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Insect Hotel


A schoolwide project that we've been thinking about for a while is building an insect hotel. Insect hotels provide a hibernation space for insects during the winter as well as nesting space during the summer. They support ecological diversity and also act as indirect exterminators as the insects who take up residence will destroy pests such as mites. As a school, we have always found that children are fascinated by insects of all kinds, so we think this could be a great catalyst for learning. We foresee many conversations about the role insects play in our ecosystem, how they adapt to the changing seasons, connections to books and scientific tools, and our responsibilities as stewards of the environment. An ecologically-beneficial learning opportunity–sounds like an MVS win-win!

 (source: https://www.installitdirect.com/blog/diy-bug-hotels-as-homes-for-beneficial-garden-insects/)

We plan to build ours in the grassy side yard, using stacked wooden pallets as the main structure. Many of the materials we will need are just now becoming available as fall rolls in. If you have any of the following items sitting around, we'd love to put them to good use:
Thank you! Our PreK teacher, Jen, has been leading this project, so please contact her with questions. Any classroom will happily accept materials donations. If you would like to read more about insect hotels and how to build them, some good resources are here, here, and here.

News and Reminders
Thanks to all who attended our Parent Potluck and PCC meeting! Another reminder that our next family event will be a picnic on the afternoon of October 14. Look out for a flyer with more details soon.

The Lamoille Family Center is sponsoring a couple of free parenting classes in October: one on October 5th about children and technology (details here) and another on October 11th about using intentional language with children (details here).

Classroom Updates
Infant I
Our children have found so much joy recently in social interactions. All week they have been greeting each other in the morning, rocking in the boat and singing songs together, including everyone in rounds of high fives, communicating verbally, sharing hugs, imitating each other's play, initiating games of chase, and caring for our youngest children by touching them gently and checking on them when they are upset. They just love to be together and it's so fun to observe these blossoming social skills. We have also been focused on our mealtime routines. We all stay seated while eating in order to keep ourselves safe, and we have also been learning to peel our own bananas and oranges and put the peels in the compost. A few children have even started helping the teachers get ready for meals by pushing their own chairs to the table. We also took advantage of the beautiful weather by painting, scrubbing down the sensory table, and exploring dirt with spoons and containers.






Infant II
This week has been full of hugs and giggles! We have enjoyed sharing hugs and high fives with children that have been out recently, welcoming them back to class. We have also been high fiving and fist bumping when we try our vegetables at lunch. Early in the week we had a puppy visit our classroom. All the children were enamored and did a great job being calm, quiet, and gentle. The baby dolls have been popular for practicing names of body parts and bringing out the children's gentle, nurturing side.






Toddlers
We enjoyed a very nice week of gorgeous weather and we are taking full advantage of it. In the morning we are also enjoying some extra outside time for the first group of children that arrive for the day. We have taken notice of acorns on the ground and leaves that are beginning to change. We have been talking a lot this week about what is okay to eat (food at snack and lunch) and what is not okay to eat (berries and apples on the ground outside; please also talk about this at home). This week the children were quite interested in digging large holes in the sandbox; some made "cake muffins" with the dirt while others worked on constructing trenches with children from Preschool I. We are also working on dealing with challenges and frustrations in positive and kind ways.




Preschool I
Yet another exciting week! As we spend more time talking about family photos, the types of relationships we hear about from the children are expanding. Along with mommies, daddies, "big kids", and "babies," we're hearing more about brothers, sisters, grandparents, and aunts. As the children grow, so does their thirst for independence, which expresses itself in risk-taking and seeking privacy. As always, it is a balance of respecting their needs and keeping them supervised, which has manifested in a "covering" around the teepee structure and a "ropes course" by the slide. The children were greatly inspired by the older students and jumped right into trying the ropes course themselves! One child was so thrilled about the upgraded teepee that she literally began jumping for joy. Our book of the week was What About Me? starring Katy, the kind child who teaches Charlie, a cat, how to share his friends with a new cat, Arthur. By the end o the week the children could mostly predict the plot, make inferences from the illustrations, and remember all of the character's names






Preschool II
This week in PS2: On Monday we went back to the Rec Path and colored with the crayons we made last week. We worked together as teams of two to make colorful pictures with two friends and two colors. It was fun to watch the collaborations and the blending of both colors and coloring styles. On Tuesday we spent most of our circle time discussing our emotions, feelings, and how we can express them both visually and verbally. Wednesday was another great story hour at the library with books about birds, bears, and buses. Our favorite was Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus. Then on Thursday the highly anticipated adventure to the Helen Day Art Center was a huge success. We loved all of the different paint brush choices and hope we can add rollers and paint scrapers to our own supplies. We finished out the week by working on more collage art and team puzzle building.








PreK
We've spent the majority of our week getting to know Tori and teaching her our rules and routines. We've shown her the SES playground, the trails to "Vicky's Hill", Sunset Rock and the Helen Day Art Center. Now that she has a sense of the area we'll be able to start splitting into smaller groups, allowing us all some space and the opportunity to really develop children's interests. Spiders continue to be high on that list. We brought our spider identification book on some of our trips and have really developed an appreciation for their hard work. We love watching Sophie descend to repair her web or wrap up an insect. We've begun to wonder where she will go when the weather gets cold. We'll be exploring this more as we begin our next school-wide project of building a "bug hotel."







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