Directors of Mounthawk Montessori School & Busy Bees Nursery & Maureen’s Preschool, Tralee, Susan Quirke-Crowley and Maureen Quirke along with General Manager Helena Wallace Dowling are delighted to welcome children back to our centres on our reopening on June 29th allowing us to support our Frontline and Essential Worker, families. We welcome the reinstatement of the National Childcare Scheme and the CCSP scheme by DCYA which will ease the burden of Childcare Fees for many families returning to work. Applications may be made directly on www.ncs.gov.ie
While the post Covid19 reopening will look a little different in Early Years settings, we are fortunate as Montessori Schools to already operate our centres along similar lines to ‘play-pods’. In simple terms, children will be allocated a specific place in a specific classroom, for set times and days, with a specific group of friends, being cared for by specific Early Years Teachers. Both of our centres enjoy purpose built large outdoor classrooms, poly tunnels, natural planting and learning areas, as well as state of the art indoor learning facilities. This ensures that all of our individual ‘play pods’ can access our Montessori Schools, indoor and outdoor natural areas and gardens safely, allowing for minimal cross over between families on arrival and departure. Our health and safety signage is child friendly with clear and simple visual task analysis to support children’s understanding of our new routines.
We are very proud of our wonderful children, our highly qualified Degree led team, and the novel ways we have remained connected with our children and families throughout the lock down. This included online learning activities, story time and project work via Social Media and Zoom. Our objective was to support the children’s emotional well being and feelings of connection with their Teachers, friends, and school community, whilst also supporting our ethos of ‘parents as partners’ during these uncertain times. In addition, our Teachers have been busy upskilling, including Infection Prevention & Control QQI with Kerry College, Monavally, enhancing our preparation for reopening and introducing new policies and procedures to safeguard all stakeholders post CoVid19.
As always, our focus will be on teaching Practical Life skills including ‘Hand Hygiene, Cough and Sneeze Etiquette’ and ‘Care of Oneself’, in our warm and nurturing environments as part of our Aistear Montessori Curriculum. Our outdoor classrooms will ensure that children get maximum benefit from their time with us in a safe and healthy manner in addition to their indoor play-pods. To support our preschool class of 2020 to experience a smooth transition from our setting to local primary schools in September, we are offering ‘Stay and Play’ sessions for our Pre-school children from July 20th, this will help to ease separation anxiety as children leave parents for the first time since March 12th. We look forward to welcoming all children and families back to Mounthawk and Maureen’s from June 29th and are confident that we can reopen safely, in a warm and nurturing manner, with the little ones at the heart of all that we do ! Quirke’s for Quality .
Phone 086-8153757 for further details .
