Healthy Ireland Smart Start
Cuala Montessori are delighted to announce that we have been awarded the status of Healthy Ireland Smart Start Pre-School. We are 1 of only 2 Bray Pre-Schools to hold this title.
What is Smart Start?
This Pre-school Health Promotion training programme is the result of over a decade of collaborative working led by the HSE Department of Health Promotion and Improvement in partnership with National Childhood Network, to ensure children in the pre-school settings are supported to adopt healthy lifestyle behaviours in early childhood. The aim is to bring all people together into a national movement with a single aim to ensure the best possible health and well-being of our nation.
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What does it mean?
The programme is broken down into 6 topics:
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Health promotion
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Emotional well-being
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Physical activity
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Nutrition
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Oral health
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Health and safety
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Our staff have many discussions to come up with ways that they could introduce the Healthy Ireland programme into their curriculum and involve the parents at every step of the way. While we had been doing a lot of it already, we introduced some new routines into our day.
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Activities for the Oral Health topic include:
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a visit from a local dental nurse to speak to the children about the importance of brushing
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a brand new toothbrush for every child
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a tooth brushing chart to bring home
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a parent’s information pack
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News Letter:
http://smart-start.ie/images/HISS_Newsletter_Issue_1_Jan_2018.pdf