D is for Delight, so remember to "Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart." Psalms 37:4 NIV
IMPORTANT CONFERENCE INFO...
We're already finishing up October, and getting closer to those cold winter months that we know are up ahead. This is the time of year that we get ready for our first set of parent teacher conferences. The teachers have had two months to get to know your children in our preschool setting, and we really enjoy the opportunity to meet to update you on how your child is doing in the areas of social, physical, emotional and educational development. We also enjoy hearing you tell us more about your child. We look at conferences as a positive experience where we can explore the areas that your child is excelling at and look at the areas where we encouraging more growth.
After your conference, I suggest that you celebrate your child's strengths with them! Our family started a tradition in preschool that we went out for a snack together after conferences to celebrate our child's growth (and I just celebrated my very last conference as a parent this year!!). What your child needs to hear at this age is how great they are doing at this new thing called "school" and how excited you are that they are growing and learning so much! I always like to remind parents that your children have only been on our planet for 3 or 4 years, and they have a LOT of growing left to do! (I mean really, I've been here for over 40 years, and there's still a lot of room for improvement with me!!)
Some basic conference info to share with you...
Parents will meet with teachers in either the room next to the preschool room or the room across from the preschool office.
Yes! Childcare will be provided in the preschool classroom by either a board member or Miss Jean (for those MWF students :)
Please knock on the door if it is your conference time and we are still in the room with another parent. This helps keep us on our schedule.
If you find that the 15 minutes was not long enough, let your teacher know, and we will set up another time to meet in the near future.
And now...onto our weekly news....
Dear Tuesday-Thursday families,
It was an exciting week in our classroom FULL of dramatic play! Miss Jean took the opportunity of Halloween to wear a "King of the Wild Things" costume and read HER favorite childhood book to the students of both classes this week. Where the Wild Things are by Maurice Sendak is a wonderful children's book that was written in 1963. Did you know that it was originally going to be called "Where the Wild Horses Are" but Mr. Sendak couldn't draw good horses (not many people can!). So his publisher suggested he draw "things" instead, saying something like, "Surely, you can at least draw 'things'!" And did you also know that those "Wild Things" were based on his aunts and uncles that would visit his childhood home in Brooklyn on Saturdays. They must have seemed big and scary to him, and I bet they even said things to him like, "You look so good, I just want to eat you up!!" It's always fun to do a little detective work on the books we read to our children!
Before I go any further, let me tell you that the new movie of the same name is NOT a movie for very young children to see. My favorite on-line movie guide, commonsensemedia.org, suggests this movie for ages 9 and up.
But don't let that stop you from going to the library to check out this Caldecott award winning book. Reading it with your child can open up the doors of communication and help bring up many subjects such as...
What is imagination, and how can we use it creatively in our lives?
What is "mischief" and what consequences do we have at our home when bad choices are made? (on that note, look for a wonderful handout on positive discipline that we'll have for you at conferences!)
Why is it that Max made the decision to "make mischief of one kind or another" ? Was he in need of some kind of attention? Did he feel that making mischief might give him the attention he wanted? Is there a better way that he could have found that attention?? Hmmmm...lots to ponder here....
What is your child afraid of, and what "tools" can you give your child to help conquer those fears? In the book, Max tells the wild things to "Be still!" and he tames them to the point that they are afraid of him!! Cool!!
Are there times that your child feels lonely and misses you, and wants to be in the place where he or she is "loved the most of all"?
Does your child (or even you, for that matter?) ever need a time when they are allowed to "roar their terrible roars, gnash their terrible teeth, roll their terrible eyes, and show their terrible claws"? We are humans, and God has given us a huge range of feelings that NEED to be expressed! And reading this story with your child will give you a chance to really explore those feelings!!
Well...I think that's enough news from the Tuesday-Thursday classroom! I think I'll end this part of the post to leave some room for the MWF news! Have a great week!
All Blessings,
Miss Jean, Miss Lacy and Miss Pat
Dear MWF Families,
We had so much fun celebrating the week of Halloween. On Monday for Show and Share a student brought in a stuffed stegosaurus dinosaur. For Letter D week there was a lot of interest in our classroom on Dinosaurs, so we combined our Halloween theme with dinosaurs! On Monday, it was another wet playground day, but we enjoyed playing as a whole group our favorite Letter D Game “Duck, Duck, Goose” in the gym. On Wednesday we practiced walking on the balance beam, and played “Where’s your cookie little mouse?”
For our Halloween Celebration the children had such fun dressing up in costumes and going Trick-or Treating throughout the church building. And it was especially fun for them when Miss Jean aka Max read the book Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak! Thank you to all of our parent volunteers who have made our Halloween Day such a success! Thanks to each of you for your contributions. We will see you at our Parent Conferences next week!
Here are some other highlights of our week…
Painted spider webs on black construction paper
Played Dress-Up with a variety of clothing and accessories.
Made newspaper hats and decorated them.
Played with Dinosaurs at our Exploration Station.
Heard the story The Dinosaur by Anna Milbourne
Sang the Christian songs “Deep and Wide” and “Down In My Heart’
Watched the Puppet Story of “There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly”
Played with Number Dominoes
Counted 100 Spiders and Creepy-Crawly Creatures on our One Hundred
Poster
Paraded about in our Halloween Costumes.
With Gratitude,
Miss Lori, Miss Donna, Miss Pat and Miss Jean
