February 17, 2017

News and Reminders:

We are always trying to reduce the amount of waste we are producing here at school. If you could send your child's lunches and snack in reusable containers instead of plastic bags and tinfoil we would greatly appreciate it! We make the effort to wash and reuse the bags and tinfoil but reusable containers go a lot further, and save you money. Please consider making the switch. Empty containers left over from hummus, yogurt, or jams make great snack and lunch containers. You don't have to spend money buying new containers, just reuse! 

Bev Bos

“Rich childhood play is the only secure foundation from which children should enter into the future.”  (Bev Bos: 1934-2016)

I first listened to Bev Bos speak when I was about 18 years old. I attended a conference with my mom in Massachusetts and watched as Bev showed pictures of children immersed in sand (in the classroom!) and talked passionately about the importance of allowing children to lose themselves in play. 

Bev Bos was the Director of Roseville Community Preschool in California for almost 50 years. She is also the author of some of my favorite books, and a committed and tireless advocate for children. She truly believed in play based education. She also expressed the importance of offering a well-designed, organized, and rich environment for children and allowing them to choose their learning within that environment. She inspired many teachers, myself included, to allow children to be in charge of their learning. She also taught us that our role is the prepare the environment, respect children's interests, and create a learning environment that will foster deep curiosity and a love of learning. These are skills that I know will take a lifetime to master. 

Bev was also very committed to involving parents in their children's learning. She constantly encouraged them to be a part of their program, to see how the teachers worked, and to work alongside them. The more that we can all partner together to offer children learning experiences the better. 

"The basics for young children are wonder, discovery, and experience," she said. "If it hasn't been in the hand, the body, and the heart, it can't be in the brain."

I think we can all learn from Bev. We can watch her talks, read her books, reflect on our own practices, and work hard to offer intentional environments that truly support children's learning and exploration. 

Her Books:
Don't Move the Muffin Tins
Tumbling Over the Edge: A Rant for Children's Play
Before the Basics: Creating Conversations with Children

Please take the time to look into Bev (if you don't know her already) and if you'd like to borrow one of her books please ask, we'd be happy to share.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/obituaries/article59874521.html#storylink=cpy

Here's a very short clip of Bev Bos talking about learning.

Classroom Updates

Infant I: This week has been very routine, just how we like it! We spent lots of time outside enjoying the abundant snow, we love to taste it and touch it, even when it makes our hands cold. One morning we also explored dirt, working very hard to keep it out of our mouths but we greatly enjoyed its texture and spreadability. At meal times there has been an increased interest in using spoons and forks to feed ourselves, and we've also been spending lots of time at the gate in our door, watching and interacting with the older children.

Infant II: This week we spent some time exploring watercolors. We worked on our own individual paintings as we challenged ourselves to mindfully hold our paintbrushes while practicing dipping them into the paint and then onto our paper. We started with yellow paint and then slowly added red and purple. Everyone really enjoyed the process of dipping their brushes into the cups of watercolors and did really well with this challenge. Excitement filled the room as each new color was added and the paint flowed together. Lots of "wows" and chants of joy were heard. Playing with balls was also a big hit this week. They enjoyed hitting them up into the air, throwing them across the room, and chasing them around the room. 

Toddlers: We had a great week in our classroom and we were very excited to welcome Amanda back from her vacation. We continue our work on encouraging independence and tasks that foster doing things for ourselves. A classroom rule we have spending a great deal of time on is using "walking feet". There are many obstacles and people in our classroom and we are working to make sure we are all aware of one another and being careful. We encourage lots of running and big body movements outside where there is more space to help the children identify and realize the difference in spaces. We have also been working on our table manners at meal times. We are making sure to use our utensils and using kind words to talk with one another. This week we were excited to play with the new animal dress up costumes in our classroom. The children have been very excited about dramatic play roles and exploring the tails and manes on the costumes. We also enjoyed working with some new blocks that opened up from squares to triangle shapes. We talked a lot about the different shapes and worked hard to label each one. 

Preschool I: The children's interest in ice and penguins has begun to wane, so the teachers are back to closely observing to see what new interests begin to arise. In the meantime, some of the children have continued expressing interest in trying writing letters, which we have done both inside and outside with sticks in the snow. We also explored some of the deeper snow outside of the playground on the side yard of the school. Also, on warmer mornings, more birds have appeared and the children love watching them and listening to their songs. The dramatic play in the classroom has really been increasing in maturity, with children accepting, negotiating, and creating rules and roles for each other. Outside we see lots of "tiger families." Inside, with some teacher facilitation, most of the class got involved with ordering pizzas. Someone would call in an order, and the others would work together to create and deliver the pizza. These skills have begun positively influencing their social-emotional skills as they have begun discussing and solving their own problems with less support from the teachers, which has been awesome to witness! 

Preschool II: We played hard outside this week. We built snow forts, created some amazing and challenging new sledding tracks, and loved running and jumping into the deep snow. We continued our work with patterns and have some different colored blocks on the light table. We worked together to create group patterns and new shapes. In block area our creativity has soared. We are working now on collaborative cities and buildings. The children have been adding details and "decorations" to make them more ornate. There have been discussions and conversations about how to build and what blocks would be most supportive in specific areas. At circle we have almost made it through the entire alphabet. We are now very good at identifying upper vs lower case letters. We are also connecting letters to certain words that we know. At the writing table we have been looking at examples and practicing the shapes of new letters. We are also working hard on holding our utensils correctly. This can also be encouraged at home! We also tried a new snack of naan bread this week which was a big hit. 

PreK: We continue to explore outside playing in the snow, observing tracks and how different they are in the deep, deep snow. We have done some amazing sledding and love climbing the enormous snowbanks around town. Inside we are working on our letter recognition skills and on accomplishing tasks through teamwork and cooperation. Our art work has been evolving individually and collboartively. We've also been working together on all types of bridge building and we are almost done with our 300 piece puzzle!