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This week at OOSH we have been continuing our Australia theme. Selena’s tree has grown bigger and bigger over the last week. The kids are coming up with a new idea each day to add to our wall. We have made Koalas, Echidnas and origami snakes to add to our OOSH display.

As we move into cooler weather our tree will change with the season, the kids wanting to add more Autumn tones.

Our Vacation care program is well under way, the kids have had a huge input in what will be happening over the Autumn break. The program and the link to book any days you require will be on our website in week eight.

Please don’t forget to email us if your child will not be attending the centre. This is especially important for an after school session. When your child does not show up the staff go to great lengths to find them. We search the school grounds and the surrounding area including the outside perimeter of the school. This happens before you have your text message. If we are unable to contact you or any of those nominated as your emergency contact by the end of the session, our policy states that the police will be contacted and a missing child report will be made. Our policy is available for viewing on our website. A quick email to our service if your child is home sick, has a playdate or other after school activity will eliminate this issue.

Thank you for your support,

This week marks the end of the early finish for our kindergarten children, staff will pick the children up from the OOSH meeting spot outside the school office at 3.25 starting next Monday.

Please notify your child’s kindy teacher of days they will be attending OOSH. Remind your child in the morning and make sure they have their OOSH band. If you don’t have one, let one of our staff know and we will supply one.

We have welcomed a lot of new children to before and after school care.
They are all settling in really well and showing a great deal of confidence.

You will also notice a few new staff. Some of our staff have finished their degrees and have moved on to pursue jobs in their chosen fields. We would like to welcome Jazmin, Amaan and Robbie. All ex OOSHies and students of Avalon School. Please introduce yourself and feel free to have a chat to make them feel welcome.

This week we have started to decorate the centre with our Australian themed wall. The kids have all had a wonderful time contributing with their artwork. Selena suggested that we use the trees on our mural to track the children’s height, the kids are enjoying learning how tall our staff are and the heights of their friends.

We are still fully booked from Monday to Thursday, thank you to those of you who relinquished spots so that others could take them. Please remember the importance of advising us if your child is not going to attend either before or after school care. Please remember when you have a permanent booking for either before or after school care, payment for the spot is required regardless of attendance. If there are special circumstances an email request will be considered.

This term we have started an After School Sports program on Wednesdays. This is a trial run, if the children show an interest, we may keep it going next term and add another day. Please encourage your children to participate.

We are always looking for new ideas to improve our centre, please feel free to contribute in any way. We would love your favourite recipes, craft ideas and anything interesting to know from your cultural background.

Please feel free to give us a call or an email if ever you have a question to would like answered.

Thank you for your continued support.

What a great start to the holidays this week has been.  We have had so much fun, the kids loved our wet and wild day, our visit from Reverse Garbage was a huge success, with the children making some amazing creations to take home.  We all enjoyed our Super Cody incursion, where the children learned to code and fly drones.
Today we are making dioramas,  this activity is a request from one of our children.  We hope you all enjoy their imaginative creations.  Tomorrow is Friday, and we are excited to have the children show off their talents at our talent quest.  If your child is booked in for Friday, please encourage them to bring in their musical instruments, magic tricks, dancing or acrobatic skills and join in the fun.  There will be no pressure to perform, just have a laugh and some fun.
We will award prizes for every performance.

We have had a number of questions regarding OOSH from new parents, so we will answer some of those here:-

If you go to our website, follow the link to make a booking and find the day unavailable.  It is because that day is fully booked.

Yes:-  You do pay for the days you have booked for vacation care and after school care, regardless of attendance.   We have a limited number of spaces available and purchase and staff according to those numbers.
In Vacation Care, we book incursions and pay for the number of children booked for the day..  We still have to pay for your child if they are not in attendance.  Our policy is clearly stated on the registration form.  When you submit this form you have ticked the box stating that you understand the terms and conditions.

Yes:-  We are still accepting Government Vouchers.  These can only be used to subsidise care for your child.  They do not cover your annual family registration fee of $80.00.  This is a one off fee charged to your account in January.

We apologise to anyone who missed spots for Vacation Care.  You are always welcome to check on the day to see if there is space available.  We can also put you on our waitlist for any days you have missed out on.

You can find our Vacation Care session booking form via the following link:
https://forms.gle/8ZiahULaEm71rJ5e8

Bookings for After School care Monday to Thursday are now closed and fully booked.  We have places for Friday afternoon.
We have availability for Before School Care each morning.  Again we are sorry for anyone who missed out.

Please remember that we are a NUT FREE centre. We do have children attending with nut allergies and would appreciate everyone’s cooperation by not sending children to OOSH with nuts.

Thank you all for your support,  please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.

We are here!!!! The last week of 2022.

We would like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas and hope you all enjoy your break from
early starts in the morning, making lunches, finding lost hats and anything else your kids choose to lose. We look forward to seeing you all in the New Year. We will close next Tuesday evening (20th) for a well earned break and return on the 9th of January ready and raring to go with a stack of holiday fun.

Our Program is up on our website along with the link to confirm any days you may require. We are extremely excited to bring Reverse Garbage to our centre. Reverse Garbage is located in Marrickville and well worth a visit they have an amazing assortment of “junk” that can be reused and made into the most amazing art. The children have made some special requests and you may see your child’s name on one of the activities. We have also had requests for Dinosaur Encounters over the past few years, finally we have been able to secure a visit for this extremely popular incursion. There are still spots available for Vacation care.
Please make sure you read the “terms and conditions” at the bottom of your form. We do not offer cancellations or swaps during the holidays.

We have been sending a weekly newsletter from the beginning of the year. For the last term we have been reminding everyone to book for before and after school care for 2023. After school care Monday to Thursday is now fully booked with availability only on Friday afternoon. We have spots available for every morning.

Please make sure you sign your children in and out of OOSH. We are finding a number of children signing themselves in in the morning and parents sending siblings in to sign children out in the afternoon.
We are legally bound to actively keep a record of children’s attendance, which includes a parent or nominated guardian signing in and out of the centre.

Annual Family Registration of $80.00 will be added from January 2023.

Thanks again everyone for your support throughout the year. If we are not seeing you again for our two day Christmas Vacation Care we hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and 2023 is full of happiness and great things.

OOSH NEWSLETTER

Well hello families,  we are here, only two more weeks to go and you’re all footloose and fancy free to enjoy the Christmas break.

Thank you everyone who attended our Christmas party last week.  We hope you all enjoyed yourselves as much as Sarah and I enjoyed seeing you all.  It was lovely to catch up with you casually, without having the main conversation being about the children.  We will do it again when the kids go back to school next year to introduce our new kindy parents to our centre.

Our two day program for Monday the 19th and Tuesday the 20th of December is now on our website.

You will also find the program and booking form for our vacation care beginning on the 9th of January.

Don’t forget to make sure you have booked your children for 2023, the bookings DO NOT automatically roll over.  Please use the links to book for the days you require for both the holidays and before and after school care.

Please let us know if you have any ideas of how we can improve our centre.  We are always looking for new ideas to keep the children happy and engaged, anything from art and craft ideas to recipes you have tried.
The children love being able to share their families cultural crafts and recipes with us.

If you know of anyone over 18 looking for some casual work in 2023, please direct them to us.  We are looking for staff, either male or female, with a passion for children, enthusiasm and initiative.  They will need a Working with Children check and preferably a First Aid Certificate.
No experience is necessary, as we will train them, just a love of kids.

Please give us a call or email if you have any questions about next year’s enrolments or vacation care.

Good morning everyone and happy Friday.

Just a couple of reminders for this week:-

Please let us know if you and your family will be attending our Christmas party next Thursday the 24th.  We  will begin at 6.30 after OOSH closes.  We are all looking forward to welcoming everyone back for our first Christmas party since COVID reared its ugly head.  We will be providing a grazing table and you are more than welcome to bring a plate to share and your own drinks.

Don’t forget that Friday the 16th is the last day of school and we will be open on Monday the 19th and Tuesday the 20th for the Pupil Free Days.  Please make sure you have booked in for those days if you need them.  Booking forms for the pupil free days are on our website now.

OOSH will close on Tuesday the 20th at 6.30 and reopen on Monday the 9th of January.

The Vacation Care program and confirmation form for any days you require will be on our website on Monday 5th December.

If you have any kindy children starting school next year,  remember that they are welcome to join us in January for vacation care.

If anyone has any questions at all regarding Before and After School care, upcoming holiday care or 2023 enrolments please email and we will be happy to assist you.

Have a great weekend everyone

Hi everyone,

Well, we have survived Halloween. We hope the children who attended our Halloween party had a great time. We certainly enjoyed organising it for them. Sadly, although we had a number of families who cancelled as they were trick or treating with friends, we also had a large number who did not cancel. The staff all came in early to decorate the centre and cook party food for the kids, so were really disappointed when we had so few. Please remember to let us know if your child or children will not be attenOOSH NEWSLETTER
ding OOSH. When your child does not show up after school, we make a search of the school grounds and the surrounding area. This takes one or two staff members away from the children who are already here. We understand that there are days where time gets away and notifying us is
forgotten, but a quick message is appreciated as we prepare food and staff according to the number of children expected.

We are getting towards that ridiculously busy time of the year and it’s time to talk about our Christmas Party. We have really missed our annual family get together over the past couple of years and hope to see as many families as possible join us on November 24th when we will celebrate another great year at OOSH. Our Christmas party is a great opportunity to chill out with some of our staff and other families rather than our usual “ships passing”. We will begin at 6.30 after closing.

Please let us know if you and your family will be attending so we are able to cater.
We will be making a large grazing table for the adults and party food for the kids.
You are more than welcome to bring a plate to contribute and your own drinks.

Our Vacation Care program will be on our website in week eight. Please encourage your children to have a voice in programming. We have some great surprises planned for January, but we really want the holidays to be all about what they would like to do.
OOSH will be open for before and after school care until Friday the 16th of December. We will open on Monday the 19th and Tuesday the 20th for a full day of care. Both days will be billed as Vacation Care and craft will be geared towards Christmas.

Thank you all fo your continued support. Don’t forget to put your family’s name down for the Christmas party.

A very brief newsletter this week everyone.  With only a couple of reminders.

Please join us next Monday evening at 6.30 for our first Parent Meeting for this term.
We encourage all our parents to come and share their ideas over a glass of wine and nibbles.
Please email if you would like to join us so we are able to cater accordingly.

On Monday the 31st we will have our annual After School Care Halloween Party.  All families are welcome to book for an afternoon of fun and laughter.  Kids can drop off dress up clothes in the morning or change when they arrive.

Our OOSH Christmas Party will be on November 24th this year.  We hope to see many of our families coming, especially after such a long break of not being able to celebrate the end of the year with you all.

We are still working on our Vacation Care Program for January.  We have some really exciting incursions booked already and of course, want to hear from you and your children with any thoughts you or they may have.

Are you planning on joining us again in 2023 for Before & After School Care?
We have opened bookings for returning Families via the following link:

https://forms.gle/AR2PDGyoucTp6KvD8

Thank you to all those who have completed the form already.
Bookings from this year do not automatically roll over into 2023, so it is very important
that we have everyone’s booking preferences in as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.

Thanks everyone for your continued support.
Have a great weekend.

Hi everyone and welcome to term four.

Vacation care was a “Blast”, the children all had a great time and we have had some incredible feedback not only from some pretty happy parents, thank you, also from the kids and the people who provided our incursions. It is always lovely to have such amazing feedback from our providers.

The very last term of the year, always full of fun and excitement.

We are currently working on our program for the January holidays. As always, the children are all very keen to have their say on which activities they would like us to include. Please encourage your kids to write on our “whiteboard” some of their favourite activities so we can include them in the program. Sometimes some of the smallest ideas have the biggest impact and create the greatest fun.

Don’t forget to share any cultural recipes you have that we can make for the kids. We all thoroughly enjoyed our Filipino chicken recipe shared by Daniel and Gabys mum Annette during the holidays. The children get so excited when they are able to share a dish from home and we are always looking for something new to make for afternoon tea.

We still have a HUGE amount of lost property left from the holidays. Those that have names on them have been given to the children, some have been taken to give to kids who don’t regularly attend. We have a table on the front path both morning and afternoon this week and next. If there is anything left next Friday, it will all be taken to the Red Cross. We don’t have room to keep items indefinitely.

Here are some important dates for your diary:-

October 24th:- OOSH Parent meeting

Please join us at 6.30 at OOSH on Monday the 24th for our regular meeting. Everyone is welcome and we encourage all our parents to join us. Avalon OOSH is a parent run centre and we always value your contribution of ideas etc.

October 31st:- Halloween Party.

On Monday the 31st we will have our annual Halloween party. If you would like your child to attend you will need to book for an After School Care session. Children are welcome to bring dress up clothes to change into.

November 1st:- Melbourne Cup Day.

We have already taken extra bookings for Melbourne cup day. We are very limited to the number of spots we still have available.

November 24th:- OOSH Christmas Party.

HOORAY!!!!!!! At last, on Thursday the 24th we will have our OOSH Christmas party. We are so happy that after almost three years of not being able to hold a Christmas party for the kids and our amazing parents, we are finally able to celebrate the end of the year with everyone.

We hope that you will join us in celebrating the end of another great year with your children before things get too crazy with work parties, family commitments, class parties etc.
Please let us know if you will be able to attend so we can have an idea of numbers for catering.

As always, thank you all for your amazing support, all the staff really appreciate it.

Only a week to go and we will be enjoying the school holidays again.

The children are pretty excited about the program we have for them.  They have all made their contributions with their ideas and requests for their favourite activities.

If you come into the centre you will notice the cupboard doors with the words “Your time, your place, your ideas”  This is a spot dedicated for the children to write their ideas for craft activities and vacation care ideas.  It certainly makes for some interesting reading.

Please make sure you get those confirmation forms for the holidays in quickly so you don’t miss out.

https://avalonoosh.com.au/vacation-care/

You are more than welcome to come into OOSH and have a look at our art and craft at any time.  I’m sure your children will love to show you around.

This year we will be having our first OOSH Christmas party in quite some time.  We hope that all our families will be able to join us on November 25th.  We know everything starts to go a little crazy in December so we are hoping to be first cab off the rank with the Christmas celebrations.

We are also reviewing our Asthma and Anaphylaxis documentation and use by dates.
If your child has a puffer or epipen kept at OOSH would you please contact us so we are able to review and update if necessary.

Thank you for your continued support.