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Hello again! Wow, we are in our final two weeks of this year! There is so much to announce here in our December newsletter. We have our 2009’s term dates, timetable, fee structures and news from our fundraising co-ordinator. All our children are growing fast and most of our sessions are growing stronger than ever. Read on to find out.....
End of Year Gathering
We will have our end of year gathering in the final week of term 4 (8th of Dec to 13th of Dec). The initial wish of a big Kimmba families gathering on the 13th of December 3:30pm at the Ruffy Lake Park in Doncaster East has been cancelled due to the unpredictable Spring/Summer weather. Please bring a plate of food to share and $5.00 present for Kris Crinkle on your child’s last session in the last week of this term.
We are going to give out certificates to our children to congratulate them on their hard work learning a second language this year and encourage them to keep up their good work and keep going next year. If you would like your child’s Chinese (Spanish or German) name to be included in his/her certificate please give it to your classroom teacher this week.
We look forward to seeing you all in our final week of the year.
2009 term dates
We are following the Victoria school terms except for term 4. The dates for 2009 are:
Term 1 2 February to 3 April, (9 March Labour Day holiday)
Term 2 20 April to 26 June (25 April ANZAC Day, 8 June Queen’s Birthday)
Term 3 13 July to 18 September
Term 4 5 October to 11 December (3 Nov Melbourne Cup Day holiday)
If there is any public holiday in the term, we will offer the make up session in the holiday break, in other words, if there is a holiday in one of the Tuesdays in term 1, we will be offering one more Tuesday session in the first week of the term 1 break, and so on.
2009 enrolment policy
Our excellent bilingual language education for preschool children has grown from the initial 5 classes when we began in April 2007 to now 16 groups weekly in 2008. We will have 20 classes in the beginning of 2009 if all proposed sessions are to proceed in February, 2009. Enrolment for existing families is closed at the end of term 4 and the enrolment for new families is open from the 1st of December, 08 as there are a lot of families on our waiting list wishing to join us in 2009. An enrolment fee of $50 must accompany each child’s enrolment form in order to confirm places for 2009.
2009 languages and session time table
A few proposed new Mandarin sessions for 2009 are; a Toddler’s class, Friday 9:30 to 11:00am; Kinder classes, Friday 1:00 to 3:00pm and Saturday 10:00am to 12:00pm; Beginner level writing class for primary school children either Tuesday 4-6pm or Thursday 4-6pm. If you would like your child/ren to participate in any of these new sessions, please email Marisha. These classes will only proceed if the number of children enrolled has reached our desired number. An alternative session date and time will be allocated for your child/ren if these classes don’t go ahead.
Fee structure and viewing of our program
All 1 & ½ hours playgroup program will cost $12 per session and the 2 hours program will cost $18 per session the as same as 2008’s program fees. To encourage new families to join our innovative bilingual educational classes, we will offer a new 3-session-trial refundable fee policy for all our classes. To try our 1 & ½ hour program, the refundable 3-session-trial fee is $54.00; the 2 hour program 3-session-trial fee is $75.00. Both are refundable upon booking a whole term’s placement at the end of the third trial session.
The casual class fee for 1 & ½ programs will be $18 per session and $25 for 2 hour sessions.
Observations of our classes (ie. without participation with our children or interaction with the class teacher) is limited to 15 minutes for free. If you would like to stay longer than 15 minutes and join our fun class, then it is treated as a casual class participant and therefore the casual class payment will be due. Please understand that our teacher is here to help our existing children to learn a second language and our interest is focused on all children enrolled in the program, therefore, we can’t accept new families weekly to watch us run the program. This would cause some young children unease and therefore difficulty to settle them, which is not what you would expect from us if you have given us the trust to help your child to gain the confidence in learning a second language.
Website
We encourage you to participate in the discussion on our new website, which contains a link to a forum for Kimmba families where we can share ideas, comments and information about almost anything related to bringing up our children bilingually. The forum is easy to use and, of course, the data is subject to strict privacy rules so you needn’t worry about cyber junk entering your home computers. So, surf on over to our new site and have your say on the new Kimmba Forum.
January intensive program for 5 to 8-year-olds (some selected preschoolers in our 4-year-old kinder group may be considered for half day program)
We are hoping to take the opportunity in the Dec/Jan long holiday period to provide families with an intensive Mandarin Learning Program. This course is designed to help serious learners gain total confidence in speaking Mandarin after 15 days.
Fees per child per day (9am to 5pm) will be $100 and half days (9am to 1pm) will be $50per child. The dates of this holiday program are 17, 18, 19, 22, 23 December 08 and 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 January 09. Total 15 days. We offer drama and speech sessions in the morning. These involve story telling, role playing, singing, dancing, making up skits for acting stories and outdoor play time. Writing, reading, mathematics and activities associated with Chinese films will be held in the afternoons. Young children are encouraged to participate in the morning sessions rather than the long day program. Please speak to Marisha for a detailed daily program.
New Spanish Baby Session
We are here to announce that we have a newly formed baby session for Spanish families. Please tell everyone you know that if they would like to join us in this innovative bilingual baby program. Contact Marisha at 0425703831 or email:
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Fund Raising Report
Thank you for all your support with our fund raising activities in 2008. We raised $1771.80 from the BBQ. Educational toy sales’ total order amount comes to $1785.80. In the year 2009, we are going to have a BBQ sausage sizzle fund-raising event at Bunnings Warehouse as well as other activities. If you would like to lend us your helping hand with our fund-raising group and/or have any ideas, please feel free to contact our fund-raising coordinator and Mandarin teacher Kirra via her email:
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May I take this opportunity to say thank you all for a wonderful year. I am so proud that our children have done their best and worked hard. Their dedication has been shown throughout 2008 in their second language learning. All the children have been delightful to teach and have progressed with much enthusiasm. The teaching staff and myself look forward to seeing you all back in 2009. Wishing you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Marisha Theeboom
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