with the pony rides and tattoos/nails on offer. Thank you Issy and Gaby for donating your tattoos and nail varnish to make the event fun. Thank you Sam and Maisey for allowing us to use your pony for rides in the car park. The children and adults thoroughly enjoyed their afternoon and what a great way to end a great year. End of Term BBQ

Without the help and support of parents and extended families, events like this wouldn’t happen, so thank you all for making it such a special day.

 

# AUG playgroup image1At the end of term the children and their families presented the playgroup staff with a gift of a tree. What a wonderful idea and myself and the staff would like to thank you all for this most precious gift by sharing the following:

‘As with every tree, growth takes place in two opposite directions, both away from and further into the ground. This reflects how social pedagogy interacts between society and the individual. Social pedagogy aims to provide nurturing conditions that support children’s growth in both directions, towards independence and interdependence’. There are two things that children should get from their parents; roots and wings (Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe 1749 – 1832).

We look forward to supporting children and parents for many years at the playgroup. Each day we will see this tree as the tree of life and remind ourselves what a wonderful job both practitioner and parent do in supporting children’s learning when working together.

 

Although we have a private social media page not everyone can access it. Therefore; we would like to thank everyone for their gifts and cards of appreciation. Thank you for the kind words written, especially the drawings/mark making entered by the children to express their thoughts.

For those who are moving on to various reception and nursery schools, we would like to wish you all the best for the future. For those who are returning to playgroup we re-open on Monday 26th September at 9am (late due to the Village Hall having a kitchen fitted).

We will be open on Wed 21st and Thursday 22nd September for the new children to visit with their families for settling in days. These will also be open days for anyone wishing to view our provision to see what we can offer moving forward into our wrap around care with the nursery at Gwenfo. We are amending Thursday daycare to a Wednesday from September due to demand.

Our operating hours from September will be Monday and Wednesday 9am until 3:15pm (with ‘drop off’ and ‘collection’ at Gwenfo Nursery) and Tuesday to Friday 9am – 12:45pm with ‘drop off’ to Nursery for 1pm. (once the school have FULL capacity, we may look at extending daycare to other days. We will operate and adjust our care to the need of the community).

If you require further information on our services then please contact us via email during the holidays: wenvoeplaygroup@btinternet.com or visit our web site wenvoeplaygroup.co.uk

We are now no longer in partnership for Early Years Funding with the Vale of Glamorgan. We continue to be registered with Care and Social Services Inspectorate Wales (CSSIW).

For places at Gwenfo Nursery please contact the Vale of Glamorgan Nursery Admissions online. You are able to register interest for children who are aged 3 years and above prior to 31st March 2017 at this time.

Sandra

 

BIG LOTTERY FUND

We are delighted to inform you that Wenvoe Playgroup have been awarded £2,500 from the Big Lottery Fund's Awards for All programme. The grant will be used to replace the outdoor slide and to advertise the Playgroup services to a new audience of parents and children in Cardiff and the Vale area. This is part of the new Fundraising Strategy adopted by the Management Committee in January 2016 to generate new and additional sources of income for Wenvoe Playgroup. Thank you Big Lottery Wales!

Children’s corner

MAP GAME
You will need a map or and atlas. Choose a place name from the map and challenge your friend/parent to see if they can find it within a couple of minutes.
If they manage it, they choose the next place.. If they don’t find it show them on the map and choose another place for them to find.
You may be surprised to find some of the names of small villages.
This is a good game to play in the car to help make the time pass on a long journey.

Messy Church

How far can you slide on a soapy, wet, blue sheet of tarpaulin? It turns out the Wenvoe Messy Church children can slide all the way across and some ended up covered shoulders to toes in soapy bubbles! Even small toddlers were having fun slipping around and gave their parents an opportunity to join the kids and have ago! # AUG MessyC IMG_20160717_203255

This was all part of the summer spectacular;Messy Sports event for Messy Church. While joining in water games; hula hooping (Georgia was definitely the champion at this!); cross country skiing on planks of wood; stilt walking; a wet sponge water fight and a few games of human noughts and crosses; we were thinking about everyone joining in, working together and respect for others. We ended our afternoon with a short worship around the fire pit (our singing could be heard as far away as Wenvoe Close!) followed by hot dogs and toasting marshmallows on the camp fire.

Huge thanks go to the Messy Church organising team for putting on yet another marvelous family event. Messy Church is a collaboration between St Mary’s and Vale Village Churches and relies on a number of volunteers from the village and both churches who organise and run the event including, activities, worship, music and cooking. This includes, most importantly, ensuring that we have enough stickers for all the children to collect as they complete each task and making sure we include plenty of  “messy” activities in each session!

In particular for this event we’d like to thank the Gwenfo C-i-W Primary School who gave us free use of their sports field and fire pit. It was a wonderful location for this outdoor event and proved to be enough space for the activities to spread out so the wet and dry activities could be kept separate! It also allowed the parents to relax and let their children take part freely in whichever activity appealed to them next in a safe environment and for parents to join in with the event. We’d also like to thank 1st Wenvoe Scout Group for lending us some of their equipment, in particular the ‘plank skis’ and stilts. These really added to the challenges and enjoyment of the afternoon.# AUG MessyC IMG_20160717_203201

Finally, the next Messy Church event will be back in the Community Centre on Saturday 1st October at 3.30pm. If you'd like to be involved or find out more please contact Gary Smith on 07782 305 738, gary@igniteme.org or https://www.facebook.com/Messy-Church-Wenvoe- 928148507307912. We look forward to seeing you all there.

Playgroup News

For all parents wishing to enrol their children from September 2016, a ‘drop in’ session will be held from 3:30pm on Thursday 30th June.

We have amended our registration to register children from the age of 2 years and 4 months into the setting. For those who will be attending Gwenfo Nursery in September, we can offer extended care either by: walking the children from Playgroup at 12:55 for their afternoon session at Nursery – 5 days per week – Monday to Friday collecting children at 11:20am from Nursery and across into playgroup until 3:15pm on a Monday and Thursday only at this time.

We will send more details of further planned open mornings to be held in September via July and August What’s On.

In the meantime you can keep up to date with all the changes on our website: wenvoeplaygroup.co.uk or for more information email wenvoeplaygroup

Gwenfo Primary School

We can’t believe that it is nearly half term… and how quickly the time is going! We have had a very busy first half summer term :

Year 4 thoroughly enjoyed their swimming sessions and all did very well indeed. Years 1, 3 and 5 have all led worship on a Friday morning; it is always such a special time for the children when their family members are invited to join us for their assemblies.

As part of Year 1 and 2’s Mini Zoo topic, 2 shepherds visited school, with their sheep! A wonderful time was had by all – and the children unanimously decided to adopt a sheep! It won’t be living in school (you will be glad to hear!) but nevertheless, close links will be established!

We were very proud of our netball teams for playing so well in the recent Irene Butcher netball tournament. A massive thank you must go to Mrs Plevey for the time she freely gives to coach netball and organise matches.

Years 2 to 6 have recently sat the national numeracy and literacy tests; we are extremely proud of the sensible and calm way in which they all approached the tests.

We enjoyed a wonderful assembly, led by our visitor, Steve Harris, in which the children were treated to a little magic as well. It is always fascinating to watch!

Before we know it, we will be back for the last half term, which promises to be busy, action packed and fun!

Visit to Caerphilly Castle

As  promised in last months What’s On, here are some photographs of our visit to Caerphilly Castle. Thank you Emma at Wheadons Coach Travel, for arranging our transport for the day. The children were so excited to be boarding the coach, regardless of our destination. The Castles’ dragon was there to meet us on entry and created a fun photo shoot. An enjoyable time was had by all. The next morning at playgroup, the children produced some lovely creative models of castles using recyclable materials and enjoyed viewing photographs of the day, shared by one of our children. During March, we also visited the library to return our books and say farewell to Mrs Lucas. The children thanked Mrs Lucas for allowing us to visit the library over the years by presenting her with a beautiful bouquet of flowers (purchased from the Secret Garden in Cardiff Market).


1459572001The Parents, Committee, Staff and Children would like to send their fondest wishes to Mrs Lucas and thank her for the support she has shown to the Playgroup over the years.


We are busy at this time practising songs to sing at our Easter Fayre and look forward to sharing our photographs and news in next months What’s On. The Playgroup is now fully booked until the Autumn Term. Please contact us should you wish to enquire about our future services as Gwenfo School prepare for their Nursery Unit. We are working closely with the School, to support families who require longer hours of care. We hope to offer care for children aged 2 years and 4 months from September and will share more information in our next article. We will be holding an open session from 3:30pm on Thursday 30th June, to register those on our waiting lists and for families to view the facilities and the care we can offer moving forward. Please register your interest by calling 029 2059 7494 during playgroup hours or email wenvoeplaygroup@btinternet.com .

You can keep up to date with our changes by visiting our website wenvoeplaygroup.co.uk

1 … 13 14 15